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Trade Deficit in U.S. Plunges on Record Petroleum Exports

I don't recall using the term or advocating protectionism, but I do believe we, as a nation, should exert some control over the disposition of our energy resources, since it is a major component of our trade imbalance, and those trade imbalances send our currency (a measure of our wealth) to other nations and not re-invested here to reduce that dependance...

Don't ignore "Internal Protectionism" that guarantees the continuation of the status quo of Energy Distribution within our borders. It's my pet peeve. The status quo captures all the renewable monies in projects that plug in to the existing grids instead of local projects to benefit local economies, local jobs, and local residents while shipping less monies out of those local economies. This is the "de facto" partnership between Centralized Distribution Network Utilities that collect taxes for their partner, gov'ts. With local projects these two behemoths are cut out of the profit loop. The local citizens are the benefactors. Isn't gov't supposed to address the issues of the citizenry, not the Corporations. Oh wait, Citizens United say these Corporations are Citizens.
 
If the government wants to assert control over the distribution of natural resources, then let them modify the existing permit process to extend that control. If however, they recognize the vast wealth we have in our natural resources, then let it be, and drive a net-exporter economy freely.
 
Decreasing US dependence of fossil fuels has the same result.

And having the appropriate technology, delivery and consumption systems, and more attractive costs are all pre-conditions on decreasing that dependency.

Unfortunately, we are decades from that. Use what you have now while building that in the future(~20 years), and you will be set.

Additionally, before I forget it, having a decreased dependence on fossil fuels while exporting what we no longer need(i.e. fossil fuels) will be a recipe for a booming economy.
 
And having the appropriate technology, delivery and consumption systems, and more attractive costs are all pre-conditions on decreasing that dependency.

Unfortunately, we are decades from that. Use what you have now while building that in the future(~20 years), and you will be set.

Additionally, before I forget it, having a decreased dependence on fossil fuels while exporting what we no longer need(i.e. fossil fuels) will be a recipe for a booming economy.

Which I agree with. Of course the problem is nobody starts a business to research for 20 years in order to have a largescale markatable product. Hence the need for green energy research.
 
Which I agree with. Of course the problem is nobody starts a business to research for 20 years in order to have a largescale markatable product. Hence the need for green energy research.

Research should always be given whatever assistance it needs to get moving. Just like with Pharmaceuticals, their long-term investments will pay out via gracious patent enforcement.
 
"Energy independence" is a concept that doesn't really exist, energy is a globally traded item and even if the United States produced 100% of its needs we are still affected by global changes in supply and demand which affects the price of said energy regardless of whether we export or import any. Even if we were Saudi Arabia the price of gas wouldn't change that much.

Well it depends what you mean. Look at the spread of WTI to Brent. Natural gas in the U.S. is about 25% of the cost it is in Asia. The equation for lower prices is not only the amount of oil and natural gas produced but also refinery capacity throughout the U.S. and pipelines to distribute oil products and natural gas throughout the U.S.

If Obama had chosen natural gas to underwrite instead of solar we would be using much more natural gas for ground transportation, which would costs materially less than gasoline, is much for environment friendly and would have an impact of the price of gasoline through supply demand.
 
Yep, thanks to
large investments in fracking and vertical drilling research by the Department of Energy, we are on our way to energy security.

And thus another conservative meme is shot down.

I'm begining to think your a bot, a simple program injected into random threads by a random number generator.

Or a Conservative trying to make Libs look ridiculous by posting inane repetitive nonsense.

If its the latter, you really dont have to create their cartoon characterization via internet trolling.

They do that on their own all to well.
 
Makes me wonder why with all the calls for "energy independence" we are exporting oil instead of consuming it and importing less........

I would like a law that says we have to use our natural resources for us first and only the surplus gets exported.
 
I would like a law that says we have to use our natural resources for us first and only the surplus gets exported.

I will co-sponsor such legislation.......
 
I will co-sponsor such legislation.......

Dems tried it with the Keystone pipeline legislation. Got buried of course.

Democrats are offering message amendments requiring oil pumped through the pipeline to stay in the U.S. and steel and other materials to be U.S.-based as well.

link...
 
Dems tried it with the Keystone pipeline legislation. Got buried of course.

Democrats are offering message amendments requiring oil pumped through the pipeline to stay in the U.S. and steel and other materials to be U.S.-based as well.

link...

Probably because Japan needs our natural resources for their manufacturing.
 
I don't recall using the term or advocating protectionism, but I do believe we, as a nation, should exert some control over the disposition of our energy resources, since it is a major component of our trade imbalance, and those trade imbalances send our currency (a measure of our wealth) to other nations and not re-invested here to reduce that dependance...

Well, I'm the one that used the term protectionism, saying it was bad. Which you contested in the case of natural resources with trade deficits.

What measures do you have in mind, specifically, when you say "exert some control"? Private firms do have control over whom they purchase their oil from (and whom they sell it to). Also, keep in mind, when we import oil we're not just shipping boatloads of cash overseas with nothing to show for it. It's a mutual business transaction - our economy benefits from our end of the bargain as well. Some of the oil is used by a engineer filling his car up so he can drive to work, some of it is used to create plastics for the medical industry, etc.

As someone pointed out earlier, "energy independence" doesn't mean what a lot of people think it means. It's a global energy market, so as long as we allow firms to buy and sell globally, the US will never be sheltered from spikes in global prices in the event of an energy crisis.
 
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Screw Japan. We have a nation to support here, first and foremost...

I would say that letting our oil companies sell to the highest bidder of their choosing, which may happen to be Japan, IS supporting our nation.
 
Makes me wonder why with all the calls for "energy independence" we are exporting oil instead of consuming it and importing less........

We're exporting oil and importing cash, so it's a net positive.
 
Well, I'm the one that used the term protectionism, saying it was bad. Which you contested in the case of natural resources with trade deficits.

What measures do you have in mind, specifically, when you say "exert some control"? Private firms do have control over who they purchase their oil from (and who they sell it to). Also, keep in mind, when we import oil we're not just shipping boatloads of cash overseas with nothing to show for it. It's a mutual business transaction - our economy benefits from our end of the bargain as well. Some of the oil is used by a engineer filling his car up so he can drive to work, some of it is used to create plastics for the medical industry, etc.

As someone pointed out earlier, "energy independence" doesn't mean what a lot of people think it means. It's a global energy market, so as long as we allow firms to buy and sell globally, the US will never be sheltered from spikes in global prices in the event of an energy crisis.

Protectionism isn't necessarily a bad thing.
 
Trade Deficit in U.S. Plunges on Record Petroleum Exports - Bloomberg



Goes to show you, drilling for oil in the US does have a very positive impact, even if it doesn't directly affect the price at the pump.

Creating value, in this case pumping oil in to the world market, is going to have a positive impact.

I work in the oil and gas world, however, and I can tell you that we've slowed down drilling considerably - that will be reflected in next year's numbers. The reason is all this drilling has driven prices down to where it's not profitable to drill as much anymore.
 
In general, protectionism is bad. Care to expound?

Sure. I feel bad for new college grads. So many middle class jobs have been shipped overseas, for example to China.

In America today, you either have a crap job or a great job. The middle class jobs and the decent entry-level jobs are gone.

That's a direct result of policy.
 
Sure. I feel bad for new college grads. So many middle class jobs have been shipped overseas, for example to China.

In America today, you either have a crap job or a great job. The middle class jobs and the decent entry-level jobs are gone.

That's a direct result of policy.

No. That has to more to do with the massive financial crisis and ensuing recession during which we lost effectively 12 million jobs. A lack of protectionism was not a factor in that.

And the bit about zero middle class jobs and entry level jobs is pure hyperbole. I happen to have a decent entry level job and I graduated May '09 - at the worst of the Great Recession.
 
No. That has to more to do with the massive financial crisis and ensuing recession during which we lost effectively 12 million jobs. A lack of protectionism was not a factor in that.

And the bit about zero middle class jobs and entry level jobs is pure hyperbole. I happen to have a decent entry level job and I graduated May '09 - at the worst of the Great Recession.

Let's take the company I work for as an example. Our revenues dipped during the recession, so we fired 30% of our workforce. Today, our revenues are at pre-recession levels. However, we have not hired back the 30%, instead we have learned to operate at a lower headcount.

That experience pretty much sums up why some economic indicators are positive, yet unemployment remains high.

Here's another one. We recently slashed our entire American-based accounting operation and moved it to India, all so that we could make room in the budget to implement new German accounting software.

Here's another. We currently have a hiring freeze in place in the United States. Obamacare raised the expense per employee by about 6%, so we need to offset the difference by cutting growth in the workforce by 6%.
 
Let's take the company I work for as an example. Our revenues dipped during the recession, so we fired 30% of our workforce. Today, our revenues are at pre-recession levels. However, we have not hired back the 30%, instead we have learned to operate at a lower headcount.

That experience pretty much sums up why some economic indicators are positive, yet unemployment remains high.

Here's another one. We recently slashed our entire American-based accounting operation and moved it to India, all so that we could make room in the budget to implement new German accounting software.

Here's another. We currently have a hiring freeze in place in the United States. Obamacare raised the expense per employee by about 6%, so we need to offset the difference by cutting growth in the workforce by 6%.

Again, most of that is the result of the recession - it doesn't have anything to do with protectionist policies or a lackthereof.

Your anecdotes are typical arguments in favor of protectionism. However, they fail because they don't view the larger picture. When I say protectionism is bad, i don't mean it literally hurts everyone. Protectionism is bad because it hurts the economy overall. In fact, protectionism DOES protect very isolated pockets of people- but only at the expense of the greater overall economy.

Such arguments are virtually identical to those against automation. Let's use the handweaver example I brought up earlier, whose jobs were eliminated by the invention of the power loom. Legislation that would have protected handweaver's jobs from being "outsourced" to a cheaper labor supply (power looms), would in fact have been beneficial to anybody that was a handweaver. But it would have hurt the overall economy and everyone across the nation who would have benefited from being able to purchase lower priced woven cloth. Ultimately, the handweavers find other jobs and the economy ends up the stronger. Protectionist policies behave the same way - protecting a small minority at the expense of a net loss.

Virtually all contemporary economists across the board, from Friedman to Krugman are opposed to protectionism as a rule on the grounds that it's damaging to the economy.
 
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