Compromise: Oil for Welfare

It's no secret that Democrats want a comprehensive system of social welfare and Republicans want to tear the country apart drilling for oil. Unfortunately, social welfare is expensive for 315 million citizens, and we have to pay for it somehow. Shoring up our massive (and wasteful) military budget is not as of yet an option, since neither party is willing to touch their sacred cows with the budget cutting axe.

Here's an option: we drill for oil. Lots of it. Drill baby drill. Here's why this works for everyone:

1) Republicans can bathe in their precious black gold.
2) Democrats can keep social welfare, because the new oil production (which will top Saudi Arabia's for #1) will basically pay for it with much more to spare.
3) Even the environmentalists can win, because we can research new ways of drilling for oil that don't have nearly as great an impact on the environment.

It's a win for everyone.

 

Even if there was no environmental impact, Democrats would be against drilling for oil.

Oil is the engine that keeps an industrial society moving forward.

Democrats are Luddites who want to send us back to the caveman days.

 

The cost of extracting oil from shale or tar sands is huge and the processes use alot of water.

 

And?


.

 

Water is precious and limited in areas that have this type of oil. I wouldn't count on 10 million bpd being produced in the US.

 

Right, which is why California is the third largest state in oil production.

 

Several reports have come out now saying that we will top Saudi Arabia in oil production in five years. Doesn't sound like much of a problem.

 

California is now rated 4th because of a 23% decline in production.

 

Margot has a love affair with the Wahibbi regime of Saudi Arabia so this is bad news for her.

 

Do you know when the last oil refinery was built in the United States? I would be interested to see if you know.

 

Its neither good nor bad... just highly unlikely because of high left and extraction costs in the US.

 

Motiva was just expanded and its the largest in the US.. Owned by the Saudis and Dutch Shell.

 

http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2004/06/the_great_refinery_shortage.html

Last new refinery was completed in 1976.

 

It's still in the top five, which was my point. He was wrong.

 

Yes.. and we are exporting refined petroleum for the first time in 40 years.

 

Which is irrelevant. If existing refineries can expand - and they have - production still rises.

 

And actually - update your source. Your article is from 2004. This one is from this year and has twelve refineries built since 1976, the most recent being 2008.

http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=29&t=6

 

Why is the United States exporting petroleum when it costs so much here? That doesn't make sense.

 

Additional oil production in the US won't lower the price at the pump because the US has the highest production costs in the world.

If the PPB goes down to $75 .. they are out of business.

 

Margot most of your info regarding shale oil is seriously out of date.

Trat: Read your source we have only 4 complex refineries. Those four produce early 80 Precent of our petroleum products. That newest refinery produces 3600 bbls a day. That might not be enough to Keep Dallas Texas in Gasoline for a day. But since it is a simple refinery rather than a complex one it may not even produce gasoline.

 

Well, I knnow that there are 3 or 4 methods of extraction.. and I know there is fracking and electrofracking.. and I know they can't clean up fracking water up sufficiently to use it for drinking or agriculture.

So they are now trying to recycle fracking water.

Motiva refines 600,000 bpd.

 

Wish there was some cost effective method of converting illegal aliens in
a biofuel.

 

Entirely irrelevant. The claim made was that *no* refineries have been built since 1976. That's factually incorrect.

 

It doesn't have to be oil. There's far more energy coming from the sun and it doesn't pollute or require us to drill.

Or maybe they want to progress to the future where we make better use of available energy resources. You know, technology tends to advance. One day, our descendants will consider fossil fuels to be primitive.

 

Actually I think Thinker offers a very workable compromise. There may be a few tweaks but the general outline is quite reasonable.

The social welfare net worked OK in the 60s because America was prosperous. The cost was easily carried by the general economy. Today you have a bigger population and a bigger percentage supported by the welfare system so of course you need a lot more money to run your “safety net.” (In this thread I’ll not explore “hand-up vs hand-out.&#8221

America’s economy at the end of the Civil War was barely above Third World standards, but by 1900 the economy was one of the biggest in the world. That prosperity and growth was a direct result of cheap, plentiful energy. In the nineteenth century that meant coal and oil. That strategy worked just fine until the late 60s and early 70s when government regulations (on all energy production and use) and foreign manipulations (of oil prices and supply) undermined the cheap and plentiful energy condition America’s prosperity was built on.

The decline in American prosperity now calls the FDR/LBJ “net” into question. According to http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/fed_spending_2010USbn
In 1970 (at the dawn of restrictions on energy) federal outlay for pensions, health care, and welfare amounted to 4.78% of GDP.

In 2012 (at current state of restrictions on energy) federal outlay for pensions, health care, and welfare amounted to 13.29% of GDP.

As a point of reference in 1970 (height of Vietnam War) defense outlay was 9.12% of GDP. In 2012 (as Afghanistan winds down) defense outlay was 5.78% of GDP. In short defense outlay fell by about a third (in terms of % of GDP) during that period.

We can see that pensions, health care, and welfare now eat up about three times the share of GDP as it did before the restrictions on energy began to bite into the economy.

When ObamaTax kicks in we can expect the percentage of GDP going into entitlements to dramatically increase.

The overall picture is clear. Federal entitlement outlays are consuming more and more of the GDP. This is “crowding out” other things and driving massive deficits.

Getting government out of the way of energy development (drilling, pipelines, refineries, powerplants and electrical transmission lines) would stimulate the economy as no amount of government attempts at Keynesian “pump priming” will ever do.

Henry Clay - the antebellum artist of compromise - once noted that the best compromise leaves both sides somewhat satisfied and somewhat dissatisfied. Thinker moves into good company as his compromise leaves both sides a bit satisfied and a bit dissatisfied. Proponents of the welfare state are mollified that their pet programs are safe, but environmental extremists are upset because their pet programs are attenuated. Likewise, spending hawks are outraged that there is no real reduction in a major component of federal spending growth, but workers and consumers will be mollified by more jobs and cheaper and more plentiful energy.

By their nature compromises are ephemeral things. The dynamics change over time and render the compromise invalid. Thinker’s compromise will have to be revisited in 5-7 years.