The Obama administration seems to believe that more government spending on temporary projects is the best way to create jobs. Common sense suggests that recovery and growth of the private sector is the way to go. Government projects only raise the deficit and create economic uncertainty among the segments of the private sector who have the capital to create real jobs.
It is thus not surprising that the Obama administration has put off deciding on a large-scale private sector project that would create both temporary and long-term jobs and lower the cost of oil in the U.S.--the Keystone XL pipeline. The environmental concerns have already been addressed. See the linked article by a well-known Texas economist.
What about the property rights of the folks who may not want to sell and move from the designated pipeline corridor?
ReplyDeleteWhy not refine the petroleum, to higher value product, closer to the production site, then sell that product as locally as possible?
. . . a Texas economist . . . izzat like a jumbo shrimp?
ReplyDeleteBennett & Ridgway:
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comments. The Fifth Amendment recognizes that governments have the power of eminent domain. The only requirements are that the taking be compensated and be for "public use."
The Supreme Court watered down the latter in the Kelo decision. No rights, including property rights are absolute. If we want Canadian oil and gas, we don't want Canadians to sell it all locally. Further, they can't consume it all. That's why they are supporting the pipeline. If there is no pipeline to and into the U.S., the Canadians will ship it to their west coast and export it to the Chinese and Indians. We have then lost a source of energy in a neighboring, stable country. We then have to increase reliance on our "friends" in the Middle East. One things professional economists from Texas do understand is the oil and gas business.