This juvenile argument is always brought up when it comes to the subject of Reparations owed by The British, but unfortunately for its proponents, holds no water. This is simply an attempt to avoid taking responsibility for gutting the Colonized Countries in all dimensions viz. Economically, Socially and Culturally.
Here is Jason Hickel (one of the authors of the posted article) on The Case for Reparations - https://www.jasonhickel.org/blog/2018/10/13/the-case-for-rep...
In particular; read his rebuttal to the five commonly used arguments (including yours) in the latter half of the above article.
Some more articles for your edification;
1) https://qz.com/1911783/what-the-uk-owes-in-reparations
2) https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/what-to-know-about-calls-...
3) https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/27/world/americas/colonial-r...
Some excerpts from all of the above links:
1) W. Arthur Lewis, a Nobel Prize-winning economist from St. Lucia, had argued since the 1930s that colonialism had gutted the economies of colonized societies for generations to come, making the debt one of not just repayment but also of reconstitution.
2) India wasn’t “developed” under British rule – it was de-developed. And not just in terms of social welfare. British policy was designed to destroy India’s domestic industries by imposing asymmetrical tariffs, by dismantling the institutions that trained up producers, and in some cases even by maiming skilled artisans – all to create captive markets for British goods. During the course of British rule, India’s share of the global economy shrank from 27% to 3%.
3) Frantz Fanon had it right when he wrote, in Wretched of the Earth, that “Colonialism and imperialism have not settled their debt to us once they have withdrawn from our territories. The wealth of the imperialist nations is also our wealth. Europe is literally the creation of the Third World.”
4) “The sequel to that history of repression and disavowal has been poverty and uneven progress. So calls for reparations consider this wide story and its micro-level consequences in their activism,” Smith said.
5) “There’s no real ownership of responsibility. So there is recognition that what happened in the past was bad, but we’re not responsible now,” said Moffet. “It’s a way of sort of separating the monarchy or British government from the past.”
6) And then it strikes you…. Then it strikes you that there is not enough money in all of Britain to compensate for these injustices. And you realize, that if Britain paid reparations – real, honest, courageous reparations – there would be nothing left. Britain would not exist.
And that is exactly what people find so terrifying about the question of reparations. It’s not that they fear the actual prospect of paying. It is that even just thinking about what is owed reveals the hard truth: that what is owed, is everything.