Intellectual Capital: A Commodity?

For all of us who thought that who was president did not mean much, this last seven plus years have changed all that. The historians will have a field day if they get into what could have been if other avenues were taken by the present administration. Everyone will want to talk about the “war” in Iraq, but the most important blunder of this administration has taken place in the last several months. With gas and diesel prices at the pump nearing $4 a gallon, the president could have opened up the oil reserves and used them to beat down the price of crude oil per barrel. This would have taken some risks, but the damage that $4 a gallon gas has presented to our domestic economy will not be fully felt for several months. Just as there is a lag effect when the government spends money in the private sector to stimulate the economy, so too is there a lag effect when money is taken out of the economy as well. American families are hurting more than they realize and the suffering that we are seeing in our economy may not have reached bottom yet. The “tax” that $4 a gallon gas has placed on the American consumer, as I have written before, has taken a lot of air out of our domestic economy.

Much of this could have been avoided had we had a president that understood just a little about economics and markets. By the government being a player in the oil market, some of the smaller players might have been moved to the sidelines. As we have seen recently, the price of a barrel of oil goes down as well as up. But, such an action by our government would have meant the use of their intellectual capital and that is a commodity they are in short supply of already.

Stay Tuned.