Here's our summary of key economic events overnight that affect New Zealand with news of a sudden change in the value of fossil fuel investments.
But first, the April durable goods orders data in the US came in surprisingly weak. They are -1.3% lower than the March level which is far away from the +0.7% gain expected. Of course they are hugely higher on a year-on-year basis but that is just the pandemic base effect. Compared to April 2019 orders are +0.4% higher so the recovery in the factory sector is still lackluster by this metric. 2021 orders for non-defense capital goods however recorded a good +3.5% gain.
US initial jobless claims fell again, down to +420,000 last week and the lowest since before the pandemic started. There are now 3.5 mln people on these claims, well down from the 22 mln at its peak, but still well above the prepandemic level of under 2 mln.
Pending home sales for April fell when a rise was expected. Record low inventory levels are the declared reason.
The Kansas City Fed's factory survey also reported softer conditions in May than for April. But they are still reporting a strong expansion and also reporting very sharp pricing pressures, just like every other similar survey nationwide.
There was another large and well-supported US Treasury bond auction overnight, this one raising US$74 bln of which the US Fed supplied US$12 bln. Private bidders offered US$150 bln and the median yield was 1.23% pa for this 7 year bond. That is only marginally lower than the 1.25% pa median at the prior equivalent event a month ago.
And we should note that the coming weekend includes the Memorial Day holiday in the US on Monday. Memorial Day weekend serves as the unofficial beginning of the US summer driving season and more than 37 million people will be on the road this weekend and petrol prices are expected to spike as a consequence. They are paying more than US$3/gallon for petrol and complaining about it, or NZ$1.09/liter.
And in courtrooms, a Dutch court found in favour of environment groups and ordered Royal Dutch Shell to set deeper and faster emissions cuts targeting a 45% reduction by 2030. The case, which industry experts say may serve as a precedent for other European oil majors, came the same day as ExxonMobil was dealt a blow with an small hedge fund unseating two board members in a bid to force the US company to diversify beyond fossil fuels, and to fight climate change. Current investors in oil and gas are going to find it very hard to quit their holdings without taking huge haircuts. These two rulings have caused an earthquake in the fossil fuel industry.
One likely strategy for these investors is to now maximise their returns in the short run, as they stop investing. With little competition, prices for fuel may well rise sharply even as demand falls.
Meanwhile, profits at large China’s industrial companies grew at a continuing fast pace in April, despite high commodity prices and weaker performance in the consumer goods sector. While the year-on-year comparisons distort the usual benchmarks, compared with April 2019 those profits were 49% higher and operating revenues were +33% higher.
In Australia, Victoria is now in a 7 day lockdown, causing a suspension of flights to and from New Zealand. And other states are closing their border with Victoria too.
On Wall Street, the S&P500 up +0.2% today in afternoon trade. Overnight, European markets were mixed with Frankfurt and London lower but Paris, Zurich and Brussels all higher. Yesterday the very large Tokyo market ended down -0.3%, Hong Kong ended down -0.2%, while Shanghai ended its session up +0.4%. The ASX200 ended flat but the NZX50 ended down -0.8% in a broad sell-off.
The latest global compilation of COVID-19 data is here. The global tally is still rising, now 168,553,000 people have been infected at some point, up +581,000 per day. Global deaths reported now exceed 3,502,000 and up +13,000 per day. Vaccinations in the world are still rising but at a slower pace, now up to 1.78 bln. In the US half of their population (50.3%) have had at least one dose. More than 40% of Americans have been fully vaccinated (133.8 mln people). The number of active cases there has fallen to 5,707,000 with fewer new infections than recoveries recently and steady if slow progress.
The UST 10yr yield starts today +2 bps higher at 1.61%. The US 2-10 rate curve is at +146 bps and a bit steeper. Their 1-5 curve is at +77 bps and steeper, while their 3m-10 year curve is at +161 bps and also steeper. The Australian Govt ten year benchmark rate is little-changed at 1.61%. The China Govt ten year bond is unchanged at its new lower level of 3.09%. The New Zealand Govt ten year is up +1 bp at 1.90%.
The price of gold starts today up at US$1897/oz, a gain of +US$4 since this time yesterday.
Oil prices start today marginally firmer at just under US$66.50/bbl in the US, while the international Brent price is just under US$69/bbl.
The Kiwi dollar opens today marginally firmer at 72.9 USc and holding its RBNZ induced slightly higher level. Against the Australian dollar we are up at 94.3 AUc. Against the euro we are still at 59.8 euro cents. That means our TWI-5 starts today at 74.5 and that is an appreciation over the past week of +124 bps.
The bitcoin price is now at US$39,175 and a mere +0.7% higher than this time yesterday. It might seem like it is trading sideways but volatility in the past 24 hours has still been very high at +/- 4.3%.
The easiest place to stay up with event risk today is by following our Economic Calendar here ».
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96 Comments
Mr Orr gave a long monologue (Trying to justify his inaction) .....and that market is cooling.......
https://www.oneroof.co.nz/news/its-crazy-out-there-mad-mad-mad-36-buyer…
Mr Orr and party.....is house price cooling.
The breathless commentary is priceless. #HousingDebtFrenzy
"Before the auction Geng said estimates had put the value at $2.2m but bids quickly shot past that, from both in-person and phone bidders. Competition was fierce, with the last three bidders pushing up in lots of $10,000 once past $2.55m, as Ray White auctioneer Ben East edged bids closer to the winning $2.635m."
"oh the humanity" ;)
On the other hand, having spent a full year of weekends in auction rooms seeing Chinese developers pay above market for everything I know how impactful this will be on those hoping to buy a home. They have my deep sympathies. (I left Auckland due to this).
What the market price is, is open to interpretation. In an environment of negative real interest rates (which currently exists in NZ), you essentially make money by borrowing money. If you borrow $1,000,000 dollars at 2%. If inflation is 6% then you make 40,000 a year by borrowing this sum.
The Chinese have come to the conclusion it is worth borrowing another 300-400k above what you would have a few years ago as the amount will be inflated away regardless. Especially if there is no structural change in the way our countries monetary policy operates.
If you use NPV of payments into perpetuity, current prices are perfectly rational. We went from a negitive interest rate environment of about -1.5% pre covid. Where inflation was 4.5% & residential interest rates were 3%. We now have an environment where borrowing rates are 2% & inflation is 6%. This means our negitive interest rates have shifted from -1.5% to -4.0%. This means a borrower of $750,000 will now make $30,000 more a year off their debt instead of the $11,250 pre covid. This value of this annuinty is ($30,000-11,2500) = $18,750. If you do the math the NPV of this into income payment into perpetuity is about $230,000. This basically gets priced into what people will pay for property so prices increase by this amount. Markets are rational.
If your've got what it takes you can pay high stakes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbbQ5rUE8-g
I agree markets are rational and indeed when capital is allowed to flow back into the country to secure ownership of land and housing this is what will happen. Its not the numbers that tell the full story as these actions while fit for NPV are not fit in light of them setting new price floors and therefore revising the position to be even more positively geared!
Meanwhile those without the means will wait for the clock to turn.
Another news / survey today :
Perception all time and expecting to calm FOMO....
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2021/05/housing-crisis-most-kiwis-…
Mr Orr was talking about FOMO,which is based on Perception and unless measures are taken to change the Perception, house price growth will never stop. Perception could have been changed only if RBNZ would have taken responsibilty and acted, instead Mr Orr does the opposite, distancing himself away from the problem - How can they say that they have nothing to do with the crisis where their actions or inactions are directly responsible for the ponzi ( low interest, removing LVR - can understand low interest rate but removing LVR was a mistake and with low interest rate, should have put in place measures like interest only loan) and No journaist have raised with them - when his action have contributed to the current housing boom, how can he shoo away from his responsibilities - not seen even one journalist / media raising question on Mr Orr's claim that he is not responsible nor is it his responsibility .......
Perception is at all time high and only one person alone is responsible and that is Mr Orr, who now hides behind his board and the only reason that he is now trying to protect himself by hiding behind committe is, for he too knows that he is being arrogant and not acting in the spirit that he should or why would he hide behind boards / committee, where he is the leader as is preparing to put the onus on the committee, when things go wrong.
A man slaps another person and when questioned, his response is that he is not responsible for what his hand does.
Best is still to come.
That person gets away smiling as everyone believed him.
Who is to be blamed, The person who slapped or the people who justified his action by accepting his response.
Definitely part of the solution. When I'm at the crossing waiting for the lights I'm always amazed how many seemingly healthy people are driving to work in a half ton metal box with only them in it. How can anyone think this is the best use of our resources?
Thanks to the new bike paths and e-bike availability things are really starting to change, heaps of bikes in Christchurch these days.
Nope, talking about Christchurch. 95% of people don't need to think about hills here, although I do ride around them for fun. Other cities may have worse weather and more hills, and if you have a particularly tricky route or struggle with fitness there are lots of e-bike options now.
Obviously there are cases where tradies need to transport goods, or people unable to ride bikes for whatever reason - I'm just talking about the huge section of people who could easily switch if they wanted to. Given the environmental, cost, health and convenience (at least in Chch City) arguments for, I don't get why there is so much resistance.
Hah, a true purist. Fair point. For my commute I choose between a 15 minute drive + walk from nearest parking (theoretical - I've never driven to work in Chch), a 10 minute bike mostly off-road, or a 30 minute walk. I guess using a bike to save myself 40 minutes a day is a little decadent.
And what will you do mfd when the next lot of zealots come a long and say you can’t have steel for bicycles and you need to use horses as they are more eco friendly and make usable bio waste. All this when they discover carbon reductions are not reducing climate warming as predicted and we need to double-down on our efforts.
YES! It's all about efficiency. I suspect one day in the future (if it's not already here), our children will look down on us and shake their heads about how we utterly wasted such a massive energy reserve doing stupid stuff like moving massive pieces of metal around.
I was reading somewhere not long ago that the true cost of fuel should be something like $1000 per L, based on the energy contained within it. And our existing vehicles that use these are only 20-30% efficient! It's truly crazy both in efficiency terms AND environmental terms.
One barrel of oil has ~1700 kilowatt hours of energy in it. Most humans doing physical labor sustain ~100W of work. Ergo the barrel of oil contains the equivalent energy to 17,000 hours (2125 days of 8 hour work) of human physical work. Even assuming only 20% efficiency of combustion this still gives ~3400 hours of equivalent of human physical labour for ~$70USD.
You can see why energy is so important to the economy. That's the whole premise of PDK and why the (real) economy will have increasing trouble going forward given the declining quality of resource bases. Also shows the stupidity of focusing purely on the financial perspective of the economy alone.
Plutocracy,
I have followed pdk's posts for some time and they have had an effect on my thinking. I have been spending a lot of time trying to become more knowledgeable on EROI.
This has led me to wonder just how much the long-term decline in global GDP could be attributed to a declining EROI.
Just shows you how many self-centred, short-term thinking people there are. Ask who tells them? And it's the media, academia and politics. All have failed.
But we must recognise that offsetting is bullshit - Air New Zealand is a champion of that; their Antarctica alignment was pure hogwash. Real - and real-time - sequestration is impossible; there wouldn't be the energy left to get off the ground.....
Nor would there be remuneration available for those claiming to be seen side-on......
The "media, academia and politics" set you refer to need the climate change cult to pay their mortgages - the other 99% of us can think for ourselves. So galling for the
we-know-better types. Highly likely the 1% carbon off setters are public servant expense accounts?
"Interest in climate change is becoming an increasingly powerful economic driver, so much so that some see it as an industry in itself whose growth is driven in large part by policy making.
The $1.5 trillion global “climate change industry” grew at between 17 and 24 percent annually from 2005-2008, slowing to between 4 and 6 percent following the recession with the exception of 2011’s inexplicable 15 percent growth, according to Climate Change Business Journal."
I'm referring to the heroic fighters on the front lines of climate change. You know the ones at the local council telling you to have less water in bath. Even though it is righteous and good they can't fight for free - those pensions and company cars aren't cheap you know.
"The San Diego, Calif.-based publication includes within that industry nine segments and 38 sub-segments. This encompasses sectors like renewables, green building and hybrid vehicles.
That also includes the climate change consulting market, which a recent report by the journal estimates at $1.9 billion worldwide and $890 million in the U.S.
Included in this sub-segment, which the report shows is one of the fastest growing areas of the climate change industry, are environmental consultants and engineers, risk managers, assurance, as well as legal and other professional services.
Figures for the climate change consulting market are expected to more than double in the next five years, and the report’s authors believe the climate change industry as a whole will have an even steeper and faster growth trajectory than the environmental consulting industry – an industry that in 1976 had billings of $600 million and today generates $27 billion"
https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/07/30/377086.htm
You're talking as if a $1.9 billion worldwide industry is significant - this is about 25 cents per person. Lets assume NZ is punching above its weight and we spend double this, then this industry has roughly the significance of 2x average Auckland houses. Like complaining that a successful corner shop is a drain on the nation's productivity.
It is trillions not billions. It was 1.7 trillion in 2015 as stated in the link. The money would be better spent on education, healthcare, sanitation etc. etc. rather than being pissed away on vain glorious attempts to change the climate back to Little Ice Age settings - while China eats your lunch.
Could you really not think of better ways to spend a couple of trillion?
change the climate back. and curled up in that, change how you live. and the easy way to do that is to restrict freedom of choice. can see the day for instance, where there will be an allowance for air travel, so many hours per person per annum. you probably will have to purchase these hours and then there might be a market created where they can be traded with a percentage fee of course. The territory of our free society, ability to live and think as you choose, is rapidly diminishing.
Since it includes renewable energy, no I can't think of a better use of the money. Remember the alternative to renewable energy is finite energy - it will run out. We do not have an alternative, either we spend the money now or we kick the can down the road a little longer and make it someone else's problem.
Another component is green building - this is just being efficient with our resources. Houses that actually hold heat. Not controversial, and will generally save money overall.
Finite? On what time scale? Nuclear will be around for a very long time. Proven oil reserves have more than quadrupled since Jimmy Carter. You could be using the money to stop dysentery deaths today rather than throw hand wringing money at some perceived energy scenario.
Does it matter? Whether we're talking ten years or a hundred years my point remains the same. We're definitely not talking about much more than a century before we're well out of easy finite energy sources.
Perhaps we would be in less of a mess if people actually though 'sustainable' might mean hundreds or thousands of years, rather than a few decades.
profile,
have a look at this-https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/16_2021.pdf The inverted pyramid showing the EROI of different oil reservoirs on page 40 is interesting.
Most consultants are parasites whatever business they leach onto. What interests me is the basic science of climate change and i am persuaded by it. What that means is that I accept the science which shows a direct and measurable relationship between the volume of 'greenhouse gases' in the atmosphere and temperature. You will be aware of the Keeling Curve and its figures are replicated right here at Baring Head which also measures methane. I am particularly interested in the cryosphere and the observable loss of mass from glaciers globally, the multi-decadal reduction in Arctic sea ice and the increasing thawing of permafrost.
So you are saying we should throw all hydro/wind/solar/geothermal energy away and keep digging up coal and oil and burning it forever? And we should do this because, even though we know it heaps up the planet and we don't know what that extra heat will do, it will mean we can spend a couple of trillion dollars elsewhere.
Wow OK. Maybe try understanding the precautionary principle and applying it to the worlds entire ecosystem, of which we are a part of.
So throw trillions/annum are at a runaway global warming hypothesis that may occur at some vague time in the future or fixing abject poverty today? An easy choice. 1.5 million people, mostly children, die of diarrheal diseases globally and you want to build windmills?
OK, so 1/750th was spent on consulting? So what? It's logical business and government would hire experts to guide them through a global energy transition, I would have thought? The size of the industry you label as the"climate change industry" is obviously multi faceted and will no doubt grow much further in the near future.
Have to remember the part the "profiles" of this world have played also. They have turned any social discourse into a swamp of BS. Exactly where they want it. Not everyone is motivated to find and understand the facts. That takes effort. Profiles denial cult is a comfortable place to be. Why let the truth interfere with that?
pdk,
You might find this interesting. https://www.cell.com/joule/pdf/S2542-4351(17)30083-1.pdf
I got it from Brian Fallow at the Herald in response to an email I sent him.
Royal Dutch Shell released their transition strategy to become net zero in their emissions by 2050. Just looking at the 2030 date it states they would cut emissions by only 20%! From what I take from it it's all around demand v investment. As demand grows Shell will invest more into renewable energy. I'd say we will all be pushed harder into renewable in the next 10 years.
The real unreported feature is that Henry Tull's temporarily-energised way of life is rapidly coming to an end.
And no amount of denial, optimism bias, spin or anything else, can alter that fact.
"Current investors in oil and gas are going to find it very hard to quit their holdings without taking huge haircuts."
That's all of us...............
The shell and Mobil news is incredible . One is driven by a court case decision. One investor led. It’s amazing to me to see such a proactive lead by investors environmentally over the last 5 years. It’s fair to say very few people saw this happening so dramatically. May it continue.
The vast majority of oil and gas companies are state owned and then there is that other elephant in the room - "The post-pandemic surge means China’s emissions reached a new record high of nearly 12bn tonnes (GtCO2) in the year ending March 2021. This is some 600m tonnes (5%) above the total for 2019."
And therein lies a fly in the ointment. China is such a major greenhouse gas producer that even if we cut all our emissions, what they do will have the dominant effect ( I recall that NZ's total emissions are less that 1% of the worlds? Is this true?). So when will China, and other high GHG producers begin to be held to account for their emissions? We have lots of pressure on importing goods that use child labour, or are not ethically produced. So when will environmental standards be included? This would dry up a lot of China's trade overnight.
Actually, Murray, a percentage of China's emissions are from the whiteware etc that we buy in our big-box stores, smugly thinking ourselves clean and green. We are so cleverly paying for it with increasing, existing-housing-backed (therefore unbacked) debt.
The base problem is that we need a minimum of high-quality energy, to run and maintain modern society. The problem is that the source we chose is leaving us, even as the burning of it is altering our global habitat. Yes, we need to pressure China, and the oil cartels. But we have to realise that the ramification is that our debt-fuelled way of life has to - and will anyway - end.
I agree PDK. It is obvious. But as I asked, why don't we put barriers in place for Chinese and other high emitting countries products to force them to stop screwing our environment. Who knows they may move the F&PW division back to Tamaki?
Plus i can see the small scale, modular nuclear reactors becoming very viable in the near future.
Why don't we? Because we want cheap prices that exclude the cost of emissions. So we export those emissions to somewhere else then laugh at the idea of putting emission taxes back on those goods because it is easier for us just to blame the country of origin. Unfortunately it's human nature to blame everyone else before looking at ourselves, even if we caused the problem.
Small scale modular reactors have been viable "in the near future" for decades. I really hope our next step is fusion, but again that has been promised for decades. Come on ITER!
Those cheap price will never become a reality if we don't work to let the alternative energy technology mature. As many commentators, including yourself, imply our demand for cheap prices is the driver. But that's not the complete story. Governments can still put the controls in place, but allow them off for sustainably produced products. The end result will be an increased demand for the sustainable products. Another thought; in the 60s and 70s most appliances, although basic, were almost bullet proof and easy and cheap to repair when they broke. These days capitalistic greed has dramatically shortened the life of most if not all appliances. These shortened lifespans increase resource consumption. that too needs to change.
While fusion is interesting, no fusion reactor has been run for a significant period yet (if I remember correctly 300 seconds is the longest run). So they will be a while before they are ready.
No doubting of PDK’s sincerity and passion and that his explanations and musings have gained over time, both respect and traction on this website for sure. Guess when the team of 5 million NZrs are thus convinced and compliant, the next step is to up shop to Beijing or similar, and start the same process on the team of 1.5 billion or so?
It's hard to take anything these lying parasitic corporations do, or say, seriously. After Exxons own scientists confirmed emissions from the product they were hawking were damaging our planet's climate system, rather than doing the moral thing and working on an energy transition, they doubled down over the next few decades by funding climate denialism and govt lobbying, to prevent action. Now, after the serious damage they have caused our biosphere, they want to become our savior. For a price of course!"For the project to be economically viable, it would need major public funding and the introduction of a price on carbon in the US. ExxonMobil says the project could be fully operational by 2040." Whether this is just the standard "keep burning we can fix this, maybe", delaying tactic? Who knows? These corporations need to be disbanded and their management rot in prison, for the damage they have inflicted! https://cen.acs.org/environment/greenhouse-gases/Exxon-Mobil-proposes-h…
There was another large and well-supported US Treasury bond auction overnight, this one raising US$74 bln
Two US Tbill auction results recorded a median 0.0% yield for both the 4 week and 8 week terms.
Debt doesn't matter: Greek 10y risk spread over bunds has fallen to its narrowest level since 2008. What’s even more remarkable, is that this spread tightening has come in spite of the fact that #Greece’s public debt has continued to climb, now stands at >200% of GDP, DB says. Link
Yes that lines up if you assume the average electricity used in charging the EV is over 80% renewable, as it is in NZ.
But is the marginal unit of electricity used to charge an extra EV in NZ 80% renewable? Some windmills are going up, but the heavy lifting for renewables is done by hydro, and we aren't planning another dozen hydro dams here.
Hard to say exactly about the marginal unit, but yes based on a high share of renewables in the generation. It's hard to imagine NZ's renewable generation share falling going forward, though. One good point is that most EV charging can be shifted to times of low demand (e.g. charge overnight) and makes little to no contribution to the peaks.
If it's hard to imagine the share of renewables falling over time, then it must be easy to imagine a lot of windmills going up plus a lot of hydro dams being constructed in the North Island. I am not so sure that will happen.
I imagine peak EV charging demand would coincide with peak dinner time demand. If that is the case then your EV is being charged by imported coal and so your carbon footprint may only be 10% less than an ICE car. It would take differential pricing to get people to program charging to off peak.
The generation is coming - Meridian and building a new wind farm every year, Contact building geothermal and wind, Mercury buying Tilt who build wind farms, new entrants building solar farms. Info is freely available - Meridian and Contact both released interesting info to the NZX in the last month or two showing their strategy for more renewables.
We have differential pricing - night rates, Flick, Electric Kiwi hour of power etc. ROI on a timer is very large and the price very small compared to buying an electric car ($20? Maybe $1-200 if it's a 15amp outlet?). If we need more differential pricing, so be it.
Unless you have a very tricky system where all the cars talk to the internet and plan who is going to charge when, you will have an even greater spike in demand as they all switch on when the cheap rate kicks in. And EVs will be the biggest user of electricity in each household so the peak will likely be covered by a fair bit of coal.
It's also a network capacity problem the electricity networks know is coming. They already see it in the affluent areas that have had a high uptake of EVs.
If we really get into a sticky situation we could add EV chargers into the ripple system. Most hot water cylinders in Chch (and other cities I believe, but not certain) are controlled by the local lines company. Mine turns on for 7 hours during the night, at a time decided by Orion, others will have an extra 2-3 hours during the day to top up, again at a time decided by Orion to fit between peaks.
A similar system for EV chargers is not too hard to imagine, especially if the lines company, gentailers, or government cover the cost in order to avoid overbuild capex.
They are already equal in TCO but will be purchase price equivalent in a year or so making them TCO cheaper. You can thank the EU for subsidising our purchase prices.
EV's will need to pay Road User Tax that is logical.
EV's are actually ok for recycling, their old batteries are sought after for secondary storage tasks (Grid and Home batteries), when end of life the ingredients of batteries are very recyclable. The car bodies are as recyclable as the current ICE ones.
Hamn eggs,
i thought you were smarter than this. Are you unaware of the massive subsidies that have been poured into the fossil fuel industries for decades?
They make the subsidies to renewables look like chump change. As the EROI of fossil fuels declines, what would your solution be?
Pamper Russian vanity to be taken seriously, and isolate China! Biden's play beginning.
Biden’s top Asia official Kurt Campbell said the dominant paradigm between China and the U.S. is going to be competition. https://bloombergquint.com/politics/biden-s-asia-czar-says-era-of-engag…
via @BloombergQuint
Link
Let's monitor US trade deficit with China over coming months to confirm.
Economic news suffers from being out of date and not reflecting the trend changes. Also commentators are imbued wth the mental framework they learned 20-30 years earlier. This is why lots express surprise at developments that were seeded years earlier. One such is CV19 killing the commute and suburb model. Another is oil and gas which are literally and metaphorically “fossil” fuels. Younger generation thinking is beginning to alter landscape of possibilities
" a Dutch court found in favour of environment groups and ordered Royal Dutch Shell to set deeper and faster emissions cuts ..." & "...in a bid to force the US company to diversify beyond fossil fuels..."
Diversifying away from fossil fuels is akin to cutting back on oxygen.(from an economic point of view)
Debt doesnt do less.
To paraphrase someones comment ... Its the woke Green dribble from largely city dwellers, all lined up in safe spaces with nice cheap clothes, new smart-ass phone and full stomachs protesting more drilling / mining / fishing /farming /roading…
I wonder how soon the protest focus would change if you stopped the trucks for a week.
Well yes, lots of urbanites are very comfortable in their fossil manufactured cocoon, as they reject that which enables their existence. At some point that cocoon will unravel because of physics. It's just a question of whether we unravel in an orderly fashion causing a lot of pain, or a disorderly fashion, having geoengineered the climate and depleted energy reserves, causing a trip back to the stone age, without the untapped resources to allow recovery.
"It's just a question of whether we unravel in an orderly fashion causing a lot of pain, or a disorderly fashion.."
Disorderly wins .... by several lengths.
Noone will willingly forgo the comforts of current living standard to go back to a tough/simple/basic life (unless they can be mobbed up with pandemic horror stories?)
All wealth is Debt.
And to shrink back is to writeoff debt burden (and wealth) and crash economies to scale (this is AirNZ trying to fly quarter full planes / or a plane only once a week...)
If the future is ever smaller, the financial system as we know it doesnt work
So any "solution" will come in the form of a collapse in money/financial crash, supply chain breaks and then enforced rationing with few jobs
There has been debt forgiveness in the past
https://michael-hudson.com/2018/08/and-forgive-them-their-debts/
“Michael Hudson reveals the real meaning of “Forgive us our sins.” It has far more to do with throwing the moneylenders out of the Temple than today’s moneylenders would like you to know.”
which is all well and good ... but you realise that also eliminates wealth/incomes streams as you know it?
Try getting elected on (eg) no Superann... ?
It means cutting up the credit card & acknowledging our severe overshoot and resource problem. No Jobs / incomes streams.
ie Massive crash in living standards.
We have a resource problem. It doesnt go away by financial manipulation.
https://ourfiniteworld.com/2021/05/27/dont-expect-the-world-economy-to-…
Don't worry, despite the drilling ban New Zealand has many happy decades of fossil fuel use ahead of it:
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.PCAP.KG.OE?contextual=defau…
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