Saturation (growth)
In economics, saturation refers to the fact that in a steady state, resources are exhausted. The characteristic of a occurring saturation is the approach of the growth rate from a positive value to zero. Depending on the model approach, this applies to both demand and production capacities, for example.
When the demand is exhausted, the supply of goods is so high that the demand is only determined by the need for replacement. When resources are exhausted, there is no more capacity to increase output.
The basic functionality is described in the last abstraction by the logistic function . The superimposition of several such functions leads, for example, to the hype cycle in which euphoria is exhausted and demand slackens.
Overall economic saturation
Ultimately, there could theoretically also be overall economic saturation, which manifests itself in the fact that consumers do not spend their income, because no attractive goods and services are offered, but save. In fact, in real systems, the superposition of saturation processes only leads to shifts in the use of resources.
There is no empirical evidence of overall economic saturation. In any case, the savings rate does not increase in any country in the long term , which would be an indication of this phenomenon. So there can be no saturation as long as the number of customers grows or only as long as the customers change.