Are we running out of resources?

[awake]

Here is a great video explaining how our heroic markets work to keep us safe...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=AcWkN4ngR2Y#at=80

[axiomata]

Some good, everyday misconception economics right there. And the production was top notch (though they've got the watch the lights on the glasses). I hope to see more like it.

[Carson]

The thing that gets me is we should be getting paid for our share.

People in Alaska get a check every year for some of the public resources that are sold. The rest of us should be compensated for ours.

[MikeStanart]

The thing that gets me is we should be getting paid for our share.

People in Alaska get a check every year for some of the public resources that are sold. The rest of us should be compensated for ours.

I'd much rather states reject federal funding that have strings attatched, and use revenue from public resources for roads and other basic services.

[doodle]

Not sure about markets but we are not as resourceful as we used to be once mentally.

[axiomata]

Another video in the series.

http://www.google.com/m/url?client=safari&ei=WINsTfjsIueStge1neHiAg&hl=en&oe=UTF-8&q=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v%3DvDhcqua3_W8&ved=0CBYQtwIwAA&usg=AFQjCNEPuKhjygc4vlT8EmNCPgdnK9zHZg

[AZKing]

Another video in the series.

http://www.google.com/m/url?client=safari&ei=WINsTfjsIueStge1neHiAg&hl=en&oe=UTF-8&q=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v%3DvDhcqua3_W8&ved=0CBYQtwIwAA&usg=AFQjCNEPuKhjygc4vlT8EmNCPgdnK9zHZg

I like how that video doesn't even mention inflation (or "cost of living increases", as some economists might prefer to call it).

[Kregisen]

I like how that video doesn't even mention inflation (or "cost of living increases", as some economists might prefer to call it).

He said "real income" of the poor is higher than it used to be. Real income = income accounted for inflation.

[heavenlyboy34]

Nice find, OP. Thanks.

[hugolp]

I am still agnostic in the "end of the resources" thing. The malthusian "end of the resources" side attracts a lot of wackos and ideologues speaking a lot of bullshit and that puts me off, but there might be some legitimate concern hidden somewhere.

About the video, I have been told that most of the proven reserves are not accesible/profitable with the current technology. How is that a prove that there is enough petrol since the new petrol discovered is not accesible? It might be in the future... or not.

[Fox McCloud]

great videos, thanks for posting!

[Zippyjuan]

Proven reserves of oil depend on both the price and technology. If the price of oil goes up, the number of proven reserves can go up. But one thing to consider is that new sources are not being developed or discovered as fast as they are currently being used up. Is there more oil out there? Yes. It just gets progressively more expensive to get it out of the ground and into usable forms. The Alberta tar sands may be viable at $100 a barrel price of oil but not at $50 a barrel. Some estimates say that the US has some trillion barrels of oil in oil shales- but that is not very profitable to extract even at $100 a barrel.

Some resources are more difficult to substitute for- one of them being water. The only real substitute or technological solution to more water is desalinization. There are already conflicts over water usage- particularly in the Western US. Growing cities demand more water but natural rainfall is limited. Farmers are also demanding water to grow crops to feed those (and others on the planet) people. If you want to tap that oil shale, that will also be demanding more millions of gallons of water a year. Water is the most critical and precious of all our resources.

Without going into details on that, food is another resource with limited substitutability. You have a limited space (and again water availability) for agriculture. You can try to increase production yields through breeding and gene manipulation as technical solutions. (natural cross breeding is an organic way to GMO foods).