Our Oil Reserves Are Depleted; It’s Time for Utopia

“You’ll see,” he said blithely, “the dollar and the euro will be at par.”

Although the conversation took place in Italy, it could have as easily occurred in a Wall Street boardroom. Despite the ongoing economic meltdown, the dominant, “business as usual” wisdom is that the ascendancy of the American model of global capitalism can only continue. It’s just a matter of time before the good ship USS Free Enterprise rights itself and we have smooth sailing ahead.

But exactly what resources will the U.S. call upon to fuel the economic recovery that our American businessman and millions of others like him continue to believe in? Our longtime economic paradigm – growth fueled by cheap oil – has no future. Even when it did, it was a flawed concept because the constant growth required under the “grow or die” capitalist paradigm demands that we relentlessly exploit natural resources – how else to increase profit margins and pay investors their ever-greater dividends?

This paradigm has brought us to the brink of ecological disaster, with a planet so over-heated that even the most optimistic climate experts are doubtful whether we will be able to prevent cataclysmic disruptions unless worldwide carbon emissions are drastically reduced in the coming years – an unlikely scenario given the unwillingness of most governments to enact tough standards and regulations.

… With oil virtually at an end, what better time to re-examine the economic paradigm that allowed us to think we could use up finite resources and just “grow” forever? Isn’t it time to rethink our blind embrace of the “grow or die” philosophy that led us down this self-destructive path?

Huffington Post