To genuinely cut CO₂, we need to scale back globalization. That way, we also regain our economic self-determination.
We’ve gotten used to a world where everything comes from somewhere else. T-shirts from Bangladesh, chips from Taiwan, likes from overseas. Sounds totally global – but mostly it’s just: completely out of control.
![[Unverifiziert]**Child labor and sweatshops – this, too, is part of the ugly realities of globalization.](https://economics.coach/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Baumwoll-Produktion-Indien-xyzfotos-Depo-1024x683.jpg)
Supply chains or odysseys?
Our products travel the world before they land on the shelf. Designed in Country A, manufactured in B, refined in C – and then shipped back to A. Sounds clever, but it costs nerves, climate and future. The irony: we celebrate cost efficiency while cargo airplanes and transport ships pump CO₂ into the air as if there were no tomorrow – even though that’s exactly the problem.
Regional is the new global
Why should a hoodie that has traveled 20,000 kilometers cost significantly less than one produced locally? A distance tariff – a climate levy on extreme transport routes – would finally make visible what is still missing on the price tag: the real ecological price. That’s not a relapse into old borders, but simply an upgrade of common sense.
Re-regionalization may sound clunky, but it’s probably the smartest idea of the present. Local energy, solidarity-based agriculture, European production networks – that’s Economy 5.0. It operates closer, fairer and more resiliently. And it saves more CO₂ than any app could ever track.
Self-determination instead of dependency
Energy, communication, chips – the nerve fibers of our world. Whoever controls them controls us – currently it’s mostly mega-corporations from the Far West and Far East.
A sustainable state ensures that everything strategic remains in public hands.
A sustainable state ensures that our basic supply and everything strategic remains in public and democratic hands. Not because it’s retro, but because freedom shouldn’t be something delivered from afar.
The new normal
De-globalization does not mean withdrawal. It means: we’ve understood.
Shorter distances. Clearer thinking. A healthier planet. That’s not a step back, but the restart of a world that finally regains its grounding – and in which we win back our political-economic sovereignty.
- Global supply chains may make products cheaper – but they pollute the climate all the more.
- A distance tariff makes climate costs visible – and fairness measurable.
- Regionalization restores national sovereignty, especially when it comes to strategic goods.
© The Economics Coach 2026 (cover photo: SittinanFamily / Deposit)
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