[JoeCoal]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'I') agree that we could turn the corner into a solar economy with some leadership.

[grabby]

What a GREAT SPEECH! What TRUTH!
No wonder they hated him and called him the WORST PRESIDENT EVER!

So they elected Reagen instead.
Looks like he hit us over the head with a 2x4 and was right on.

Can't do that in politics, as he found out.

Too bad sooo sad.

Yes we easily could have been on solar power by now.

The last thing a teacher can EVER do for a spoiled brat, is tell the parents that they are the parents of a spoiled brat...

Every year from now on is going to be most interesting.

[grabby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ElijahJones', ' ')
The imported stoneware that the crumbs are sitting upon? Nope

[grabby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SoothSayer', 'H')mm - most of these posts are erudite & many are believable.

However as soon as I start feeling that we can create a workable Plan to maintain/grow the economy in the face of Peak Oil, an image of the teeming million or so people in my local city of Birmingham (England) pops into my mind & I shudder.

So many of the local population are ill educated and/or of extremist religious faith that I really cannot imagine that they would listen to any Government telling them to cut back on fuel or energy, or change their way of life in any way.

I suspect that major energy cost increases, or fuel shortages, would cause trouble on the streets.

The UK government must be aware of this, but I have no idea of what their approach might be to such disturbances.

[DoctorDoom]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('cube', '
')My definition of economic growth can not be measured very easily with numbers and I'm quite certain there is a technical term for it but I just don't know it.

For example lets assume a steel mill gets built. Most people would say that's good. Jobs will be created, the government can collect taxes, and money will get pushed around which is good for the GDP.

However I would counter by asking what will the steel be used for? Does it serve a "meaningfull" purpose? If the answer is the steel will be used to build railroad tracks which lead to nowhere because it's some politician's special pet project then obviously no that is not good....no matter how much that may add to the GDP. However if the steel is going to be used for a much needed railroad that will relieve traffic congestion and thus increase efficiency then that's good.

So what's the technical term for this? if anyone knows tell me!

[DoctorDoom]

What's the difference between going on the gold standard and just going back to barter? Gold is just a commodity like any other. By making it a standard all you do is eliminate the complication of trying to calculate how many laptop computers your cow is worth. With everything measured in gold mass equivalents, converting anything to anything is easy. Gold-backed currency doesn't change this, it just eliminates the need to lug heavy masses of gold back and forth to effect exchanges. A gold standard wouldn't limit the supply of money. As soon as you can figure out how many gold masses something else is worth, it, too, could serve as a measure and/or medium of exchange. For example if you think a mass of platinum is worth 2x the same mass of gold, ouila, you can use platinum for money just as easily. Or cocca beans. But wait, you're thinking, cocca beans might fluctuate in value. Sure. So can gold. It gets worse. You have captial assets. Some are durable. Some are eternal. These may become abundant or scarce over time, thus their value as measured in gold masses can also fluctuate.

Re. debt, banning "lending at usury" won't eliminate debt. The moment you loan a shovel to a friend so he can dig a well, you have a debtor relationship. If the friend promises to give you the shovel back (a little worse for wear) and let you use the well (a mile closer than the one in the nearest village), that's "interest". Or suppose you dig the well with the shovel to save yourself the walk to the village. You have just made an "investment", expending resources now to reap greater rewards in the future. We've been doing that for 1000s of years simply by teaching our children.

Ultimately economic activities, as judged by a neutral observer looking only at actual physical activities and not at the bookkeeping, sees only a process of investment and return. The problem with growth is not in the "bookkeeping" wherein you make an arrangement with your friend for mutual benefit, or wherein you did something for yourself. This sort of activity will continue. The real problem is that you may run out of economically valuable activities to engage in. At this point, you have nothing further to "invest" in. You would then be at the point where real interest rates on risk-free debt would approach zero.

At this point, the only investment you can make is to save resources for your old age. Keeping with low-tech examples, you know that you won't be able to work the fields when you're 60, so you'd like to save up enough food to live on for 20 years during your 40 most productive years, then start consuming it afterwards. Since storing food for that long is not realistic, you make a deal with the next generation to provide you the food you need out of their expected surplus, in exchange for some of your surplus now. Is that debt? Is that bad?

[ohanian]

Why almost all countries will

LIE
CHEAT
BULLY
MURDER
STEAL

at/to/from other countries.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he price of crude oil rose steadily over the last few years for several reasons, the most important of which is the global demand for oil, according to Doug MacIntyre, senior oil market analyst at the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

"It's almost impossible for a country these days to grow substantially economically without dramatically increasing their oil demand," he said.

[NEOPO]

Yep - yet when one tries to say that now with peakoil the economy can no longer grow and will ultimately shrink = depression - its preposterous.

[gego]

Given the fact that oil is the energy that is either a direct part of many of the things we produce, or indirectly facilitates their production and delivery, it only stands to reason that we will have less with the plateau and subsequent shrinkage of oil production. The economic pie will shrink in repsonse to less oil, just as it expanded before in response to more oil.

Depression is a time when, on average, we have less to consume. Prosperity is a time when, on average, we have more to consume. We are in for the mother of all depressions that will coorelate in depth and time with the oil depletion curve. When before has a depression lasted 30 years and wiped out 75% (or more) of what we have available to consume?

The proportions are just enormous.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gego', 'W')hen before has a depression lasted 30 years and wiped out 75% (or more) of what we have available to consume?

[Permanently_Baffled]

Interesting to note that Indias oil demand dropped 3.5% last year despite massive economic growth.

I agree though - over time - growth isnt possible without more and more energy (not necessarily oil)

[dukey]

yup true
although you often read that it's demand from india and china .. helping to cause the increased crude prices

[gego]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Doly', '
')Where do you get that 75% figure from?

[MrBill]

I do not disagree with your -75% number, as I certainly do not know and therefore do not have a better number to put forth as an alternative.

However, it will be physical availability of all forms of energy - crude oil, natural gas, coal, bio-diesel, ethanol, nuclear, hydrogen, hydro-electric, methane, geo-thermal, wind, solar, etc. - that will drive any growth, if any, in a world of declining access to traditional fossil fuels. And not price.

Price is always a relative term. Relative to what? Wages? A basket of goods? Given amount of energy? Etc.

The search for alternatives and the transition from the economy we have based on cheap energy to one of scarcity will itself generate a lot of economic activity, just as building transcontinental railroads, Hoover Dam/Three Gorges Dam, or in fact reclaiming parts of The Netherlands from the sea, or terracing mountain sides to grow crops produced economic activity and eventually a valuable asset. Where did the 'money' come from to build or create these assets? An agricultural surplus, land, labor and capital. The usual suspects.

Growth does not have to be one way either. It can go into reverse. We have ample historical evidence of declining empires and abandoned areas.

The physical availability of energy not its price is what is important to this activity. Cheap energy means you can build something quicker and with less labor perhaps, but aside from the human definition of investment time horizon and payback the transition to a post-peak oil world using other forms of energy is not only possible, but inevitable. All we know is that at the moment there is no replacement for fossil fuels that are as efficient for transport as gasoline, so the infrastructure and organization of society, and different societies, will look much different than the modern western economy based on easy motoring and a far flung expensive to maintain infrastructure.

Meauring such activities in today's money only distorts the picture. For example, if we generate methane from manure and convert it into electricity, we say it is inefficient because it costs 6 cents per kilowatt (or whatever) and traditional hydro-electric power still only costs 3 cents per kilowatt. So what? When one no longer has 3 cent power, one gladly pays 6 cents, if the alternative is no power. That doubling in cost may still be a small proportion of your wages, or a basket of goods, or whatever it is that you produce for your daily bread as compared to doing everything with manual labor and without electricity.

And if there is less energy available in total, then through the process of elimination you allocate energy based on its highest utility. Gone is just in time delivery, so you have to carry larger inventories. Gone is door to door delivery, so you have central warehousing. Gone is long distance trucking, so you wait while your container is delivered by rail. Economic efficiencies get lost. Standards of living may decline. Jobs will be lost. Some will not be able to live in their current, very large and energy intensive houses. But as sure as we are here today, life will go on post-peak oil as there is no alternative. Economic necessity will replace economic nicety. Sorry, no more seadoos and snowmobiles!

Will the western world look like America in the 1930's? I doubt it. We have long given up that infrastructure already. We do not even have enough breeding stock to quickly rebuild the draught power we once relied on, nevermind the bits of hardware to make use of it anymore. More likely a tractor running on bio-diesel or ethanol. It will not be as efficient, but more efficient than rearing animals to pull plows and thrash grain.

Thankfully, along with all our excesses and poor investment decisions, we have used the past 150-200 years as well to discover many useful inventions, so we are already ahead in terms of technology in comparison to 1800 or 1900.

Of course, wars are very expensive and can damage economies as well as disrupt economic output. That can exacerbate the problems associated with the post-peak oil transition to a lower energy intensive future. Even if someone has a partial solution to our energy problems, it won't help if there is no security of assets and means of production as may be the case if we (collectively) sink to the level of Zimbabwe or Rawanda or Congo in the meantime.

A dirty suitcase bomb can disrupt even the best laid plans and is one of the variables which makes prophecizing the future very inexact. We just have to assign likely probabilities to each outcome based on what we know now and admit to ourselves that we do not know what will be invented or perfected in five or ten years from now that will help ensure a better outcome or what resource wars, social disruptions or population displacements may occur over the same time horizon that will destroy any progress we may have made?

But again just to stress, it is availability of energy not price or its cost in today's money that will determine economic growth or the lack of it in the future post-peak oil.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '
')But again just to stress, it is availability of energy not price or its cost in today's money that will determine economic growth or the lack of it in the future post-peak oil.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Doly', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '
')But again just to stress, it is availability of energy not price or its cost in today's money that will determine economic growth or the lack of it in the future post-peak oil.

[rogerhb]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', 'G')rowth does not have to be one way either. It can go into reverse. We have ample historical evidence of declining empires and abandoned areas.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', ' ')But again just to stress, it is availability of energy not price or its cost in today's money that will determine economic growth or the lack of it in the future post-peak oil.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', 'I')n this respect we would see a return to something similar to the beginnings of the era of steam and industrialization that started to compete with the age of sail and trade on major routes through central markets. Economic activity will radiate out from these centers until the cost of transport outweighs the benefits of trade, and then you will have smaller, self-contained communities with local and regional economies. Not likely either or.