Mexican Oil field to go under?

[Lawrence of Arabia]

as i was saying . . . inefficient, bad used of capital, etc. . .

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
education, infrastructure, etc, will do a lot more for the country than investing in oil exports and then subsidizing it to score political points with the people to prop up your failing government. (for example)

its not so much the revenus from it, its the negatives that it brings along.

i dont think that the capital they invest has necessairly outweighted the negative effects.

1. capital invested in state oil is used inefficiently (higher returns elswhere, or under different business structure.)
2. too much money/capital flying around from the oil revenues means lower interest rates and allows investments into areas which really shouldnt be invested in (for example, look at all the white elephant projects in the middle east. there have too much capital, dont know what to do with it, throw good money after bad.) can lead to more volatility, bad for foreign investors.
3. less soft money in the treasury means less possibilities of corruption, a big problem in mexico.

there may be larger pecuninary gains from investing (even inefficiently) in oil, but thats not whats going to make mexico a developped country.

getting the govt out of the oil business is not a whole other topic because as long as there is oil, there will be pressure to have it state owned (and look at how many oil exporting countries have state run/ monopolies of oil.) it goes hand in hand with having it in the first place. since its unlikely that the government will ever privatize it (too many incentives not to) the only way to break the inefficieny is for there not to be anymore of it.

How much have you had to drink?

[Dinner]

I imagine if they start steam injection they'll find this site has many more barrels left.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by notyoueither


How much have you had to drink?

Aparently he doesn't realise that if you have a machine which puts out more money than it takes in you are able to use the excess to pay for that other **** he wants.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Aparently he doesn't realise that if you have a machine which puts out more money than it takes in you are able to use the excess to pay for that other **** he wants.

its one thing to have the moneey to do it, its another to do it. having the money and not doing it is the same as not having the money and not doing it.

Human Development Index (top 15 oil export countries bolded, non democratic countries with **)

#1 Norway: 0.963
#2 Iceland: 0.956
#3 Australia: 0.955
#4 Luxembourg: 0.949
#5 Canada: 0.949
#6 Sweden: 0.949
#7 Switzerland: 0.947
#8 Ireland: 0.946
#9 Belgium: 0.945
#10 United States: 0.944
#11 Netherlands: 0.943
#12 Japan: 0.943
#13 Finland: 0.941
#14 Denmark: 0.941
#15 United Kingdom: 0.939
#16 France: 0.938
#17 Austria: 0.936
#18 Italy: 0.934
#19 New Zealand: 0.933
#20 Germany: 0.93
#21 Spain: 0.928
#22 Hong Kong: 0.916
#23 Israel: 0.915
#24 Greece: 0.912
#25 Singapore: 0.907
#26 Slovenia: 0.904
#27 Portugal: 0.904
#28 Korea, South: 0.901
#29 Cyprus: 0.891
#30 Barbados: 0.878
#31 Czech Republic: 0.874
#32 Malta: 0.867
#33 Brunei: 0.866
#34 Argentina: 0.863
#35 Hungary: 0.862
#36 Poland: 0.858
#37 Chile: 0.854
#38 Estonia: 0.853
#39 Lithuania: 0.852
#40 Qatar: 0.849 **
#41 United Arab Emirates: 0.849 **
#42 Slovakia: 0.849
#43 Bahrain: 0.846
#44 Kuwait: 0.844 **
#45 Croatia: 0.841
#46 Uruguay: 0.84
#47 Costa Rica: 0.838
#48 Latvia: 0.836
#49 Saint Kitts and Nevis: 0.834
#50 Bahamas, The: 0.832
#51 Seychelles: 0.821
#52 Cuba: 0.817
#53 Mexico: 0.814
#54 Tonga: 0.81
#55 Bulgaria: 0.808
#56 Panama: 0.804
#57 Trinidad and Tobago: 0.801
#58 Libya: 0.799 **
#59 Antigua and Barbuda: 0.797
#60 Macedonia, Republic of: 0.797
#61 Malaysia: 0.796
#62 Russia: 0.795
#63 Brazil: 0.792
#64 Romania: 0.792
#65 Mauritius: 0.791
#66 Grenada: 0.787
#67 Belarus: 0.786
#68 Bosnia and Herzegovina: 0.786
#69 Colombia: 0.785
#70 Dominica: 0.783
#71 Oman: 0.781
#72 Albania: 0.78
#73 Thailand: 0.778
#74 Samoa: 0.776
#75 Saudi Arabia: 0.772 **
#76 Venezuela: 0.772 **
#77 Saint Lucia: 0.772
#78 Ukraine: 0.766
#79 Peru: 0.762
#80 Kazakhstan: 0.761
#81 Lebanon: 0.759
#82 Ecuador: 0.759
#83 Armenia: 0.759
#84 Philippines: 0.758
#85 Suriname: 0.755
#86 Paraguay: 0.755
#87 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines: 0.755
#88 China: 0.755
#89 Belize: 0.753
#90 Jordan: 0.753
#91 Tunisia: 0.753
#92 Fiji: 0.752
#93 Sri Lanka: 0.751
#94 Turkey: 0.75
#95 Dominican Republic: 0.749
#96 Maldives: 0.745
#97 Jamaica: 0.738
#98 Turkmenistan: 0.738
#99 Iran: 0.736 **
#100 Georgia: 0.732
#101 Azerbaijan: 0.729
#102 West Bank: 0.729
#103 Gaza Strip: 0.729
#104 Algeria: 0.722 **
#105 El Salvador: 0.722
#106 Cape Verde: 0.721
#107 Syria: 0.721
#108 Guyana: 0.72
#109 Vietnam: 0.704
#110 Kyrgyzstan: 0.702
#111 Indonesia: 0.697
#112 Uzbekistan: 0.694
#113 Nicaragua: 0.69
#114 Bolivia: 0.687
#115 Mongolia: 0.679
#116 Moldova: 0.671
#117 Honduras: 0.667
#118 Guatemala: 0.663
#119 Vanuatu: 0.659
#120 Egypt: 0.659
#121 South Africa: 0.658
#122 Equatorial Guinea: 0.655
#123 Tajikistan: 0.652
#124 Gabon: 0.635
#125 Morocco: 0.631
#126 Namibia: 0.627
#127 São Tomé and PrÃncipe: 0.604
#128 India: 0.602
#129 Solomon Islands: 0.594
#130 Burma: 0.578
#131 Cambodia: 0.571
#132 Botswana: 0.565
#133 Comoros: 0.547
#134 Laos: 0.545
#135 Bhutan: 0.536
#136 Pakistan: 0.527
#137 Nepal: 0.526
#138 Papua New Guinea: 0.523
#139 Ghana: 0.52
#140 Bangladesh: 0.52
#141 East Timor: 0.513
#142 Togo: 0.512
#143 Sudan: 0.512
#144 Congo, Republic of the: 0.512
#145 Uganda: 0.508
#146 Zimbabwe: 0.505
#147 Madagascar: 0.499
#148 Swaziland: 0.498
#149 Cameroon: 0.497
#150 Lesotho: 0.497
#151 Djibouti: 0.495
#152 Yemen: 0.489
#153 Mauritania: 0.477
#154 Haiti: 0.475
#155 Kenya: 0.474
#156 Gambia, The: 0.47
#157 Guinea: 0.466
#158 Senegal: 0.458
#159 Nigeria: 0.453
#160 Rwanda: 0.45
#161 Angola: 0.445
#162 Eritrea: 0.444
#163 Benin: 0.431
#164 Côte d'Ivoire: 0.42
#165 Tanzania: 0.418
#166 Malawi: 0.404
#167 Zambia: 0.394
#168 Congo, Democratic Republic of the: 0.385
#169 Mozambique: 0.379
#170 Burundi: 0.378
#171 Ethiopia: 0.367
#172 Central African Republic: 0.355
#173 Guinea-Bissau: 0.348
#174 Chad: 0.341
#175 Mali: 0.333
#176 Burkina Faso: 0.317
#177 Sierra Leone: 0.298
#178 Niger: 0.281
weighted average = 0.7

top 15 exporting countries weighted average HDI = 0.768. and this includes canada and norway, two countries who do not depend on oil in the same way as the others, and who becamed developped countries not by exporting oil but by developping human capita.

not only that, we have some of the worlds worst human rights violators and most corrupt and authoritarian governments,and terrorist sponsering governments.

so tell me what i dont understand now.

[Kuciwalker]

Oil gives the government a crutch it can use to avoid making real progress.

[Barnabas]

Look at it this way Lawrence, Lybia has oil, and it is much wealthier than Morocco, Algeria or Tunis.

Yemen is the only very poor arabian country, and it is the only one in the arabian peninsula with no oil.

Oil matters and helps a lot

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Oil gives the government a crutch it can use to avoid making real progress.

What's the excuse of those without oil?

[Lawrence of Arabia]

algeria has oil too, yet 121 countries have a higher HDI that it does.

tunisia's HDI is greater than 4 of the worlds largest exporters in oil.

infact, oil has had very little effect on the HDI of these countries. with the amount of money that they make, the average of the 15 largest oil exporting countries is only 68 points higher (0.097 about 10% higher) than the world average (which includes, lets not forget, such places as the DRC and its 2 million casualities in the last civil war, and other notable failed states like Haiti). this means that these countries are in general not much better off, despite all this oil.

add the fact that one of these countries' head of state was implicated in the bombing of a commercial airliner, and you see that having all of this oil is not as great as it seems.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

What's the excuse of those without oil?

thats not an excuse, thats a fact. countries rich in natural resources have problems because there is a lot of incentive to steal, rebel, kill, to get the huge revenues linked to these resources. why doesnt that happen in developped countires? because those economics are based on knowledge, and human capital. you cannot steal/ kill to get someone's knowledge to make money. simply controlling a diamond mine however, gives you a huge payoff.
with all this easy money around, no wonder there exists repressive governments/ civil wars in those countries.

[notyoueither]

Viewing mineral wealth as dooming a country to failure is quite interesting.

[Kuciwalker]

I think you mischaracterize his argument.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Barnabas
Look at it this way Lawrence, Lybia has oil, and it is much wealthier than Morocco, Algeria or Tunis.

Yemen is the only very poor arabian country, and it is the only one in the arabian peninsula with no oil.

Oil matters and helps a lot

Syria, Jordan, Yemen, Sudan, Morocco, Tunis, Lebanon, and Egypt all have little to no oil. I'd add Palestine to that list but there's no such country.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Oil gives the government a crutch it can use to avoid making real progress.

That's the truth in a nutshell. It allows governments to not make badly needed changes though some countries have used the opportunity to advance the economy into other fields.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I think you mischaracterize his argument.

Indeed. He also argues that low interest rates are bad because they lead to more development, and other absurd things.