Traditional economics says that whoever controls the world's natural resources and essential commodities controls the world. This also means that if there are only limited resources, one person's gain must be another person's loss; the richer one person is, the poorer his neighbors must be.
Economist Paul Pilzer argues that today we do not live in a resource-scarce environment – that in fact accelerated technological development has virtually eliminated scarcity. We live in a world today that Pilzer calls an Alchemic world – a world where the opportunities are unlimited, and wealth is not a finite pie to be cut up.
Just as the alchemists of old attempted to create gold from base metals, today we are able to create great value (and ultimately great wealth) from mundane and otherwise "worthless" resources. Today we can even make "computers from dirt". So what's the magic ingredient? Technology.
In 1972, the Club of Rome, a consortium of scientists, industrialists, politicians and world thinkers from 25 countries issued The Limits to Growth, a doom and gloom report warning that among other things, the world's oil resources would only last another 40 years at then current rates of consumption. Fifteen years later the reserves were estimated at nearly twice what the anticipated amount should have been.
As we enter the last years of this century, the effective supply of energy reserves by 2000 is anticipated to be 50% larger than it was in 1980. The same is true of most other commodities. So how did this happen? Technology.
First by improving our abilities to find, obtain, distribute, and store resources, and second by improving the efficiency with which we use the resources. In the case of automobiles, the simple act of replacing $300 carburetors with $25 fuel injectors doubled the fuel efficiency of new cars by 35% in less than a decade.
And, as supplies increase and technology improves, the price of products becomes less. So the relative price of oil has come back down from the huge increases of the 70's. This also shows up as being able to get more car for the price, and cars that last longer with less repairs. When's the last time someone in your office called in late because of a flat tire or a blowout? Even tires are lasting longer now.
Pilzer's optimistic books include several examples of how the principles of Alchemy work, and how to create wealth by closing the gap between the level of technology currently being used and level that is available. He is an economist I can agree with and he writes so that others can understand.
I highly recommend using these books to begin closing your own technology gap and finding ways to work smarter. By his own explanation, Unlimited Wealth is geared more towards the economist, while God Wants You to Be Rich has plenty of specific examples for the businessperson or budding entrepreneur.
Summaries by Katie Darden
|
|
