Michael, I earned my living by hawking oil products. It always amuses me when people go on about the "oil weapon". As though Iran can do great harm to the Great Satan by turning off their oil. <The Iranians have much to worry about in an economic clash with the US. >
Sellers of fungible products have got a lot more to worry about than their customers. Sure, if MSFT turned off my computer and I had to go to Linux or something, it would be a problem. Which shows how little of a monopoly they have - I'd be in business in no time and the cost would be trivial.
If Shell goes out of business [or goes on strike to punish vehicle drivers], I would cruise on by to one of several other service stations. Come to think of it, I rarely buy Shell anyway so it would cause a bit more congestion on other service stations, which is no problem as they don't design service stations and supermarkets to have big queues as customers will go elsewhere. Governments design roads to have traffic jams [dum governments].
I didn't ever think it a good idea to tell customers that I might make them be nice to me by threatening to stop selling oil. My boss would have fired me [and probably phone a psychiatrist].
It would be much more a problem for Iran if the USA wouldn't accept their oil than a problem of the USA if Iran said they wouldn't supply. Even at current prices, there will be a LOT of people trimming their consumption of oil. They'll switch to something else, then, when oil prices drop, they won't take out their insulation, buy a bigger vehicle having scrapped their old monster [which they maybe scrapped a year earlier than would otherwise have happened], or turn off a nuclear reactor, or photovoltaics, or new coal quarry.
If the USA blockades Iran and Iran can't sell their oil at all, that would be a really big problem for Iran. Not for the USA.
Mqurice |
