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2021-03-22

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Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble<blockquote>走向债务泡沫破裂</blockquote>

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{"i18n":{"language":"zh_CN"},"detailType":1,"isChannel":false,"data":{"magic":2,"id":359876652,"tweetId":"359876652","gmtCreate":1616387507976,"gmtModify":1634526114051,"author":{"id":3551005900171575,"idStr":"3551005900171575","authorId":3551005900171575,"authorIdStr":"3551005900171575","name":"LamPatrick","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/e030c454d48868b546dbefa7ff2b4c87","vip":1,"userType":1,"introduction":"","boolIsFan":false,"boolIsHead":false,"crmLevel":11,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[],"wearingBadges":[],"fanSize":234,"starInvestorFlag":false},"themes":[],"images":[],"coverImages":[],"title":"","extraTitle":"","html":"<html><head></head><body>Comment</body></html>","htmlText":"<html><head></head><body>Comment</body></html>","text":"Comment","highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":4,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"favoriteSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/359876652","repostId":1158879714,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1158879714","kind":"news","pubTimestamp":1616380355,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1158879714?lang=zh_CN&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-03-22 10:32","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble<blockquote>走向债务泡沫破裂</blockquote>","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1158879714","media":"zerohedge","summary":"A $1.9 trillion stimulus package was recently signed into law in the United States. Can such a stimu","content":"A $1.9 trillion stimulus package was recently signed into law in the United States. Can such a stimulus bill, plus packages passed in other countries, really pull the world economy out of the downturn it has been in 2020? I don’t think so.<blockquote>一项1.9万亿美元的刺激计划最近在美国签署成为法律。这样的刺激法案，加上其他国家通过的一揽子计划，真的能让世界经济走出2020年的低迷吗？我不这么认为。</blockquote> The economy runs on energy, far more than it operates on growing debt. Our energy problems don’t appear to be fixable in the near term, such as six months or a year. Instead, the economy seems to be headed for a collapse of its debt bubble. Eventually, we may see a reset of the world financial system leading to fewer interchangeable currencies, far less international trade and falling production of goods and services. Some governments may collapse.<blockquote>经济依靠能源运行，远远超过依靠不断增长的债务。我们的能源问题似乎无法在短期内解决，比如六个月或一年。相反，经济似乎正走向债务泡沫的破裂。最终，我们可能会看到世界金融体系的重置，导致可兑换货币减少，国际贸易大幅减少，商品和服务生产下降。一些政府可能会垮台。</blockquote> [1] What Is Debt?<blockquote>[1]什么是债务？</blockquote> I understand debt to be an&nbsp;indirect promise for future goods and services. These future goods and services can only be created if there are adequate supplies of the right kinds of energy and other materials, in the right places, to make these future goods and services.<blockquote>我明白债务是一种对未来商品和服务的间接承诺只有在正确的地方有足够的正确种类的能源和其他材料来制造这些未来的商品和服务，这些未来的商品和服务才能被创造出来。</blockquote> I think of debt as being a&nbsp;time-shifting device.&nbsp;Indirectly, it is a promise that the economy will be able to provide as many, or more, goods and services in the future compared to what it does at the time the loan is taken out.<blockquote>我认为债务是一种时移装置。间接地，这是一个承诺，即与贷款发放时相比，经济在未来将能够提供同样多或更多的商品和服务。</blockquote> Common sense suggests that it is much easier to repay debt with interest in a growing economy than in a shrinking economy. Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff unexpectedly ran across this phenomenon in their 2008 working paper,&nbsp;This Time Is Different: A Panoramic View of Eight Centuries of Financial Crises. They reported (p. 15), “It is notable that the non-defaulters, by and large, are all hugely successful growth stories.” In other words, their analysis of 800 years of governmental debt showed that default was almost inevitable if a country stopped growing or started shrinking.<blockquote>常识表明，在经济增长中偿还带息债务比在经济萎缩中容易得多。卡门·莱因哈特（Carmen Reinhart）和肯·罗格夫（Ken Rogoff）在他们2008年的工作文件《这一次不同：八个世纪金融危机的全景》中出人意料地遇到了这一现象。他们报告说（第 15 页）：“值得注意的是，总的来说，非违约者都是非常成功的增长故事”。换句话说，他们对800年政府债务的分析表明，如果一个国家停止增长或开始萎缩，违约几乎是不可避免的。</blockquote> The IMF estimates that the world economy&nbsp;shrank by 3.5%&nbsp;in 2020. There are many areas with even worse indications: Euro Area, -7.2%; United Kingdom, -10.0%; India, -8.0%; Mexico, -8.5%; and South Africa, -7.5%. If these situations cannot be turned around quickly, we should expect to see collapsing debt bubbles. Even the US, which shrank by 3.4%, needs a rapid return to growth if it is to keep its debt bubble inflated.<blockquote>国际货币基金组织估计，2020年世界经济将萎缩3.5%。还有许多地区的迹象更加糟糕：欧元区，-7.2%；英国，-10.0%；印度，-8.0%；墨西哥，-8.5%；南非，-7.5%。如果这些情况不能迅速扭转，我们应该会看到债务泡沫破裂。即使是萎缩了3.4%的美国，如果要保持债务泡沫膨胀，也需要迅速恢复增长。</blockquote> [2] The Inter-Relationship Among (a) Growing Debt, (b) Growing Energy Consumption and a (c) Growing Economy<blockquote>[2]（a）不断增长的债务、（b）不断增长的能源消耗和（c）不断增长的经济之间的相互关系</blockquote> When we are far from energy limits, growing debt seems to pull the economy along. This is a graphic I put together in 2018, explaining the situation. A small amount of debt is helpful to the system. But, if there gets to be too much debt, both oil prices and interest rates rise, bringing the braking system into action. The bicycle/economy rapidly slows.<blockquote>当我们远离能源极限时，不断增长的债务似乎会拉动经济。这是我在2018年整理的一张图，解释了情况。少量债务对系统有帮助。但是，如果债务过多，油价和利率都会上涨，制动系统就会发挥作用。自行车/经济迅速放缓。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/988ae9ff86e02ba9f0e17f7c656fa38a\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"345\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 1. The author’s view of the analogy of a speeding upright bicycle and a speeding economy.<blockquote>图1。作者对高速行驶的直立自行车与高速行驶的经济的类比的看法。</blockquote> Just as a two-wheeled bicycle needs to be going fast enough to stay upright, the economy needs to be growing rapidly enough for debt to do what it is intended to do. It takes energy supply to create the goods and services that the economy depends on.<blockquote>正如两轮自行车需要足够快才能保持直立一样，经济也需要足够快的速度增长，债务才能发挥其预期的作用。能源供应需要创造经济所依赖的商品和服务。</blockquote> If oil and other energy products are cheap to produce, their benefit will be widely available. Employers will be able to add more efficient machines, such as bigger tractors. These more efficient machines will act to leverage the human labor of the workers. The economy can grow rapidly, without the use of much debt. Figure 2 shows that the world oil price was $20 per barrel in 2020$, or even less, prior to 1974.<blockquote>如果石油和其他能源产品的生产成本低廉，它们的好处将广泛可用。雇主将能够增加更高效的机器，如更大的拖拉机。这些更高效的机器将利用工人的人力劳动。经济可以快速增长，而不需要使用大量债务。图2显示，2020年世界石油价格为每桶20美元，甚至比1974年还要低。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/0713c7ad2aa2952ae70ab31f031409a6\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"301\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 2. Oil price in 2020 dollars, based on amounts through 2019 in 2019$ from&nbsp;BP’s 2020 Statistical Review of World Energy, the inflationary adjustment from 2019 to 2020 based on CPI Urban prices from the US Department of Labor and the average spot Brent oil price for 2020 based on EIA information.<blockquote>图2。2020 年油价（美元），基于英国石油公司 2020 年《世界能源统计评论》中截至 2019 年的油价；2019 年至 2020 年的通胀调整；基于美国劳工部 CPI 城市价格；以及基于 EIA 信息的 2020 年布伦特原油平均现货价格。</blockquote> Figure 3 below shows the historical relationship between the growth in&nbsp;US energy consumption&nbsp;(red line) and&nbsp;the dollar increase in US debt growth required to add a dollar increase in GDP&nbsp;(blue line). This chart calculates ratios for five-year periods because ratios for individual years are unstable.<blockquote>下图3显示了美国能源消耗（红线）和美国债务增长的美元增加需要增加GDP的美元增加（蓝线）。此图表计算五年期间的比率，因为个别年份的比率不稳定。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/657120d86e4004601bc5a5909fa1cc55\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"303\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 3. Comparison of five-year average growth in US energy consumption based on EIA data with five-year average amount of added debt required to add $1 of GDP.<blockquote>图3。基于EIA数据的美国能源消耗五年平均增长率与增加1美元GDP所需的五年平均新增债务金额的比较。</blockquote> Based on Figure 3, the US average annual growth in energy consumption (red line) generally fell between 1951 and 2020. The quantity of debt that needed to be added to create an additional $1 dollar of GDP (blue line) has generally been rising.<blockquote>根据图3，美国能源消耗的年均增长率（红线）在1951年至2020年间普遍下降。创造1美元GDP（蓝线）所需增加的债务数量通常一直在上升。</blockquote> According to&nbsp;Investopedia,&nbsp;Gross domestic product&nbsp;(GDP) is the total monetary or market value of all the finished goods and services produced within a country’s borders in a specific time period.&nbsp;Notice that there is no mention of debt in this definition. If businesses or governments can find a way to make large amounts of credit available to borrowers who are not very credit worthy, it becomes easy to sell cars, motorcycles or homes to buyers who may never repay that debt. If the economy hits turbulence, these marginal buyers are likely to default, causing a collapse in a debt bubble.<blockquote>据 Investopedia 报道，国内生产总值 (国内生产总值) 是一国境内特定时期内生产的所有制成品和服务的总货币价值或市场价值。请注意，本定义中未提及债务。如果企业或政府能够找到一种方法，向信用状况不佳的借款人提供大量信贷，那么向可能永远无法偿还债务的买家出售汽车、摩托车或房屋就变得容易了。如果经济陷入动荡，这些边缘买家可能会违约，导致债务泡沫破裂。</blockquote> [3] Analyzing Energy Consumption Growth, Debt Growth and Economic Growth for Broader Groupings of Years<blockquote>[3]分析更广泛年份的能源消耗增长、债务增长和经济增长</blockquote> To get a better idea what is happening with respect to energy growth, debt growth, and GDP growth, I created some broader groupings of years, based primarily on patterns in Figure 2, showing inflation-adjusted oil prices. The following groupings of years were chosen:<blockquote>为了更好地了解能源增长、债务增长和GDP增长的情况，我创建了一些更广泛的年份分组，主要基于图2中显示通货膨胀调整后的油价的模式。选择了以下年份分组：</blockquote> <ul> <li>1950-1973<blockquote><ul><li>1950-1973</li></ul></blockquote></li> <li>1974-1980<blockquote><li>1974-1980</li></blockquote></li> <li>1981-2000<blockquote><li>1981-2000</li></blockquote></li> <li>2001-2014<blockquote><li>2001-2014</li></blockquote></li> <li>2015-2020<blockquote><li>2015-2020</li></blockquote></li> </ul> Using these groupings of years, I put together charts in which it is easier to see trends.<blockquote>使用这些年份的分组，我把图表放在一起，在图表中更容易看到趋势。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/602cfb962c02189ea5825a1f4f7d790d\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"302\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 4. Average annual increase in energy consumption for period shown based on EIA data versus average increase in real (inflation-adjusted) GDP for the period shown based on data of the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.<blockquote>图4。根据 EIA 数据显示的期间能源消耗的平均年增长率与根据美国经济分析局数据显示的期间实际（经通胀调整）GDP 的平均增长率相比。</blockquote> Figure 4 shows that for the US, there has been a general downward trend in the annual growth of energy consumption. At same time, real (that is, inflation-adjusted) GDP has been trending downward, but not quite as quickly.<blockquote>图4显示，对于美国来说，能源消耗的年增长率总体呈下降趋势。与此同时，实际（即通货膨胀调整后的）国内生产总值一直呈下降趋势，但速度没有那么快。</blockquote> We would expect that lower energy consumption would lead to lower growth in real GDP because it takes energy of the appropriate kinds to make goods and services. For example, it takes oil to ship most goods. It takes electricity to operate computers and keep the lights on. According to the&nbsp;World Coal Association, large quantities of coal are used in producing cement and steel. These are important for construction, such as is planned in stimulus projects around the world.<blockquote>我们预计，较低的能源消耗将导致实际GDP增长较低，因为制造商品和服务需要适当种类的能源。例如，运输大多数货物都需要石油。操作电脑和保持灯开着需要电力。据世界煤炭协会称，大量煤炭用于生产水泥和钢铁。这些对建设很重要，例如世界各地的刺激项目中计划的建设。</blockquote> Also, on Figure 4, the period 1981 to 2000 shows an uptick in both energy consumption growth and real GDP growth. This period corresponds to a period of relatively low oil prices (Figure 2). With lower oil prices, businesses found it affordable to add new devices to leverage human labor, making workers more productive. The growing productivity of workers is at least part of what led to the increased growth in real GDP.<blockquote>此外，在图4中，1981年至2000年期间，能源消耗增长和实际GDP增长都有所上升。这一时期对应于油价相对较低的时期（图2）。随着油价下跌，企业发现增加新设备来利用人类劳动力是负担得起的，从而提高工人的生产力。工人生产率的提高至少是导致实际GDP增长的部分原因。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9dfc9c699891a0b02f9e46e6f3f53bda\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"301\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 5. Dollars of additional debt required to add $1 dollar of GDP growth (including inflation), based on data of the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.<blockquote>图5。根据美国经济分析局的数据，增加1美元的GDP增长（包括通货膨胀）所需的额外债务。</blockquote> Figure 5, above, is disturbing. It strongly suggests that the US economy (and probably a lot of other economies) has needed to add an increasing amount of debt to add $1 of GDP in recent years. This pattern started long before President Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package in 2021.<blockquote>上图5令人不安。这强烈表明，近年来，美国经济（可能还有许多其他经济体）需要增加越来越多的债务，以增加1美元的GDP。这种模式早在拜登总统 2021 年推出 1.9 万亿美元经济刺激计划之前就开始了。</blockquote> To make matters worse, GDP growth in Figure 5 has not been reduced to remove the impact of inflation. On average, removing the impact of inflation reduces the above GDP growth by about half. In the period 2015 to 2020, it took about $4.35 of additional debt to add one dollar of GDP growth, including inflation. It would take about double that amount, or $8.70 worth of debt, to create $1.00 worth of inflation-adjusted growth. With such a low return on added debt, it seems unlikely that the $1.9 trillion stimulus package will increase the growth of the economy very much.<blockquote>更糟糕的是，图5中的GDP增长并没有降低以消除通货膨胀的影响。平均而言，去除通货膨胀的影响会使上述GDP增长减少一半左右。在2015年至2020年期间，包括通货膨胀在内，增加1美元的GDP增长需要大约4.35美元的额外债务。需要大约两倍的金额，即价值8.70美元的债务，才能创造价值1.00美元的通胀调整后的增长。由于增加债务的回报率如此之低，1.9万亿美元的刺激计划似乎不太可能大大促进经济增长。</blockquote> [4] Falling interest rates (Figure 6) are a major part of what allowed the rapid growth in debt after 1981 shown in Figure 5.<blockquote>[4]利率下降（图6）是1981年后债务快速增长的一个主要因素，如图5所示。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/74f347d946ebcebc62fe4fdee1dfffd3\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"193\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 6. 10-Year and 3-Month US Treasury Rates through February 2021, in a chart prepared by the Federal Reserve of St. Louis.<blockquote>图6。圣路易斯美联储编制的图表显示了截至2021年2月的10年期和3个月期美国国债利率。</blockquote> Clearly, debt is more affordable if the interest rate is lower. For example, auto loans and home mortgages have lower monthly payments if the interest rate is lower. It is also clear that governments need to spend less of their tax revenue on interest rate payments if interest rates are lower. Changes made by US President Ronald Reagan when he took office 1981 also encouraged the use of more debt.<blockquote>显然，如果利率较低，债务就更容易负担得起。例如，如果利率较低，汽车贷款和住房抵押贷款的月供就会较低。同样明显的是，如果利率较低，政府需要将更少的税收收入用于利率支付。美国总统罗纳德·里根在1981年上任时做出的改变也鼓励使用更多的债务。</blockquote> A major concern with respect to today’s debt bubble is the fact that interest rates are about as low as they can go without going negative. In fact, the interest rate on 10-year Treasury bonds is now 1.72%, which is higher than the February 2021 average rate shown on the chart. As interest rates rise, it becomes more costly to add more debt. As interest rates rise, businesses will be less likely to take on debt in order to expand and hire more workers.<blockquote>当今债务泡沫的一个主要问题是，利率在不变成负值的情况下已经尽可能低了。事实上，10年期国债利率现在为1.72%，高于图表中显示的2021年2月平均利率。随着利率上升，增加更多债务的成本变得更高。随着利率上升，企业不太可能为了扩张和雇佣更多工人而举债。</blockquote> [5] Interest expense is a major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners everywhere. Energy costs are another major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners. It makes sense that falling interest rates can partly hide rising energy prices.<blockquote>[5]利息支出是世界各地政府、企业和房主的主要支出。能源成本是政府、企业和房主的另一项主要开支。利率下降可以部分掩盖能源价格上涨，这是有道理的。</blockquote> A trend toward lower interest rates was needed starting in 1981 because the US could no longer produce large amounts of crude oil that were profitable to sell at less than $20 per barrel, in inflation-adjusted prices. Lower interest rates made adding debt more feasible. This added debt could smooth the transition to an economy that was less dependent on oil, now that it was high-priced. The lower interest rates helped all segments of the economy adjust to the new higher cost of oil and other fuels.<blockquote>从 1981 年开始，美国需要出现降低利率的趋势，因为美国无法再生产大量原油，而这些原油按通货膨胀调整后的价格以每桶不到 20 美元的价格出售是有利可图的。较低的利率使得增加债务更加可行。由于石油价格昂贵，这种额外的债务可能会平稳过渡，向一个不那么依赖石油的经济过渡。较低的利率帮助所有经济部门适应石油和其他燃料成本的上涨。</blockquote> [6] The US experience shows precisely how helpful having a rapidly growing supply of inexpensive to produce oil could be to an economy.<blockquote>[6]美国的经验清楚地表明，快速增长的廉价石油供应对经济有多大帮助。</blockquote> US oil production, excluding Alaska (blue “remainder” in Figure 7), rose rapidly after 1945 but began to decline not long after hitting a peak in 1970. This growing oil production had temporarily provided a huge boost to the US economy.<blockquote>美国石油产量（不包括阿拉斯加（图 7 中的蓝色 “剩余部分”）在 1945 年后迅速上升，但在 1970 年达到峰值后不久就开始下降。这种不断增长的石油产量暂时为美国经济提供了巨大的推动力。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f4038b2f211130347e8f49562c4fcac0\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"303\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 7. US crude oil production, based on data of the US Energy Information Administration.<blockquote>图7。美国原油产量，基于美国能源信息署的数据。</blockquote> Up until almost 1970, US oil production was rising rapidly. Figure 8 shows that during this period, incomes of both the bottom 90% of workers and the top 10% of workers increased rapidly. Over a period of about 20 years, incomes for both groups grew by about 80%, after adjusting for inflation. On average, workers were about 4% better off each year, with the rapid growth in very inexpensive-to-produce oil, all of which stayed in the US (rather than being exported). US imports of inexpensive-to-produce oil also&nbsp;grew during this period.<blockquote>直到1970年，美国的石油产量一直在快速增长。图8显示，在此期间，底层90%的工人和顶层10%的工人的收入都快速增长。在大约20年的时间里，经通货膨胀调整后，这两个群体的收入增长了约80%。平均而言，随着生产成本非常低廉的石油的快速增长，工人的收入每年提高约4%，所有这些石油都留在了美国（而不是出口）。在此期间，美国生产成本低廉的石油进口也有所增长。</blockquote> Once oil prices were higher, income growth for both the lower 90% and the top 10% slowed. With the changes made starting in 1981, wage disparities quickly started to grow. There suddenly became a need for new, high-tech approaches that used less oil. But these changes were more helpful to the managers and highly educated workers than the bottom 90% of workers.<blockquote>一旦油价上涨，收入最低的90%和收入最高的10%的人的收入增长都会放缓。随着1981年开始的变化，工资差距开始迅速扩大。人们突然需要使用更少石油的新的高科技方法。但这些变化对管理者和受过高等教育的工人比底层90%的工人更有帮助。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/863a8245e4a663113ef507527988a806\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"361\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 8. Chart comparing income gains by the top 10% to income gains by the bottom 90% by economist Emmanuel Saez. Based on an analysis of IRS data,&nbsp;published in Forbes.<blockquote>图8。经济学家 Emmanuel Saez 绘制的图表比较了收入最高 10% 的收入增长和收入最低 90% 的收入增长。基于对国税局数据的分析，发表在《福布斯》上。</blockquote> [7] Most of the world’s cheap-to-extract oil sources have now been exhausted. Our problem is that the world market cannot get prices to rise high enough for producers to cover all of their expenses, including taxes.<blockquote>[7] 世界上大多数廉价开采的石油资源现已枯竭。我们的问题是，世界市场无法让价格上涨到足以让生产商支付包括税收在内的所有费用。</blockquote> Based on my analysis, the world price of oil would need to be at least $120 per barrel to cover all of the costs it needs to cover. The costs that need to be covered include more items than an oil company would normally include in its costs estimates. The company needs to develop new fields to compensate for the ones that are being exhausted. It needs to pay interest on its debt. It also needs to pay dividends to its shareholders. In the case of shale producers, the price needs to be high enough that production outside of “sweet spots” can be carried on profitably.<blockquote>根据我的分析，世界石油价格至少需要每桶 120 美元才能覆盖其需要覆盖的所有成本。需要涵盖的成本包括比石油公司通常在成本估算中包含的更多的项目。该公司需要开发新的油田来弥补正在枯竭的油田。它需要支付债务利息。它还需要向股东支付股息。就页岩生产商而言，价格需要足够高，以便在 “甜蜜点 ”之外进行生产。</blockquote> For oil exporters, it is especially important that the sales price be high enough so that the government of the oil exporting country can collect adequate tax revenue. Otherwise, the exporting country will not be able to maintain food subsidy programs that the population depends on and public works programs that provide jobs.<blockquote>对于石油出口国来说，销售价格足够高，以便石油出口国政府能够征收足够的税收尤为重要。否则，出口国将无法维持人口赖以生存的粮食补贴计划和提供就业机会的公共工程计划。</blockquote> [8] The world can add more debt, but it is difficult to see how the debt bubble that is created will really pull the world economy forward rapidly enough to keep the debt bubble from collapsing in the next year or two.<blockquote>[8]世界可以增加更多的债务，但很难看到正在制造的债务泡沫将如何真正快速地拉动世界经济向前发展，以防止债务泡沫在未来一两年内崩溃。</blockquote> Many models are based on the assumption that the economy can easily go back to the growth rate it had, prior to COVID-19. There are several reasons why this seems unlikely:<blockquote>许多模型都基于这样的假设：经济可以很容易地恢复到 COVID-19 之前的增长率。这似乎不太可能有几个原因：</blockquote> <ul> <li>Many parts of the world economy weren’t really growing very rapidly prior to the pandemic. For example, shopping malls were doing poorly. Many airlines were in financial difficulty. Private passenger auto sales in China reached a peak in 2017 and have declined every year since.<blockquote><ul><li>在大流行病之前，世界经济的许多地区并没有真正快速增长。例如，购物中心表现不佳。许多航空公司陷入财务困境。中国私人乘用车销量在2017年达到顶峰，此后逐年下降。</li></ul></blockquote></li> <li>At the low oil prices prior to the pandemic, many oil producers (including the US) would need to reduce their production. The 2019 peak in shale production (shown in Figure 7) may prove to be the peak in US oil production because of low prices.<blockquote><li>在疫情爆发前的低油价下，许多石油生产国（包括美国）需要减产。由于价格低廉，2019年页岩油产量的峰值（如图7所示）可能会被证明是美国石油产量的峰值。</li></blockquote></li> <li>Once people became accustomed to working from home, many of them really do not want to go back to a long commute.<blockquote><li>一旦人们习惯了在家工作，他们中的许多人真的不想回到长途通勤。</li></blockquote></li> <li>It is not clear that the pandemic is really going away, now that we have kept it around this long. New mutations keep appearing. Vaccines aren’t 100% effective.<blockquote><li>现在还不清楚疫情是否真的会消失，因为我们已经把它保留了这么久。新的突变不断出现。疫苗并非100%有效。</li></blockquote></li> <li>As I showed in Figure 5, adding more debt seems to be a very inefficient way of digging the economy out of a hole. What is really needed is a growing supply of oil that can be produced and sold profitably for less than $20 per barrel. Other types of energy need to be similarly inexpensive.<blockquote><li>正如我在图5中展示的那样，增加更多的债务似乎是一种非常低效的让经济走出困境的方式。真正需要的是不断增长的石油供应，这种石油可以以每桶不到20美元的价格生产和销售。其他类型的能源也需要同样便宜。</li></blockquote></li> </ul> I should note that intermittent wind and solar energy is not an adequate substitute for oil. It is not even an adequate substitute for “dispatchable” electricity production. It is simply an energy product that has been sufficiently subsidized that it can often make money for its producers. It also sounds good, if it is referred to as “clean energy.” Unfortunately, its true value is lower than its cost of production.<blockquote>我应该指出，间歇性风能和太阳能并不能充分替代石油。它甚至不能充分替代“可调度”发电。它只是一种能源产品，得到了足够的补贴，经常可以为生产者赚钱。如果它被称为 “清洁能源 ”，听起来也不错。不幸的是，它的真实价值低于其生产成本。</blockquote> [9] What’s Ahead?<blockquote>[9] 未来会怎样？</blockquote> I expect that oil prices will rise a bit, but not enough to raise prices to the level producers require. Interest rates will continue to rise as governments around the world attempt more stimulus. With these higher interest rates and higher oil prices, businesses will do less and less well. This will slow the economy enough that debt defaults become a major problem. Within a few months to a year, the worldwide debt bubble will start to collapse, bringing oil prices down by more than 50%. Stock market prices and prices of buildings of all kinds will fall in inflation-adjusted dollars. Many bonds will prove to be worthless. There will be problems with empty shelves in stores and gasoline stations with no products to sell.<blockquote>我预计油价会小幅上涨，但不足以将价格提高到生产商要求的水平。随着世界各国政府尝试更多刺激措施，利率将继续上升。随着利率上升和油价上涨，企业的生意会越来越差。这将使经济放缓到足以使债务违约成为一个主要问题。在几个月到一年内，全球债务泡沫将开始崩溃，导致油价下跌50%以上。股票市场价格和各种建筑物的价格将以通货膨胀调整后的美元计算下跌。许多债券将被证明一文不值。商店和加油站会出现货架空，没有产品可卖的问题。</blockquote> People will start to see that while debt is a promise for the equivalent of future goods and services, it is not necessarily the case that those who make the promises will be able to stand behind these promises. Paper wealth generally can be expected to lose its value.<blockquote>人们将开始看到，虽然债务是对未来商品和服务等价物的承诺，但做出承诺的人未必能够支持这些承诺。纸面财富通常会失去价值。</blockquote> I can imagine a situation, not too many years from now, whencountries everywhere will establish new currencies that are not as easily interchangeablewith other currencies as today’s currencies are. International trade will dramatically fall. The standard of living of most people will fall precipitously.<blockquote>我可以想象一种情况，不久之后，当世界各国都将建立新的货币，但这些货币并不容易兑换其他货币与今天的货币相同。国际贸易将急剧下降。大多数人的生活水平将急剧下降。</blockquote> I doubt that the new currencies will be electronic currencies. Keeping the electricity on is a difficult task in economies that increasingly need to rely solely on local resources. Electricity may be out for months at a time after an equipment failure or a storm. Having a currency that depends on electricity alone would be a poor idea.<blockquote>我怀疑新货币会是电子货币。在越来越需要完全依赖当地资源的经济体中，保持电力供应是一项艰巨的任务。设备故障或暴风雨过后，一次可能会停电数月。拥有一种完全依赖电力的货币是一个坏主意。</blockquote>","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble<blockquote>走向债务泡沫破裂</blockquote></title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 12.5px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nHeaded For A Collapsing Debt Bubble<blockquote>走向债务泡沫破裂</blockquote>\n</h2>\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\nzerohedge2021-03-22 10:32\n\n</h4>\n</header>\n<article>\nA $1.9 trillion stimulus package was recently signed into law in the United States. Can such a stimulus bill, plus packages passed in other countries, really pull the world economy out of the downturn it has been in 2020? I don’t think so.<blockquote>一项1.9万亿美元的刺激计划最近在美国签署成为法律。这样的刺激法案，加上其他国家通过的一揽子计划，真的能让世界经济走出2020年的低迷吗？我不这么认为。</blockquote> The economy runs on energy, far more than it operates on growing debt. Our energy problems don’t appear to be fixable in the near term, such as six months or a year. Instead, the economy seems to be headed for a collapse of its debt bubble. Eventually, we may see a reset of the world financial system leading to fewer interchangeable currencies, far less international trade and falling production of goods and services. Some governments may collapse.<blockquote>经济依靠能源运行，远远超过依靠不断增长的债务。我们的能源问题似乎无法在短期内解决，比如六个月或一年。相反，经济似乎正走向债务泡沫的破裂。最终，我们可能会看到世界金融体系的重置，导致可兑换货币减少，国际贸易大幅减少，商品和服务生产下降。一些政府可能会垮台。</blockquote> [1] What Is Debt?<blockquote>[1]什么是债务？</blockquote> I understand debt to be an&nbsp;indirect promise for future goods and services. These future goods and services can only be created if there are adequate supplies of the right kinds of energy and other materials, in the right places, to make these future goods and services.<blockquote>我明白债务是一种对未来商品和服务的间接承诺只有在正确的地方有足够的正确种类的能源和其他材料来制造这些未来的商品和服务，这些未来的商品和服务才能被创造出来。</blockquote> I think of debt as being a&nbsp;time-shifting device.&nbsp;Indirectly, it is a promise that the economy will be able to provide as many, or more, goods and services in the future compared to what it does at the time the loan is taken out.<blockquote>我认为债务是一种时移装置。间接地，这是一个承诺，即与贷款发放时相比，经济在未来将能够提供同样多或更多的商品和服务。</blockquote> Common sense suggests that it is much easier to repay debt with interest in a growing economy than in a shrinking economy. Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff unexpectedly ran across this phenomenon in their 2008 working paper,&nbsp;This Time Is Different: A Panoramic View of Eight Centuries of Financial Crises. They reported (p. 15), “It is notable that the non-defaulters, by and large, are all hugely successful growth stories.” In other words, their analysis of 800 years of governmental debt showed that default was almost inevitable if a country stopped growing or started shrinking.<blockquote>常识表明，在经济增长中偿还带息债务比在经济萎缩中容易得多。卡门·莱因哈特（Carmen Reinhart）和肯·罗格夫（Ken Rogoff）在他们2008年的工作文件《这一次不同：八个世纪金融危机的全景》中出人意料地遇到了这一现象。他们报告说（第 15 页）：“值得注意的是，总的来说，非违约者都是非常成功的增长故事”。换句话说，他们对800年政府债务的分析表明，如果一个国家停止增长或开始萎缩，违约几乎是不可避免的。</blockquote> The IMF estimates that the world economy&nbsp;shrank by 3.5%&nbsp;in 2020. There are many areas with even worse indications: Euro Area, -7.2%; United Kingdom, -10.0%; India, -8.0%; Mexico, -8.5%; and South Africa, -7.5%. If these situations cannot be turned around quickly, we should expect to see collapsing debt bubbles. Even the US, which shrank by 3.4%, needs a rapid return to growth if it is to keep its debt bubble inflated.<blockquote>国际货币基金组织估计，2020年世界经济将萎缩3.5%。还有许多地区的迹象更加糟糕：欧元区，-7.2%；英国，-10.0%；印度，-8.0%；墨西哥，-8.5%；南非，-7.5%。如果这些情况不能迅速扭转，我们应该会看到债务泡沫破裂。即使是萎缩了3.4%的美国，如果要保持债务泡沫膨胀，也需要迅速恢复增长。</blockquote> [2] The Inter-Relationship Among (a) Growing Debt, (b) Growing Energy Consumption and a (c) Growing Economy<blockquote>[2]（a）不断增长的债务、（b）不断增长的能源消耗和（c）不断增长的经济之间的相互关系</blockquote> When we are far from energy limits, growing debt seems to pull the economy along. This is a graphic I put together in 2018, explaining the situation. A small amount of debt is helpful to the system. But, if there gets to be too much debt, both oil prices and interest rates rise, bringing the braking system into action. The bicycle/economy rapidly slows.<blockquote>当我们远离能源极限时，不断增长的债务似乎会拉动经济。这是我在2018年整理的一张图，解释了情况。少量债务对系统有帮助。但是，如果债务过多，油价和利率都会上涨，制动系统就会发挥作用。自行车/经济迅速放缓。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/988ae9ff86e02ba9f0e17f7c656fa38a\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"345\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 1. The author’s view of the analogy of a speeding upright bicycle and a speeding economy.<blockquote>图1。作者对高速行驶的直立自行车与高速行驶的经济的类比的看法。</blockquote> Just as a two-wheeled bicycle needs to be going fast enough to stay upright, the economy needs to be growing rapidly enough for debt to do what it is intended to do. It takes energy supply to create the goods and services that the economy depends on.<blockquote>正如两轮自行车需要足够快才能保持直立一样，经济也需要足够快的速度增长，债务才能发挥其预期的作用。能源供应需要创造经济所依赖的商品和服务。</blockquote> If oil and other energy products are cheap to produce, their benefit will be widely available. Employers will be able to add more efficient machines, such as bigger tractors. These more efficient machines will act to leverage the human labor of the workers. The economy can grow rapidly, without the use of much debt. Figure 2 shows that the world oil price was $20 per barrel in 2020$, or even less, prior to 1974.<blockquote>如果石油和其他能源产品的生产成本低廉，它们的好处将广泛可用。雇主将能够增加更高效的机器，如更大的拖拉机。这些更高效的机器将利用工人的人力劳动。经济可以快速增长，而不需要使用大量债务。图2显示，2020年世界石油价格为每桶20美元，甚至比1974年还要低。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/0713c7ad2aa2952ae70ab31f031409a6\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"301\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 2. Oil price in 2020 dollars, based on amounts through 2019 in 2019$ from&nbsp;BP’s 2020 Statistical Review of World Energy, the inflationary adjustment from 2019 to 2020 based on CPI Urban prices from the US Department of Labor and the average spot Brent oil price for 2020 based on EIA information.<blockquote>图2。2020 年油价（美元），基于英国石油公司 2020 年《世界能源统计评论》中截至 2019 年的油价；2019 年至 2020 年的通胀调整；基于美国劳工部 CPI 城市价格；以及基于 EIA 信息的 2020 年布伦特原油平均现货价格。</blockquote> Figure 3 below shows the historical relationship between the growth in&nbsp;US energy consumption&nbsp;(red line) and&nbsp;the dollar increase in US debt growth required to add a dollar increase in GDP&nbsp;(blue line). This chart calculates ratios for five-year periods because ratios for individual years are unstable.<blockquote>下图3显示了美国能源消耗（红线）和美国债务增长的美元增加需要增加GDP的美元增加（蓝线）。此图表计算五年期间的比率，因为个别年份的比率不稳定。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/657120d86e4004601bc5a5909fa1cc55\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"303\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 3. Comparison of five-year average growth in US energy consumption based on EIA data with five-year average amount of added debt required to add $1 of GDP.<blockquote>图3。基于EIA数据的美国能源消耗五年平均增长率与增加1美元GDP所需的五年平均新增债务金额的比较。</blockquote> Based on Figure 3, the US average annual growth in energy consumption (red line) generally fell between 1951 and 2020. The quantity of debt that needed to be added to create an additional $1 dollar of GDP (blue line) has generally been rising.<blockquote>根据图3，美国能源消耗的年均增长率（红线）在1951年至2020年间普遍下降。创造1美元GDP（蓝线）所需增加的债务数量通常一直在上升。</blockquote> According to&nbsp;Investopedia,&nbsp;Gross domestic product&nbsp;(GDP) is the total monetary or market value of all the finished goods and services produced within a country’s borders in a specific time period.&nbsp;Notice that there is no mention of debt in this definition. If businesses or governments can find a way to make large amounts of credit available to borrowers who are not very credit worthy, it becomes easy to sell cars, motorcycles or homes to buyers who may never repay that debt. If the economy hits turbulence, these marginal buyers are likely to default, causing a collapse in a debt bubble.<blockquote>据 Investopedia 报道，国内生产总值 (国内生产总值) 是一国境内特定时期内生产的所有制成品和服务的总货币价值或市场价值。请注意，本定义中未提及债务。如果企业或政府能够找到一种方法，向信用状况不佳的借款人提供大量信贷，那么向可能永远无法偿还债务的买家出售汽车、摩托车或房屋就变得容易了。如果经济陷入动荡，这些边缘买家可能会违约，导致债务泡沫破裂。</blockquote> [3] Analyzing Energy Consumption Growth, Debt Growth and Economic Growth for Broader Groupings of Years<blockquote>[3]分析更广泛年份的能源消耗增长、债务增长和经济增长</blockquote> To get a better idea what is happening with respect to energy growth, debt growth, and GDP growth, I created some broader groupings of years, based primarily on patterns in Figure 2, showing inflation-adjusted oil prices. The following groupings of years were chosen:<blockquote>为了更好地了解能源增长、债务增长和GDP增长的情况，我创建了一些更广泛的年份分组，主要基于图2中显示通货膨胀调整后的油价的模式。选择了以下年份分组：</blockquote> <ul> <li>1950-1973<blockquote><ul><li>1950-1973</li></ul></blockquote></li> <li>1974-1980<blockquote><li>1974-1980</li></blockquote></li> <li>1981-2000<blockquote><li>1981-2000</li></blockquote></li> <li>2001-2014<blockquote><li>2001-2014</li></blockquote></li> <li>2015-2020<blockquote><li>2015-2020</li></blockquote></li> </ul> Using these groupings of years, I put together charts in which it is easier to see trends.<blockquote>使用这些年份的分组，我把图表放在一起，在图表中更容易看到趋势。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/602cfb962c02189ea5825a1f4f7d790d\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"302\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 4. Average annual increase in energy consumption for period shown based on EIA data versus average increase in real (inflation-adjusted) GDP for the period shown based on data of the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.<blockquote>图4。根据 EIA 数据显示的期间能源消耗的平均年增长率与根据美国经济分析局数据显示的期间实际（经通胀调整）GDP 的平均增长率相比。</blockquote> Figure 4 shows that for the US, there has been a general downward trend in the annual growth of energy consumption. At same time, real (that is, inflation-adjusted) GDP has been trending downward, but not quite as quickly.<blockquote>图4显示，对于美国来说，能源消耗的年增长率总体呈下降趋势。与此同时，实际（即通货膨胀调整后的）国内生产总值一直呈下降趋势，但速度没有那么快。</blockquote> We would expect that lower energy consumption would lead to lower growth in real GDP because it takes energy of the appropriate kinds to make goods and services. For example, it takes oil to ship most goods. It takes electricity to operate computers and keep the lights on. According to the&nbsp;World Coal Association, large quantities of coal are used in producing cement and steel. These are important for construction, such as is planned in stimulus projects around the world.<blockquote>我们预计，较低的能源消耗将导致实际GDP增长较低，因为制造商品和服务需要适当种类的能源。例如，运输大多数货物都需要石油。操作电脑和保持灯开着需要电力。据世界煤炭协会称，大量煤炭用于生产水泥和钢铁。这些对建设很重要，例如世界各地的刺激项目中计划的建设。</blockquote> Also, on Figure 4, the period 1981 to 2000 shows an uptick in both energy consumption growth and real GDP growth. This period corresponds to a period of relatively low oil prices (Figure 2). With lower oil prices, businesses found it affordable to add new devices to leverage human labor, making workers more productive. The growing productivity of workers is at least part of what led to the increased growth in real GDP.<blockquote>此外，在图4中，1981年至2000年期间，能源消耗增长和实际GDP增长都有所上升。这一时期对应于油价相对较低的时期（图2）。随着油价下跌，企业发现增加新设备来利用人类劳动力是负担得起的，从而提高工人的生产力。工人生产率的提高至少是导致实际GDP增长的部分原因。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9dfc9c699891a0b02f9e46e6f3f53bda\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"301\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 5. Dollars of additional debt required to add $1 dollar of GDP growth (including inflation), based on data of the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.<blockquote>图5。根据美国经济分析局的数据，增加1美元的GDP增长（包括通货膨胀）所需的额外债务。</blockquote> Figure 5, above, is disturbing. It strongly suggests that the US economy (and probably a lot of other economies) has needed to add an increasing amount of debt to add $1 of GDP in recent years. This pattern started long before President Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package in 2021.<blockquote>上图5令人不安。这强烈表明，近年来，美国经济（可能还有许多其他经济体）需要增加越来越多的债务，以增加1美元的GDP。这种模式早在拜登总统 2021 年推出 1.9 万亿美元经济刺激计划之前就开始了。</blockquote> To make matters worse, GDP growth in Figure 5 has not been reduced to remove the impact of inflation. On average, removing the impact of inflation reduces the above GDP growth by about half. In the period 2015 to 2020, it took about $4.35 of additional debt to add one dollar of GDP growth, including inflation. It would take about double that amount, or $8.70 worth of debt, to create $1.00 worth of inflation-adjusted growth. With such a low return on added debt, it seems unlikely that the $1.9 trillion stimulus package will increase the growth of the economy very much.<blockquote>更糟糕的是，图5中的GDP增长并没有降低以消除通货膨胀的影响。平均而言，去除通货膨胀的影响会使上述GDP增长减少一半左右。在2015年至2020年期间，包括通货膨胀在内，增加1美元的GDP增长需要大约4.35美元的额外债务。需要大约两倍的金额，即价值8.70美元的债务，才能创造价值1.00美元的通胀调整后的增长。由于增加债务的回报率如此之低，1.9万亿美元的刺激计划似乎不太可能大大促进经济增长。</blockquote> [4] Falling interest rates (Figure 6) are a major part of what allowed the rapid growth in debt after 1981 shown in Figure 5.<blockquote>[4]利率下降（图6）是1981年后债务快速增长的一个主要因素，如图5所示。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/74f347d946ebcebc62fe4fdee1dfffd3\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"193\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 6. 10-Year and 3-Month US Treasury Rates through February 2021, in a chart prepared by the Federal Reserve of St. Louis.<blockquote>图6。圣路易斯美联储编制的图表显示了截至2021年2月的10年期和3个月期美国国债利率。</blockquote> Clearly, debt is more affordable if the interest rate is lower. For example, auto loans and home mortgages have lower monthly payments if the interest rate is lower. It is also clear that governments need to spend less of their tax revenue on interest rate payments if interest rates are lower. Changes made by US President Ronald Reagan when he took office 1981 also encouraged the use of more debt.<blockquote>显然，如果利率较低，债务就更容易负担得起。例如，如果利率较低，汽车贷款和住房抵押贷款的月供就会较低。同样明显的是，如果利率较低，政府需要将更少的税收收入用于利率支付。美国总统罗纳德·里根在1981年上任时做出的改变也鼓励使用更多的债务。</blockquote> A major concern with respect to today’s debt bubble is the fact that interest rates are about as low as they can go without going negative. In fact, the interest rate on 10-year Treasury bonds is now 1.72%, which is higher than the February 2021 average rate shown on the chart. As interest rates rise, it becomes more costly to add more debt. As interest rates rise, businesses will be less likely to take on debt in order to expand and hire more workers.<blockquote>当今债务泡沫的一个主要问题是，利率在不变成负值的情况下已经尽可能低了。事实上，10年期国债利率现在为1.72%，高于图表中显示的2021年2月平均利率。随着利率上升，增加更多债务的成本变得更高。随着利率上升，企业不太可能为了扩张和雇佣更多工人而举债。</blockquote> [5] Interest expense is a major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners everywhere. Energy costs are another major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners. It makes sense that falling interest rates can partly hide rising energy prices.<blockquote>[5]利息支出是世界各地政府、企业和房主的主要支出。能源成本是政府、企业和房主的另一项主要开支。利率下降可以部分掩盖能源价格上涨，这是有道理的。</blockquote> A trend toward lower interest rates was needed starting in 1981 because the US could no longer produce large amounts of crude oil that were profitable to sell at less than $20 per barrel, in inflation-adjusted prices. Lower interest rates made adding debt more feasible. This added debt could smooth the transition to an economy that was less dependent on oil, now that it was high-priced. The lower interest rates helped all segments of the economy adjust to the new higher cost of oil and other fuels.<blockquote>从 1981 年开始，美国需要出现降低利率的趋势，因为美国无法再生产大量原油，而这些原油按通货膨胀调整后的价格以每桶不到 20 美元的价格出售是有利可图的。较低的利率使得增加债务更加可行。由于石油价格昂贵，这种额外的债务可能会平稳过渡，向一个不那么依赖石油的经济过渡。较低的利率帮助所有经济部门适应石油和其他燃料成本的上涨。</blockquote> [6] The US experience shows precisely how helpful having a rapidly growing supply of inexpensive to produce oil could be to an economy.<blockquote>[6]美国的经验清楚地表明，快速增长的廉价石油供应对经济有多大帮助。</blockquote> US oil production, excluding Alaska (blue “remainder” in Figure 7), rose rapidly after 1945 but began to decline not long after hitting a peak in 1970. This growing oil production had temporarily provided a huge boost to the US economy.<blockquote>美国石油产量（不包括阿拉斯加（图 7 中的蓝色 “剩余部分”）在 1945 年后迅速上升，但在 1970 年达到峰值后不久就开始下降。这种不断增长的石油产量暂时为美国经济提供了巨大的推动力。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f4038b2f211130347e8f49562c4fcac0\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"303\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 7. US crude oil production, based on data of the US Energy Information Administration.<blockquote>图7。美国原油产量，基于美国能源信息署的数据。</blockquote> Up until almost 1970, US oil production was rising rapidly. Figure 8 shows that during this period, incomes of both the bottom 90% of workers and the top 10% of workers increased rapidly. Over a period of about 20 years, incomes for both groups grew by about 80%, after adjusting for inflation. On average, workers were about 4% better off each year, with the rapid growth in very inexpensive-to-produce oil, all of which stayed in the US (rather than being exported). US imports of inexpensive-to-produce oil also&nbsp;grew during this period.<blockquote>直到1970年，美国的石油产量一直在快速增长。图8显示，在此期间，底层90%的工人和顶层10%的工人的收入都快速增长。在大约20年的时间里，经通货膨胀调整后，这两个群体的收入增长了约80%。平均而言，随着生产成本非常低廉的石油的快速增长，工人的收入每年提高约4%，所有这些石油都留在了美国（而不是出口）。在此期间，美国生产成本低廉的石油进口也有所增长。</blockquote> Once oil prices were higher, income growth for both the lower 90% and the top 10% slowed. With the changes made starting in 1981, wage disparities quickly started to grow. There suddenly became a need for new, high-tech approaches that used less oil. But these changes were more helpful to the managers and highly educated workers than the bottom 90% of workers.<blockquote>一旦油价上涨，收入最低的90%和收入最高的10%的人的收入增长都会放缓。随着1981年开始的变化，工资差距开始迅速扩大。人们突然需要使用更少石油的新的高科技方法。但这些变化对管理者和受过高等教育的工人比底层90%的工人更有帮助。</blockquote> <img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/863a8245e4a663113ef507527988a806\" tg-width=\"500\" tg-height=\"361\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\"><blockquote></blockquote> Figure 8. Chart comparing income gains by the top 10% to income gains by the bottom 90% by economist Emmanuel Saez. Based on an analysis of IRS data,&nbsp;published in Forbes.<blockquote>图8。经济学家 Emmanuel Saez 绘制的图表比较了收入最高 10% 的收入增长和收入最低 90% 的收入增长。基于对国税局数据的分析，发表在《福布斯》上。</blockquote> [7] Most of the world’s cheap-to-extract oil sources have now been exhausted. Our problem is that the world market cannot get prices to rise high enough for producers to cover all of their expenses, including taxes.<blockquote>[7] 世界上大多数廉价开采的石油资源现已枯竭。我们的问题是，世界市场无法让价格上涨到足以让生产商支付包括税收在内的所有费用。</blockquote> Based on my analysis, the world price of oil would need to be at least $120 per barrel to cover all of the costs it needs to cover. The costs that need to be covered include more items than an oil company would normally include in its costs estimates. The company needs to develop new fields to compensate for the ones that are being exhausted. It needs to pay interest on its debt. It also needs to pay dividends to its shareholders. In the case of shale producers, the price needs to be high enough that production outside of “sweet spots” can be carried on profitably.<blockquote>根据我的分析，世界石油价格至少需要每桶 120 美元才能覆盖其需要覆盖的所有成本。需要涵盖的成本包括比石油公司通常在成本估算中包含的更多的项目。该公司需要开发新的油田来弥补正在枯竭的油田。它需要支付债务利息。它还需要向股东支付股息。就页岩生产商而言，价格需要足够高，以便在 “甜蜜点 ”之外进行生产。</blockquote> For oil exporters, it is especially important that the sales price be high enough so that the government of the oil exporting country can collect adequate tax revenue. Otherwise, the exporting country will not be able to maintain food subsidy programs that the population depends on and public works programs that provide jobs.<blockquote>对于石油出口国来说，销售价格足够高，以便石油出口国政府能够征收足够的税收尤为重要。否则，出口国将无法维持人口赖以生存的粮食补贴计划和提供就业机会的公共工程计划。</blockquote> [8] The world can add more debt, but it is difficult to see how the debt bubble that is created will really pull the world economy forward rapidly enough to keep the debt bubble from collapsing in the next year or two.<blockquote>[8]世界可以增加更多的债务，但很难看到正在制造的债务泡沫将如何真正快速地拉动世界经济向前发展，以防止债务泡沫在未来一两年内崩溃。</blockquote> Many models are based on the assumption that the economy can easily go back to the growth rate it had, prior to COVID-19. There are several reasons why this seems unlikely:<blockquote>许多模型都基于这样的假设：经济可以很容易地恢复到 COVID-19 之前的增长率。这似乎不太可能有几个原因：</blockquote> <ul> <li>Many parts of the world economy weren’t really growing very rapidly prior to the pandemic. For example, shopping malls were doing poorly. Many airlines were in financial difficulty. Private passenger auto sales in China reached a peak in 2017 and have declined every year since.<blockquote><ul><li>在大流行病之前，世界经济的许多地区并没有真正快速增长。例如，购物中心表现不佳。许多航空公司陷入财务困境。中国私人乘用车销量在2017年达到顶峰，此后逐年下降。</li></ul></blockquote></li> <li>At the low oil prices prior to the pandemic, many oil producers (including the US) would need to reduce their production. The 2019 peak in shale production (shown in Figure 7) may prove to be the peak in US oil production because of low prices.<blockquote><li>在疫情爆发前的低油价下，许多石油生产国（包括美国）需要减产。由于价格低廉，2019年页岩油产量的峰值（如图7所示）可能会被证明是美国石油产量的峰值。</li></blockquote></li> <li>Once people became accustomed to working from home, many of them really do not want to go back to a long commute.<blockquote><li>一旦人们习惯了在家工作，他们中的许多人真的不想回到长途通勤。</li></blockquote></li> <li>It is not clear that the pandemic is really going away, now that we have kept it around this long. New mutations keep appearing. Vaccines aren’t 100% effective.<blockquote><li>现在还不清楚疫情是否真的会消失，因为我们已经把它保留了这么久。新的突变不断出现。疫苗并非100%有效。</li></blockquote></li> <li>As I showed in Figure 5, adding more debt seems to be a very inefficient way of digging the economy out of a hole. What is really needed is a growing supply of oil that can be produced and sold profitably for less than $20 per barrel. Other types of energy need to be similarly inexpensive.<blockquote><li>正如我在图5中展示的那样，增加更多的债务似乎是一种非常低效的让经济走出困境的方式。真正需要的是不断增长的石油供应，这种石油可以以每桶不到20美元的价格生产和销售。其他类型的能源也需要同样便宜。</li></blockquote></li> </ul> I should note that intermittent wind and solar energy is not an adequate substitute for oil. It is not even an adequate substitute for “dispatchable” electricity production. It is simply an energy product that has been sufficiently subsidized that it can often make money for its producers. It also sounds good, if it is referred to as “clean energy.” Unfortunately, its true value is lower than its cost of production.<blockquote>我应该指出，间歇性风能和太阳能并不能充分替代石油。它甚至不能充分替代“可调度”发电。它只是一种能源产品，得到了足够的补贴，经常可以为生产者赚钱。如果它被称为 “清洁能源 ”，听起来也不错。不幸的是，它的真实价值低于其生产成本。</blockquote> [9] What’s Ahead?<blockquote>[9] 未来会怎样？</blockquote> I expect that oil prices will rise a bit, but not enough to raise prices to the level producers require. Interest rates will continue to rise as governments around the world attempt more stimulus. With these higher interest rates and higher oil prices, businesses will do less and less well. This will slow the economy enough that debt defaults become a major problem. Within a few months to a year, the worldwide debt bubble will start to collapse, bringing oil prices down by more than 50%. Stock market prices and prices of buildings of all kinds will fall in inflation-adjusted dollars. Many bonds will prove to be worthless. There will be problems with empty shelves in stores and gasoline stations with no products to sell.<blockquote>我预计油价会小幅上涨，但不足以将价格提高到生产商要求的水平。随着世界各国政府尝试更多刺激措施，利率将继续上升。随着利率上升和油价上涨，企业的生意会越来越差。这将使经济放缓到足以使债务违约成为一个主要问题。在几个月到一年内，全球债务泡沫将开始崩溃，导致油价下跌50%以上。股票市场价格和各种建筑物的价格将以通货膨胀调整后的美元计算下跌。许多债券将被证明一文不值。商店和加油站会出现货架空，没有产品可卖的问题。</blockquote> People will start to see that while debt is a promise for the equivalent of future goods and services, it is not necessarily the case that those who make the promises will be able to stand behind these promises. Paper wealth generally can be expected to lose its value.<blockquote>人们将开始看到，虽然债务是对未来商品和服务等价物的承诺，但做出承诺的人未必能够支持这些承诺。纸面财富通常会失去价值。</blockquote> I can imagine a situation, not too many years from now, whencountries everywhere will establish new currencies that are not as easily interchangeablewith other currencies as today’s currencies are. International trade will dramatically fall. The standard of living of most people will fall precipitously.<blockquote>我可以想象一种情况，不久之后，当世界各国都将建立新的货币，但这些货币并不容易兑换其他货币与今天的货币相同。国际贸易将急剧下降。大多数人的生活水平将急剧下降。</blockquote> I doubt that the new currencies will be electronic currencies. Keeping the electricity on is a difficult task in economies that increasingly need to rely solely on local resources. Electricity may be out for months at a time after an equipment failure or a storm. Having a currency that depends on electricity alone would be a poor idea.<blockquote>我怀疑新货币会是电子货币。在越来越需要完全依赖当地资源的经济体中，保持电力供应是一项艰巨的任务。设备故障或暴风雨过后，一次可能会停电数月。拥有一种完全依赖电力的货币是一个坏主意。</blockquote>\n<div class=\"bt-text\">\n\n\n 来源：<a href=\"https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/headed-collapsing-debt-bubble\">zerohedge</a>\n为提升您的阅读体验，我们对本页面进行了排版优化\n\n\n</div>\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{},"source_url":"https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/headed-collapsing-debt-bubble","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1158879714","content_text":"A $1.9 trillion stimulus package was recently signed into law in the United States. Can such a stimulus bill, plus packages passed in other countries, really pull the world economy out of the downturn it has been in 2020? I don’t think so.\nThe economy runs on energy, far more than it operates on growing debt. Our energy problems don’t appear to be fixable in the near term, such as six months or a year. Instead, the economy seems to be headed for a collapse of its debt bubble. Eventually, we may see a reset of the world financial system leading to fewer interchangeable currencies, far less international trade and falling production of goods and services. Some governments may collapse.\n[1] What Is Debt?\nI understand debt to be an indirect promise for future goods and services. These future goods and services can only be created if there are adequate supplies of the right kinds of energy and other materials, in the right places, to make these future goods and services.\nI think of debt as being a time-shifting device. Indirectly, it is a promise that the economy will be able to provide as many, or more, goods and services in the future compared to what it does at the time the loan is taken out.\nCommon sense suggests that it is much easier to repay debt with interest in a growing economy than in a shrinking economy. Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff unexpectedly ran across this phenomenon in their 2008 working paper, This Time Is Different: A Panoramic View of Eight Centuries of Financial Crises. They reported (p. 15), “It is notable that the non-defaulters, by and large, are all hugely successful growth stories.” In other words, their analysis of 800 years of governmental debt showed that default was almost inevitable if a country stopped growing or started shrinking.\nThe IMF estimates that the world economy shrank by 3.5% in 2020. There are many areas with even worse indications: Euro Area, -7.2%; United Kingdom, -10.0%; India, -8.0%; Mexico, -8.5%; and South Africa, -7.5%. If these situations cannot be turned around quickly, we should expect to see collapsing debt bubbles. Even the US, which shrank by 3.4%, needs a rapid return to growth if it is to keep its debt bubble inflated.\n[2] The Inter-Relationship Among (a) Growing Debt, (b) Growing Energy Consumption and a (c) Growing Economy\nWhen we are far from energy limits, growing debt seems to pull the economy along. This is a graphic I put together in 2018, explaining the situation. A small amount of debt is helpful to the system. But, if there gets to be too much debt, both oil prices and interest rates rise, bringing the braking system into action. The bicycle/economy rapidly slows.\n\nFigure 1. The author’s view of the analogy of a speeding upright bicycle and a speeding economy.\nJust as a two-wheeled bicycle needs to be going fast enough to stay upright, the economy needs to be growing rapidly enough for debt to do what it is intended to do. It takes energy supply to create the goods and services that the economy depends on.\nIf oil and other energy products are cheap to produce, their benefit will be widely available. Employers will be able to add more efficient machines, such as bigger tractors. These more efficient machines will act to leverage the human labor of the workers. The economy can grow rapidly, without the use of much debt. Figure 2 shows that the world oil price was $20 per barrel in 2020$, or even less, prior to 1974.\n\nFigure 2. Oil price in 2020 dollars, based on amounts through 2019 in 2019$ from BP’s 2020 Statistical Review of World Energy, the inflationary adjustment from 2019 to 2020 based on CPI Urban prices from the US Department of Labor and the average spot Brent oil price for 2020 based on EIA information.\nFigure 3 below shows the historical relationship between the growth in US energy consumption (red line) and the dollar increase in US debt growth required to add a dollar increase in GDP (blue line). This chart calculates ratios for five-year periods because ratios for individual years are unstable.\n\nFigure 3. Comparison of five-year average growth in US energy consumption based on EIA data with five-year average amount of added debt required to add $1 of GDP.\nBased on Figure 3, the US average annual growth in energy consumption (red line) generally fell between 1951 and 2020. The quantity of debt that needed to be added to create an additional $1 dollar of GDP (blue line) has generally been rising.\nAccording to Investopedia, Gross domestic product (GDP) is the total monetary or market value of all the finished goods and services produced within a country’s borders in a specific time period. Notice that there is no mention of debt in this definition. If businesses or governments can find a way to make large amounts of credit available to borrowers who are not very credit worthy, it becomes easy to sell cars, motorcycles or homes to buyers who may never repay that debt. If the economy hits turbulence, these marginal buyers are likely to default, causing a collapse in a debt bubble.\n[3] Analyzing Energy Consumption Growth, Debt Growth and Economic Growth for Broader Groupings of Years\nTo get a better idea what is happening with respect to energy growth, debt growth, and GDP growth, I created some broader groupings of years, based primarily on patterns in Figure 2, showing inflation-adjusted oil prices. The following groupings of years were chosen:\n\n1950-1973\n1974-1980\n1981-2000\n2001-2014\n2015-2020\n\nUsing these groupings of years, I put together charts in which it is easier to see trends.\n\nFigure 4. Average annual increase in energy consumption for period shown based on EIA data versus average increase in real (inflation-adjusted) GDP for the period shown based on data of the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.\nFigure 4 shows that for the US, there has been a general downward trend in the annual growth of energy consumption. At same time, real (that is, inflation-adjusted) GDP has been trending downward, but not quite as quickly.\nWe would expect that lower energy consumption would lead to lower growth in real GDP because it takes energy of the appropriate kinds to make goods and services. For example, it takes oil to ship most goods. It takes electricity to operate computers and keep the lights on. According to the World Coal Association, large quantities of coal are used in producing cement and steel. These are important for construction, such as is planned in stimulus projects around the world.\nAlso, on Figure 4, the period 1981 to 2000 shows an uptick in both energy consumption growth and real GDP growth. This period corresponds to a period of relatively low oil prices (Figure 2). With lower oil prices, businesses found it affordable to add new devices to leverage human labor, making workers more productive. The growing productivity of workers is at least part of what led to the increased growth in real GDP.\n\nFigure 5. Dollars of additional debt required to add $1 dollar of GDP growth (including inflation), based on data of the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.\nFigure 5, above, is disturbing. It strongly suggests that the US economy (and probably a lot of other economies) has needed to add an increasing amount of debt to add $1 of GDP in recent years. This pattern started long before President Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package in 2021.\nTo make matters worse, GDP growth in Figure 5 has not been reduced to remove the impact of inflation. On average, removing the impact of inflation reduces the above GDP growth by about half. In the period 2015 to 2020, it took about $4.35 of additional debt to add one dollar of GDP growth, including inflation. It would take about double that amount, or $8.70 worth of debt, to create $1.00 worth of inflation-adjusted growth. With such a low return on added debt, it seems unlikely that the $1.9 trillion stimulus package will increase the growth of the economy very much.\n[4] Falling interest rates (Figure 6) are a major part of what allowed the rapid growth in debt after 1981 shown in Figure 5.\n\nFigure 6. 10-Year and 3-Month US Treasury Rates through February 2021, in a chart prepared by the Federal Reserve of St. Louis.\nClearly, debt is more affordable if the interest rate is lower. For example, auto loans and home mortgages have lower monthly payments if the interest rate is lower. It is also clear that governments need to spend less of their tax revenue on interest rate payments if interest rates are lower. Changes made by US President Ronald Reagan when he took office 1981 also encouraged the use of more debt.\nA major concern with respect to today’s debt bubble is the fact that interest rates are about as low as they can go without going negative. In fact, the interest rate on 10-year Treasury bonds is now 1.72%, which is higher than the February 2021 average rate shown on the chart. As interest rates rise, it becomes more costly to add more debt. As interest rates rise, businesses will be less likely to take on debt in order to expand and hire more workers.\n[5] Interest expense is a major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners everywhere. Energy costs are another major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners. It makes sense that falling interest rates can partly hide rising energy prices.\nA trend toward lower interest rates was needed starting in 1981 because the US could no longer produce large amounts of crude oil that were profitable to sell at less than $20 per barrel, in inflation-adjusted prices. Lower interest rates made adding debt more feasible. This added debt could smooth the transition to an economy that was less dependent on oil, now that it was high-priced. The lower interest rates helped all segments of the economy adjust to the new higher cost of oil and other fuels.\n[6] The US experience shows precisely how helpful having a rapidly growing supply of inexpensive to produce oil could be to an economy.\nUS oil production, excluding Alaska (blue “remainder” in Figure 7), rose rapidly after 1945 but began to decline not long after hitting a peak in 1970. This growing oil production had temporarily provided a huge boost to the US economy.\n\nFigure 7. US crude oil production, based on data of the US Energy Information Administration.\nUp until almost 1970, US oil production was rising rapidly. Figure 8 shows that during this period, incomes of both the bottom 90% of workers and the top 10% of workers increased rapidly. Over a period of about 20 years, incomes for both groups grew by about 80%, after adjusting for inflation. On average, workers were about 4% better off each year, with the rapid growth in very inexpensive-to-produce oil, all of which stayed in the US (rather than being exported). US imports of inexpensive-to-produce oil also grew during this period.\nOnce oil prices were higher, income growth for both the lower 90% and the top 10% slowed. With the changes made starting in 1981, wage disparities quickly started to grow. There suddenly became a need for new, high-tech approaches that used less oil. But these changes were more helpful to the managers and highly educated workers than the bottom 90% of workers.\n\nFigure 8. Chart comparing income gains by the top 10% to income gains by the bottom 90% by economist Emmanuel Saez. Based on an analysis of IRS data, published in Forbes.\n[7] Most of the world’s cheap-to-extract oil sources have now been exhausted. Our problem is that the world market cannot get prices to rise high enough for producers to cover all of their expenses, including taxes.\nBased on my analysis, the world price of oil would need to be at least $120 per barrel to cover all of the costs it needs to cover. The costs that need to be covered include more items than an oil company would normally include in its costs estimates. The company needs to develop new fields to compensate for the ones that are being exhausted. It needs to pay interest on its debt. It also needs to pay dividends to its shareholders. In the case of shale producers, the price needs to be high enough that production outside of “sweet spots” can be carried on profitably.\nFor oil exporters, it is especially important that the sales price be high enough so that the government of the oil exporting country can collect adequate tax revenue. Otherwise, the exporting country will not be able to maintain food subsidy programs that the population depends on and public works programs that provide jobs.\n[8] The world can add more debt, but it is difficult to see how the debt bubble that is created will really pull the world economy forward rapidly enough to keep the debt bubble from collapsing in the next year or two.\nMany models are based on the assumption that the economy can easily go back to the growth rate it had, prior to COVID-19. There are several reasons why this seems unlikely:\n\nMany parts of the world economy weren’t really growing very rapidly prior to the pandemic. For example, shopping malls were doing poorly. Many airlines were in financial difficulty. Private passenger auto sales in China reached a peak in 2017 and have declined every year since.\nAt the low oil prices prior to the pandemic, many oil producers (including the US) would need to reduce their production. The 2019 peak in shale production (shown in Figure 7) may prove to be the peak in US oil production because of low prices.\nOnce people became accustomed to working from home, many of them really do not want to go back to a long commute.\nIt is not clear that the pandemic is really going away, now that we have kept it around this long. New mutations keep appearing. Vaccines aren’t 100% effective.\nAs I showed in Figure 5, adding more debt seems to be a very inefficient way of digging the economy out of a hole. What is really needed is a growing supply of oil that can be produced and sold profitably for less than $20 per barrel. Other types of energy need to be similarly inexpensive.\n\nI should note that intermittent wind and solar energy is not an adequate substitute for oil. It is not even an adequate substitute for “dispatchable” electricity production. It is simply an energy product that has been sufficiently subsidized that it can often make money for its producers. It also sounds good, if it is referred to as “clean energy.” Unfortunately, its true value is lower than its cost of production.\n[9] What’s Ahead?\nI expect that oil prices will rise a bit, but not enough to raise prices to the level producers require. Interest rates will continue to rise as governments around the world attempt more stimulus. With these higher interest rates and higher oil prices, businesses will do less and less well. This will slow the economy enough that debt defaults become a major problem. Within a few months to a year, the worldwide debt bubble will start to collapse, bringing oil prices down by more than 50%. Stock market prices and prices of buildings of all kinds will fall in inflation-adjusted dollars. Many bonds will prove to be worthless. There will be problems with empty shelves in stores and gasoline stations with no products to sell.\nPeople will start to see that while debt is a promise for the equivalent of future goods and services, it is not necessarily the case that those who make the promises will be able to stand behind these promises. Paper wealth generally can be expected to lose its value.\nI can imagine a situation, not too many years from now, whencountries everywhere will establish new currencies that are not as easily interchangeablewith other currencies as today’s currencies are. International trade will dramatically fall. The standard of living of most people will fall precipitously.\nI doubt that the new currencies will be electronic currencies. Keeping the electricity on is a difficult task in economies that increasingly need to rely solely on local resources. Electricity may be out for months at a time after an equipment failure or a storm. Having a currency that depends on electricity alone would be a poor idea.","news_type":1,"symbols_score_info":{}},"isVote":1,"tweetType":1,"viewCount":545,"commentLimit":10,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"symbols":[],"verified":2,"subType":0,"readableState":1,"langContent":"EN","currentLanguage":"EN","warmUpFlag":false,"orderFlag":false,"shareable":true,"causeOfNotShareable":"","featuresForAnalytics":[],"commentAndTweetFlag":false,"andRepostAutoSelectedFlag":false,"upFlag":false,"length":7,"xxTargetLangEnum":"ORIG"},"commentList":[],"isCommentEnd":true,"isTiger":false,"isWeiXinMini":false,"url":"/m/post/359876652"}