Don't blame climate activists for the current spike in energy prices, writes columnist Paul Krugman.
In this Jan. 16, 2015, photo, pumpjacks are seen operating in Bakersfield, Calif.The price of oil, which was extremely low during the worst of the pandemic — it actually went below $0 for a brief, weird period — has spiked as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
OK, obligatory reminder that higher oil production would not necessarily be a good thing. The dangers of climate change just keep getting even more terrifying, and the world needs to wean itself from fossil fuels, not produce more. At best, you can make a St. Augustine argument — “Make me chaste and celibate, but not yet” — for higher oil production during the Ukraine war. But even that’s dubious.
But the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas recently carried out a survey of oil producers, asking them what was inhibiting their expansion, and for the most part, they didn’t blame either regulators or environmentalists. Instead, they blamed their bankers. And this Serious Person enthusiasm for hydrocarbons translated into a willingness to throw money at the fracking industry, which bled cash year after year but kept going by running up hundreds of billions in debt.
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