Syd seems to understand that there is a new problem but does not say
what he thinks it is. The reality is we are in a bind. We need very
large inputs to generate the new energy regime but now that growth is
drying up we no longer have the excess energy to do the work.
Our options now are very limited.
All the commentators assume some form of business as usual.
Business as usual requires significant GDP and growth, but energy costs
keep eating all our surplus funds.

From now on we have no choice but to apply sustainability principles
with a relish or else our GDP will go negative and we will be in recession.

Welcome to the Post Peak Oil World !

sadly..joe hockey stick..has the same cure for jobs jobs jobs
ie sell off more furniture..so private for profit capitalists can reduce the workforce..AND REAP Their harvest..just so joe can build more infrastructure..[more furniture..to sell off next time

GREAT[not]..but think..these are the big stuff capitalists wont spend their 'investments on/TILL WE FIRE SELL IT..off..like the common wealth bank..the fed..telicom..etc

and so the new money..goes to the same builders
ONLY TO BUY IT UP..AT THE NEXT FIRE SALE..once the hard work is done

Yebiga
You don't define 'economic rationalist' bit I presume you mean free market. Yes? No? What do you actually mean by the term?

Can you see that government monopoly control of the supply of money and credit, government cartelisation of banks, government granting banks a licence to print money in return for an endless market for government debt, government backing private banks so as to keep the whole scam going, so government can pursue a policy of cheap credit by endless inflation, government dictating fractional reserve banking, government fiat currency, government insurances of this whole dodgy Ponzi scheme ... can you see how it's mere economic ignorance to lay the blame for this or its fruits to free markets, economic rationalism or libertarian economic theory?

Jardine, all the fiddling with money & its derivatives is desperation
actions by economists who do not really understand what is going on.
Fortunately there are just a very few economists that do realise that
the economy is slave to the available energy. Not the other way around.

We are right now up against the peak of available energy and there is
no slack in the system to more than just keeping things going.
However as sure as the sun will rise tomorrow we have to plan to wind
down our unimportant expenditures and start prioritising where we spend
our resources.

This I think is beyond the ken of our political parties.

Hi Jardine
I agree with your depiction of the ponzi banking scheme - on this part the libertarians are right.

As for economic rationalism, to me this is a blessed conviction that everything can be done by the market, that there is no role for government in industry and no social welfare or health or other civic role.

In sporting terms its a good offensive game plan no defence. And in most games defense wins, or is at least as important as offence - which just looks like more fun.

Now. What do I mean by defense? Well, your chief asset are the people of any economy and they have some basic needs which must be addressed before you can expect to get the best out of them. If they are uneducated, hungry, without shelter, sick, lacking medicine then your never going to get the best out of them.

The counter argument is that if you give them all that, you will never get anything out of them because why should they bothered?

And it is this, just this argument and which side of it you fall, which essentially determines everyone's political leanings. The right is committed to offence and believes a success offence is the best kind of defence. The left argues for the reverse.

The right economic rationalist is convinced that the guarantee of essentials would make for so many slackers and become such a drain on the economy that we would all become impoverished.

The left, on the contrary, believe if you guarantee people their essentials they are then truly able to become fully engaged and operate at a far greater proficiency.

In practice, what this means is the right want to minimise all government interference and the left want to institute all sorts of public programs. Both are consistent with their view of human nature

Jardine to clarify myself
Thoroughly agree that the current banking system which creates money through debt and requires governments to borrow at interest is a Ponzi scheme.

But i also believe the correct balance between government and business was achieved in the 1970s. I do not accept the rationalist approach subsequently initiated by Reagan, Thatcher et al, which was then imported here. The economic success which this rationalism supposedly delivered is entirely based on a series of fallacies and myths which have beguiled our entire culture.

Selling off public assets was a short term band aid which injected capital into the economy via private debt to complete the sell off. This injection of debt helped increase economic activity in the short term.

Similarly, the evisceration of unions, the casualisation of the workforce, the proliferation of consultants has enabled huge increases in the profitability of the largest publicly listed corporations but at the same time Legitimised a culture of rewarding the senior management with obscene sums entirely disproportionate to their worth. Thus the savings made from extracting more and more productivity from the ordinary worker has been passed on to the once managers who are now ordained entrepreneur CXOs.

As the 1990s arrived the world was again heading for recession and stagnation the sell offs and thefts had lost their steam. Fortunately, high tech, computers, pcs, mobile phones and Internet arrived and kicked the d-day can down the road.

By 2001, the ideology is bankrupt. The high tech impetus absorbed. Now Reagan and Thatchers bastard children Resorted to war and asset inflation - the last desperate move, the death rattle of a system bereft of ideas.

The rationalists sold us a sick puppy a lie. The excess of big business is a kin to the excess of big government. A key role for Government is to limit excess not to enable it. The role of government is to enable anyone to open a business and contribute to wealth of a nation not to restrict entry and enable a culture of distortion to mask itself as legitimate.