Tag Archive | "Dow Jones Industrial Average"
Couchsurfing with my soapbox
My recent foray to Wisconsin and Michigan had me staying five different homes, hence sleeping in five different beds and eating at many different tables. It was quite an exciting adventure, spent with wide-awake people, and I hope to repeat the experience as many times as the industrial economy allows. I’ve embedded one of the [...]
Continue reading...The race is on
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Everywhere I turn, I read and hear about $200 oil in the near future (here’s one recent example, from somebody who should know better, here’s another from hyperinflation guru Gonzalo Lira, and here’s another from historian Niall Ferguson. Investors are being sucked in, too, and at least one pundit fool has jumped the shark, calling [...]
Continue reading...A presentation with audio and another about bioenergy
Friday, October 1, 2010
Two presentations follow. The first focuses on the twin sides of the fossil fuel coin and what we can do about it, as presented in Louisville, Kentucky earlier this week. It’s similar to many presentations I’ve given recently and it includes an audio file, so you can follow along with the slides. The second was [...]
Continue reading...Balloon seeks pin
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
I speak openly about myriad ongoing collapses, regardless how others respond. Among the costs: Rumors of my insanity have spread beyond the institution I departed and throughout the nation’s hallowed halls. Apparently I’ve contracted a rare disease, which explains the insanity. I can only hope (i.e., wish) it’s not fatal. Further evidence I’ve lost my [...]
Continue reading...Economic and environmental consequences of expensive oil
Friday, July 16, 2010
What are the causes and consequences of expensive oil? The first question is posed in this article, and answered surprisingly well by a neoclassical economist. He understands the relationship between the price of oil and economic growth, and he hints at constrained supply while also expressing irrational exuberance about continued economic growth. As an economist, [...]
Continue reading...Teetering
Thursday, June 10, 2010
The industrial economy, that is. On the brink, yet again. The real economy — not the born-again exuberance in the world’s stock markets — is stalling as the effects of easy money wear off. Indeed, investor fund flows haven’t been this bad since Lehmann Brothers collapsed in the autumn of 2008. The IMF says risks [...]
Continue reading...We didn’t start the fire
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Actually, to counter singer/songwriter Billy Joel, we did start this FIRE. Not you and me, of course, but our culture. The U.S. industrial economy is all about Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate. The FIRE is about to run its course, extinguished by the absence of fuel in each of those interconnected sectors. The financial sector [...]
Continue reading...Rollercoaster redux
Thursday, May 6, 2010
To his imperial credit, Barack Obama did manage to calm the stock markets for a year. But his promises of oversight and transparency are being overwhelmed by his actions. It’s obvious the banksters will not be regulated on Obama’s watch in any significant manner because the entire American economic system is based on fraud, and [...]
Continue reading...What works, maybe: individual options
Monday, April 26, 2010
Like global climate change, peak oil represents a predicament, not a problem. There is no politically viable solution to either of these great challenges. Political solutions require economic growth, forever, and therefore no significant sacrifice on the behalf of the electorate. Further, the industrial economy is underlain by the assumption of growth: The industrial economy [...]
Continue reading...Surveying the field and charting a course
Friday, April 16, 2010
It’s all the rage to talk about a double-dip in the industrial economy. That would be an economic trend in the shape of a W. I think an M is far more likely. The assumption of never-ending growth underlies all neoclassical economic assessments, but I think that assumption is about to break up on the [...]
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Thursday, September 29, 2011
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