Every country that draws from the bathtub suffers from price shocks, but the United States suffers more than its peers. The U.S. economy has a high oil intensity; it consumes a lot of oil to produce each dollar of its gross domestic product. America’s economy is more than 40 percent more oil-intensive than China’s, even though China is a net oil importer and sources much of its oil from Persian Gulf countries, including Iran. The European Union’s economy is half as oil-intensive as America’s. Even Russia, a petrostate, is about 20 percent less reliant on oil per unit of economic output than the United States is.
China is still a developing country in many ways. Developing countries tend to consume more oil than fully industrialized ones. But China also recognized its strategic vulnerability to oil shocks years ago and has been methodically decreasing it — not with warships but with electric vehicles and high-speed electric rail. Chinese gasoline consumption appears to have peaked in 2023, far earlier than analysts expected. According to an analysis by BloombergNEF, some two-thirds of electric vehicles sold worldwide are purchased in China, and within the next year, China’s E.V. sales are projected to exceed the entire U.S. car market.
The solution to this problem isn't more oil production. It's less oil consumption. Less oil consumption being the opposite of trump's goal. He of the "drill, baby, drill" camp.
Is it surprising he has positioned the US in exactly the wrong way? No. Because when it comes to strategery (thanks George) Don's tends to be impulsive, self-indulgent, ignorant, and non fact based. But he does know his bread has been buttered by legacy oil company donations. Remember his offer during the campaign?
Trump pressed oil executives to give $1 billion for his campaign, people in industry say
Former President Donald Trump asked oil industry executives last month to donate $1 billion to aid his campaign to retake the White House, three people familiar with the conversation told POLITICO — a request that campaign finance experts said appeared troubling but is probably legal.
The request, first reported Thursday by The Washington Post, occurred during a meeting of industry executives at the former president’s home in Palm Beach, Florida.
The oil industry has a long list of policy actions it would want Trump to take, including dismantling parts of President Joe Biden’s green agenda and rolling back pollution regulations that threaten to crimp their profits. As POLITICO reported Wednesday, oil executives are also preparing some highly specific requests for Trump, including executive orders they hope he would sign if reelected.
