Entries Tagged as 'oil'

Social Oilocracy

A boom in oil has [generally] led to a decline, if not a complete devastation, of conventional businesses … in Britain in the 1980s, after North Sea oil was discovered, the British industrial economy was virtually obliterated, leaving four million people jobless. Among oil economies, Norway … is almost alone in having avoided this fate. As oil has boomed, so has everything else, and it has boomed in areas that will continue to generate economic growth when the oil revenues are gone … while other countries have become apathetic and uncompetitive during petroleum booms, Norway appears near the top of every international index of competitiveness and entrepreneurship. … Only about 10 per cent of Norway’s $70-billion government budget comes from oil money. In order to finance their generous state services and social benefits, Norwegians’ income taxes are among the highest in the world, and their gas stations charge $2.30 for a litre of unleaded – the highest price in the world, in a country that is the world’s third-largest exporter of the stuff. But it’s hard to find Norwegians who consider this a burden. They have among the highest disposable incomes in the world (and the fairest distribution of income: Even the poor are comparatively rich). In every quality-of-life index, Norway ranks at or near the very top … the unemployment rate is currently 2 per cent.

Tags: economics, Norway, oil, social democracy by mike
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No Oil For War!

For all the talk of America’s growing reliance on computers, advanced sensors, and stealth technology to prevail in warfare, it has been oil above all that gave the US military its capacity to “project power” onto distant battlefields like Iraq and Afghanistan. Every Humvee, tank, helicopter, and jet fighter requires its daily ration of petroleum, without which America’s technology-driven military would be forced to abandon the battlefield. No surprise, then, that the US Department of Defense is the world’s single-biggest consumer of petroleum … The average GI in Iraq now uses about seven times as much oil per day as GIs did in the first Gulf War less than two decades ago. And every sign indicates that the same ratio of increase will apply to coming conflicts; that the daily cost of fighting will skyrocket; and that the Pentagon’s capacity to shoulder multiple foreign military burdens will unravel. Thus are superpowers undone.

Tags: Afghanistan, geopolitics, Gulf War, Iraq, oil, Pentagon, United States, US by mike
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