Economics 2200
Economic Development of the US
David B. Mustard

Exhaustion of Resources


    1944 federal government review predicted that by now [the mid 1970s] the US would exhaust its reserves of 21 of 41 commodities it examined. Among them were tin, nickel, zinc, lead and manganese.







    Claim: ABC News, "Earth 2100" (2009) makes the following claims about 2015:
  "We are running out of oil." "Oil: its getting harder and more expensive to find."   
   Homas Homer Dixon: "We can see a doubling or tripling of real oil prices--that is after inflation." "As energy becomes more expensive, [the suburbs] become less desirable places to live."
   Michael Klare: "We are running out of oil."
      Heidi Cullen: "By 2015 in the United States, add about 20 milion people to the population and then just play out what that does to consumption patterns--the number of people that we have to feed. There is basically this slow, creeping tension for natural resources."
   As the American way of life becomes increasingly unsustainable, ...."
   Data: World production of oil was 63.99 million barrells of oil per day in 1980. In 2014, world production of oil was 93.10 million barrels of oil per day. (US Energy Information Administration)

Population and Poverty

    In the mid 1970s the US government sponsored a travelling exhibit for schoolchildren titled, "Population: The Problem is Us." (Jacqueline Kasun, The War Against Population, San Francisco: CA, Ignatius, 1988, p. 21.)
    In 1989, when the US Supreme Court was hearing the Webster case, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor brought the idea of overpopulation into a hypothetical question she asked of Charles Fried, former solicitor-general, "Do you think that the state has the right to, if in a future century we had a serious overpopulation problem, has a right to require women to have abortions after so many children?"
   World Bank president Barber Conable calls for population control because "poverty and rapid population growth reinforce each other" (Washington Post, July 16, 1990, p. A13)
    Prince Philip advises us that "It must be obvious by now that further population growth in any country is undesirable" (Washington Post, May 8, 1990, p. A26)
    Newsweek's year-ending cover story concluded that "Foremost of the new realities is the world's population problem" (December 25, 1990, p.44)
    The president of NOW warns that continued population growth would be a "catastrophe" (Nat Hentoff in the Washington Post, July 29, 1989, p. A17)
    Ted Turner (Atlanta Journal Constitution, Wed. Dec. 2, 1998) in an address to the Society of Environmental Journalists in Chattanooga - blamed Christianity for overpopulation and environmental degradation, and argued that the people who disagree with him are "dummies." He stated in part, "The Judeo-Christian religion says man was given dominion over everything, and his salvation was that he was to go out and increase and multiply. Well, we have done that ... to the point where in Calcutta, it’s a hellhole. So it's not an environmentally friendly religion."
    Ellen Goodman laments "People Pollution" (Washington Post, March 3, 1990, p. A25)
    Herblock cartoon shows that the U. S. neglecting the "world population explosion" (Washington Post, July 19, 1990, p. A22)
    Hobart Rowen likens population growth to "the pond weed [which] grows in huge leaps" (Washington Post, April 1, 1990, p. H8).
    A Newsweek "My Turn" suggests giving every teen-age girl a check for up to $1200 each year that she does not have a baby "in order to stop the relentless increase of humanity" (Noel Perrin. "A Nonbearing Account", April 2, 1990, p. 9).
    Christiana Figueres Executive Secretary of the UN Framework on Climate Change (2013). Greg Dalton said, "But isn't it true that stopping the rise of the population would be one of the biggest levers and driving the rise of greenhouse gases?" Figueres replied, "Obviously less people would exert less pressure on the natural resources."  "Today we are already exceeding the planet's planetary carrying capacity." Cite: InforWars, April 6, 2015.

Climate Change

    Claim Jan. 1970: "By 1985, air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half." Life Magazine, January 1970. Life Magazine also noted that some people disagree, "but scientists have solid experimental and historical evidence to support each of the predictions."




    Later in the article, "Whatever the cause of the cooling trend, its effects could be extremely serious, if not catastrophic. Scientists figure that only a 1% decrease in the amount of sunlight hitting the earth's surface could tip teh climatic balance, and cool the planet enough to send it sliding down the road to another ice age within only a few hundred years."
    Source: "Another Ice Age," Time Magazine, June 24, 1974.


    Claims: "Britain's winter ends tomorrow with further indications of a striking environmental change: snow is starting to disappear from our lives."
    "Sledges, snowmen, snowballs and ... are all a rapidly diminishing part of Britain's culture, as warmer winters--which scientists are attributing to global climate change--produce not only fewer white Christmases, but fewer white Januaries and Februaries."
    "London's last substantial snowfall was in February 1991." "Global warming, the heating of the atmosphere by increased amounts of industrial gases, is now accepted as a reality by the international community."
    According to Dr. David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, within a few years "children just aren't going to know what snow is" and winter snowfall will be "a very rare and exciting event." Interviewed by the UK Independent, March 20, 2000.
    Data: "Coldest December Since records began as temperatures plummet to minus 10 C bringing travel chaos across Britain." Mailonline. Dec. 18, 2010. Also, winter of 2013-2014 was wettest UK winter in 248 years--see Daily Mail: Could Met Office Have been More Wrong?.

    Data: When asked about these old predictions Oppenheimer stated,
    However, that claim is not obviously true. Data from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center show that precipitation -- rain and snow -- has increased slightly over the century.

    Claim: "Unfortunately, it is just too hot for the Scottish ski industry," said Dr. Viner."It is very vulnerable to climate change. The resorts have always been marginal in terms of snow and, as the rate of climate change increases, it is hard to see a long-term future." The Guardian, "Global Warming Forces Sales of Scottish Winter Sports Resorts." Feb. 13, 2004.
    Data: In 2013-14, Scotland had most snow since 1945. "Most Snow in Hills in 69 years." BBC News. Feb. 26, 2014.

    Claim: "The North Polar ice cap is falling off a cliff. It could be completely gone in summer in as little as seven years. Seven years from now." Al Gore, Nobel Prize speech, 2007. Also predicting, that the Arctic would be ice-free by the summer of 2014: John Kerry (US Secretary of State, predicted in 2009) and Mr. Gore has repeated the claim many times. In  July 2013, Cambridge University's Peter Wadhams claimed that the Arctic will be ice free by Sep. 2015.
    Data: Arctic ice cap is larger in 2014 (about 5.62 million square kms) than in 2007 (about 4.8 million square kilometers)

    Claims: In 2008, Al Gore said, "Some of the models suggest that there is a 75 percent chance that the entire north polar ice cap, during some of the summer months, could be completely ice-free within the next five to seven years."
    In 2007, American scientist Wieslaw Maslowski said, "you can argue that maybe our projection of [an ice free Arctic by 2013] is already too conservative." (see BBC News, "Arctic summers ice-free 'by 2013.'" Dec. 12, 2007)



Ehrlich told that the consequences of future warming could be dire.