…“… we have undertaken the most extensively regulatory reduction ever conceived. Regulation is stealth taxation. The U.S. Like many other countries unelected bureaucrats … they have imposed crushing and anti-business and anti-worker regulations on our citizens with no vote, no legislative debate, and no real accountability. In America those days are over.
“I pledged to eliminate two unnecessary regulations for everyone new regulation. We have succeeded beyond our highest expectations. Instead of two for one, we have cut 22 burdensome regulations for everyone new rule. We are freeing our businesses and workers so they can thrive and flourish as never before. We are creating an environment that attracts capital, invites investment, and rewards production. America is the place to do business, so come to America where you can innovate, create and build.”
“We build into our automobiles more power and greater gas consumption than we need. We use the press and radio to push the sales of more cars. We drive them hundreds of millions of miles a year in pursuit of futility.”
“With the exhaustion of our own oil wells in sight … much of our resource capital has been used up, but we still have our yacht, our stable of horses….”
– William Vogt. Road to Survival (New York: William Sloane, 1948), p. 68.
MasterResource documents the historical record behind the grand energy debate from the vantage points of business, economics, political economy, and history. What was said? When? Why? And to what effect?
One aspect of the debate has been the difference between natural market efficiency/conservation versus its political offshoot, conservationism, defined as the belief that less usage is per se a moral good or economic necessity.…
“The National Academy of Science reports are supposed to guide the thinking of policymakers …. One constant in both reports is the unwavering faith of energy experts in the efficacy of government-subsidized energy research and development, and government intervention in energy production markets. Looking back we can see that the Energy in Transition report from 1980 was largely a failure as an exercise in technical and economic prognostication.”
– Ronald Bailey, ‘How Green Is Your Crystal Ball?‘ (August 4, 2009).
The argument from authority (aka appeal to authority) is a favorite of climate alarmists/activists who are certain of a problem and its solution. But consensus-worshipping (intellectual bullying?) has been long employed by the Malthusian mainstream against those who do not see a massive market failure in the self-interested actions of humankind striving to be fruitful and consume in a free and prosperous commonwealth.…