Peak oil - Fact or fiction?

[bigpaul]

Scythe="Optimistic pessamism" i like it-yes that about sums it up or "prepare for the worst-hope for the best", isnt that what we do as preppers?? we prepare for the worst case scenario but we hope it never comes to that??

[NorthernRaider]

Its not the amount of oil that is available, or where it is, its can we afford it and I think the answer will be NO for most people, go back 150 years when people lit their homes with whale oil, it got ever more expensive until only wealthier folk could afford it, Then Parafin,Then town gas, then natural gas as each and every energy supplies usage grows it always suddenly become to expensive for the ordinary people.

[Timelord]

I know it is getting more expensive & that SUCKs -- But consider this, As we live on a globalising planet and it is driven by greed & capatalistic forces (yes greed again), then the money only goes round if the barter system is operational! What I am trying to say is ... The elite who control the prices (on a day to day none crisis scenario) can not allow the oil price to escalate beyond what gives them a good return. Ie, no matter how much they wish to make, there is a finite balance point beyond which they then receive diminishing returns due to the exorbitant cost being out of reach for a substantial percentage of the population and hence the economic model starts to regress. So therefore - If we can't bleedin afford it, then they don't gets the money!!!
I have come to the conclusion over the last decade that we are now in a phase of market extortion, ie, maxing the take from our pockets. ok, that has always been the capatalist mantra, but in this last few decades the business methods & supporting technologies have got a lot smarter and now it is openly known that big corporations view those last few pennies in your pocket as rightfully theirs. They think they are entitled to it and us poor herd animals are only there to provide them with it. in fact we are to be milked to the max.
In the long run you can not suck the milk cow dry indefinitely. But they dont care about that. Short term gain - just like our MP's.
>>> Sorry, been going off point on a soapbox rant. >>> Basically I can not see the oil price going up to the point where the masses start getting priced off the road and industry starts folding, because then the oil elites would then be selling less of it. Ok in the short term, but self oil industry damaging in the longer term. There will always be a balance point - Until we reach the real end of oil times. Lets hope there is something else we have developed by then & not Nuclear for all our sakes.. They are just pushing the market as far as they can get away with it and it will most probably go higher yet before we start revaluating our western petrochemical lifestyles. At that point they will just lower it slightly to keep us on their teet. :-) TL.

[Scythe13]

(9 February 2012, 16:47)NorthernRaider Wrote: Its not the amount of oil that is available, or where it is, its can we afford it and I think the answer will be NO for most people

This is exactly what I have been thinking, but not managed to explain quite as accurately as I'd wished to.

I understand where you're coming from TL, but I have to disagree. The majority of the cost of fuel for us is tax. It's at a rediculous percentage now. The capitalist system allows the prices of items to come down through increases in technology, production, transportation, and transaction. That is the beauty of capitalism, it allows everyone the opportunity.

The problem is the tax on fuel and the government's lack of understanding of true Smithian capitalism. It will be the government's tax that pushed the cost of fuel outside of everyday peoples boundries. Granted the cost of fuel has increased for the industrial production machine, but much of that is just inflation and cost to extract/process. The major increase is the tax % the government adds on. Remember a couple of months ago when there was going to be that tax that would add 10p per litre? The government doesn't know anything about business. If the did, they would be earning mega bucks with their own business.

Big business won't price the everyday man out of the market. The government's tax will.

[Skean Dhude]

Don't forget when you think how did that get screwed up start from its the governments fault. they have a finger in the pie somewhere and incentives matter. It is human nature.

I am a very positive person and I'm looking to the future if politicians didn't screw it up first