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| ▲ | throwaway2037 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | What is wild to me: The United Kingdom, The Netherlands, and Norway took very different paths. For those unaware, the UK shares the North Sea with Norway and there is plenty of oil and gas extract in the UK area of the North Sea. And, the Netherlands has an enormous gas field in the northern part of its country. The UK and Netherlands left it up to private industry and (mostly) taxed it as regular business profits. They didn't create a national petro fund from these profits. However, Norway took a very different path. They created a state-run oil and gas company (Statoil/Equinor) that operate many of the oil and gas extraction sites, and famously created a national petro fund to manage most of the profits. I always wonder why... Was this a missed opportunity for UK and Netherlands? | | |
| ▲ | fancyfredbot 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I wonder the same thing about high taxes and state run energy companies. I don't think the UK ever really had an option to create a fund though. Deficit was too high. Doubt there would have been anything left to invest even with an increased cut for the state. UK had an IMF bailout in the 70s and was in a mess. Norway was in much better shape I think. | | | |
| ▲ | touwer 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | In the Netherlands it was surely a wasted opportunity. They used the money mostly to prop up some services and fill short-term gaps in the budget. Should have saved it like Norwy. It's awful | |
| ▲ | hagbard_c 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | You're missing what happened in the Netherlands when the gas reserves were found. The social-democratic government headed by Joop den Uyl - who thought the reserves should be extracted and sold within 30 years - used the proceeds to increase social benefits while lowering the acceptance rules to get government benefits. This had a large pull effect which ended up with more than 10% of the labour force getting benefits under the 'WAO' (an acronym for 'Wet op de ArbeidsOngeschiktheidsverzekering' or 'law governing insurance for those not fit for employment'). This way of spending temporarily available resources on expanding the welfare state got a name: The Dutch Disease. It was an example for Norway on how not to squander income from the oil reserves and a deciding factor in creating the oil fund. | | |
| ▲ | opo an hour ago | parent [-] | | >...This way of spending temporarily available resources on expanding the welfare state got a name: The Dutch Disease. The term "Dutch Disease" is a bit more general than that: >...The term was coined in 1977 by The Economist to describe the decline of the manufacturing sector in the Netherlands after the discovery of the large Groningen gas field in 1959.[1][2] >The presumed mechanism is that while revenues increase in a growing sector (or inflows of foreign aid), the given economy's currency becomes stronger ("appreciates") compared to foreign currencies (manifested in the exchange rate). This results in the country's other exports becoming more expensive for other countries to buy, while imports become cheaper, rendering those sectors less competitive. Ideally a temporary windfall should be used to invest in the future. Taking a temporary windfall and spending it on basically buying votes should have a name, but that isn't generally what the term Dutch Disease refers too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_disease |
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| ▲ | joecot 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It usually is when western countries don't continuously interfere with your government. | | |
| ▲ | noosphr 6 hours ago | parent [-] | | Texas is well known for good government and long term planning. | | |
| ▲ | linkregister 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Civil liberties aside, yes, Texas has good governance. | | |
| ▲ | throwaway2037 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | One thing that many people don't know: Texas has one of the best performing state economies in the last twenty five years -- number 3 in the US. Ref: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/gdp-growth-by-u-s-state-map... This isn't an accident. Yes, there has been a oil-and-gas boom (fracking, mostly), but it is a great place to do business, so many other non-petro industries have been furiously expanding there in the last 25 years. | |
| ▲ | throwaway27448 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Well, they're also terrible at spending state resources despite high taxes (outside of income tax). One of, if not the worst, public education systems in the country. Pretty bad urban planning, too. Decent food and music tho | | |
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| ▲ | telotortium 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I mean, compared to a lot of other states Texas is fairly well run for its budget. | | |
| ▲ | georgeecollins 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | This. I think people in California (like me) have trouble seeing the things Texas does well because of partisanship. It's bad for California not to see when another state does a thing better. | | |
| ▲ | all2 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | And the terrible thing is a huge number of folks from California are moving to Texas and brining their failed policies with them. As the voting bloc shifts left, you can expect more and more insane fiscal policy that will eventually drive Texas into the ground. Like California. | | |
| ▲ | scarmig 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | California's biggest problems are mostly along the lines of "too many people want to live here." I have plenty of complaints about California governance, many of them conservative coded. But if California is a failed state, it's a failed state that much of the world aspires to be. | | |
| ▲ | rmunn 33 minutes ago | parent [-] | | I have family in California so I've visited often. It's got beautiful geography, and very pleasant weather most of the time (at least in the areas people have chosen to live: few people voluntarily choose to live in the desert areas). I don't have much personal experience with California's government other than second-hand reports, usually from people leaving the state so you can imagine those reports tend negative. But I suspect that if California's government were better, there would be even more overcrowding problems, i.e. that bad government is actually helping the state (in a small, entirely backwards, way) by keeping many more people from wanting to move there. |
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| ▲ | throwaway27448 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | What are the counterexamples? Maybe Nigeria? EDIT: yes, also Iraq and Venezuela | | |
| ▲ | GeneralMayhem 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Norway is pretty much the only country with oil wealth that can reasonably be considered well run (unless you count Canada or the US, which, while resource-rich, have a lot of other things going on and aren't dependent on their petroleum resources). Of the other countries where petroleum is >10% of the national economy, I think Norway might be the only one that isn't a brutal dictatorship, a failed state, or both? | | |
| ▲ | throwaway2037 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > Of the other countries where petroleum is >10% of the national economy, I think Norway might be the only one that isn't a brutal dictatorship, a failed state, or both?
You raise a great point. I wracked my brain trying to think of counterexamples: It is tough!I found this graphic from CNBC that summarises data from the World Bank: https://assets.weforum.org/editor/0GAQbN2nVTxgIqOLjWpWSZYh-9... One thing I want to point out: Kuwait is the most dependent upon oil and gas of any nation in the world (about 50% of its GDP). However, I think it would be a stretch to call them "a brutal dictatorship, a failed state, or both". Sure, it isn't a Western liberal democracy, but people live pretty good lives and the state does not have a strong reputation for suppressing its people. (I'm not here to apologize for their gov't... but I think it would be a bit harsh to put in your categories.) UAE, Bahrain, Oman, Brunei, and Qatar: I would put in the same category: Non-democracy or flawed democracy, but life is pretty good for the locals. I guess that we can call all of the countries that I mentioned before: "benevolent dictator" gov't model. Interestingly, Ecuador is about 20% of GDP, but I would call them a developing/emerging democracy. The rest of the list... sheesh: It does not look good! What do you think about my analysis? Do you agree? | |
| ▲ | throwaway27448 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | ?? Russia, the US, half the damn gulf states seem to be doing just fine (maybe excluding Bahrain and Iraq). Very much including Iran, despite our efforts to strangle it to death for fifty years straight. > I think Norway might be the only one that isn't a brutal dictatorship Just because you don't like a government doesn't mean it's doing a bad job at, well, holding a state together. | | |
| ▲ | GeneralMayhem 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Russia Totalitarian, and trending toward failed state. > US Not eligible for the reason I stated: the US economy is much less than 10% petroleum. We have a lot of oil, but we have a lot more of everything else. > gulf states Mostly brutal, repressive dictatorships (especially Saudi Arabia and Iran) - some are better than others, but the trend is poor. > Just because you don't like a government doesn't mean it's doing a bad job at, well, holding a state together You're moving the goalposts a fair amount here. The thread started with "good governance", and I said "well run" - it's hard to say that the bar for either of those is simply maintaining superficial order. But even if you set that aside, consider the famous quote from the Shiekh of Dubai about the fragility of the petrostates that haven't figured out how to build strong civil societies with their wealth: "my grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel." |
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| ▲ | scrollaway 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | “The resource curse” is what you’re looking for. There’s a lot of counter examples - Norway is the odd one out. | | |
| ▲ | _--__--__ 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I think the resource curse didn't apply to Norway because they had an established post-industrial economy for hundreds of years before they got into oil exporting (they didn't even start drilling until the 1960s, 50 years after Venezuela or the Arab states). | | |
| ▲ | atombender 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | While being an established post-industrial economy is part of it, Norway was also keenly aware of the resource curse at that point. The "Dutch disease" comes from what happened when the Dutch, a liberal democracy, found oil in the 1950s — just a little before Norway did. A lot is thanks to Farouk Al-Kasim [1], who helped develop the fundamental plan for Norway's petroleum industry. As far I know, his task group's plan, developed while at the Department of Industry, was essentially accepted wholesale by the government. Part of it was ensuring the government retained control, and another part of it was ensuring oil revenue was carefully managed rather than flooding every level of society and government. [1] https://archive.ph/lEYl7 |
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| ▲ | true_religion 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Or even the USA historically. Pre 1900s, America was a country of continual economic crises, and fractured politics. It was sitting at the time in the latest supply of easily exploited natural resources in the world, yet somehow could not pay its troops pensions lost Civil war, could not keep its strategic oil supply from being raided by the executive branch corruption, and could not keep it plutocrats from directing military action for the sake of bananas of all things. |
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| ▲ | cyberax 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Honestly, pretty much every other resource-rich country: Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Venezuela, ... Norway is an outlier. | | |
| ▲ | throwaway27448 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Iran seem to be doing just fine. | | |
| ▲ | detourdog 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | My first job was at a design firm that worked for Samarec Riyadh Refinery. We were design an interactive exhibit based on the refining process. Our principal was Jewish and we needed special permission for him to enter the country for presentations. During one of the presentations one of our team took a photo of a fountain and it initially ended up in our presentation to be used to set the tone. While previewing our slideshow to our handlers we were told to remove the slide of the fountain. The fountain belonged to the king and could not be photographed without permission from the king. Admittedly there was no violence but we were warned that it was very bad. This was the early 1990’s so I’m sure this are much looser now. | |
| ▲ | GeneralMayhem 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | In what universe is Russia "doing just fine"? |
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