Essentially mexicos energy sector sucks, they have everything they need to fix it but cant because of internal politics.
It's not skills, it's political culture plus law and order. Corruption, bureaucracy, and what Zeihan calls "one of world's most draconian anti-investment laws".Hard to build up the skill base for advanced oil extraction when most of your country is under the control of one cartel or another, and young people aren't exactly going to Mexico for high-end tech jobs either.
Yes, the anti-investment laws are very much an issue.It's not skills, it's political culture plus law and order. Corruption, bureaucracy, and what Zeihan calls "one of world's most draconian anti-investment laws".
State monopoly? Incompetent? Can't keep up with modern techs? Poor organization and corruption? Socialist government? Where have we heard that kind of stuff before...
In such circumstances, what idiot would invest into capital, human or machine, to make the energy sector work properly? And as a finishing blow add the current romance of green and red politically...
If it was skills alone, building them would be a formality, and when push comes to shove they could import western workers like Arabs do, and those may even ask less bonus for it than for living in a theocratic desert shithole.
Yes, the anti-investment laws are very much an issue.
However Ziehan also pointed out that Mexico is not producing the skilled workers needed to run the oil fields, which were put in a long time ago, and I guess have mostly been running on 'skill inertia' for a while.
Mexico is fine for mid-level manufacturing; running and drilling oil fields in very much not 'mid-level' anything.
As i said, if they wanted to get it fixed, they could hire foreigners like other third world countries do, it doesn't take many people to run the oil fields and the lower level techs can be local, unlike in many other countries.Yes, the anti-investment laws are very much an issue.
However Ziehan also pointed out that Mexico is not producing the skilled workers needed to run the oil fields, which were put in a long time ago, and I guess have mostly been running on 'skill inertia' for a while.
Mexico is fine for mid-level manufacturing; running and drilling oil fields in very much not 'mid-level' anything.
As i said, if they wanted to get it fixed, they could hire foreigners like other third world countries do, it doesn't take many people to run the oil fields and the lower level techs can be local, unlike in many other countries.
The problem is that those foreigners would not only want the kind of salaries that make socialists seethe, they would also take cushy job spots that would make socialist politicians seethe double because normally their cronies would get those.
And then they would want to keep a lot of money to spend on machines and shit rather than bribing the electorate, and they would also not tolerate corruption and incompetence at lower levels like state monopoly does, which would piss off even more people.
Without fixing that mess, imagine what would happen even if they did have some skilled oil engineers, tutored by US ones or something?
If they didn't get assassinated, bribed, or threatened away by cartel friends of the status quo, socialists would decree that they can't be getting insane wages from state company while people in slums are poor, and so the next thing they would do would be getting a ticket to UAE or something where they would be able to get insane wages the moment they proven they can manage an oil field well.
And back to square one...
Question.
How on Earth could Mexico solve the Cartel issue with anything less than a Knight of the Long Knives? And if it could do that...what could it do next?
Realistically, they can't.Question.
How on Earth could Mexico solve the Cartel issue with anything less than a Knight of the Long Knives? And if it could do that...what could it do next?
The first thing you'd need is a leadership cadre for the federal government that's willing to go to drastic means to fight the cartels.Question.
How on Earth could Mexico solve the Cartel issue with anything less than a Knight of the Long Knives? And if it could do that...what could it do next?
America either needs to magically stop wanting drugs or the border needs to be slammed shut for a few decades. And I do mean shut. Immigration is a release valve for Mexican political dissidents who would otherwise fight for change in their own country and America's fabulously wealthy black market is what feeds the Cartels. Actual immigration from Mexico has declined as the living standards in Mexico rise (and fall in the US) but the dysfunctional border has issues beyond just the people jumping the fence.Question.
How on Earth could Mexico solve the Cartel issue with anything less than a Knight of the Long Knives? And if it could do that...what could it do next?
America either needs to magically stop wanting drugs or the border needs to be slammed shut for a few decades. And I do mean shut. Immigration is a release valve for Mexican political dissidents who would otherwise fight for change in their own country and America's fabulously wealthy black market is what feeds the Cartels. Actual immigration from Mexico has declined as the living standards in Mexico rise (and fall in the US) but the dysfunctional border has issues beyond just the people jumping the fence.
You also have to dismantle the legacy of the Institutional Revolutionary Party and free Mexico from the notoriously corrupt government edivices of Mexico City. Once you have a federal service that isn't just another cartel in a nicer suit then you can start purging regional governments. The important thing isn't to kill or punish the cartels themselves, but to keep reformers and legitimate politicans and officers alive and healthy so that a functional governmnet becomes the norm in Mexico and the citizenry treat it as such.
The cartels feed on a combination of American black market funds and Mexican despair. You have to lance both those boils at the same time to end the cartels, which, as LordsFire pointed out, requires good faith cooperation by both the US and Mexican governments.
essentially covid and the economic crash have effected mexican demographics also stop using cocaine.
Peter's thoughts on energy independence under Biden:
TL;DW:
-Public lands are regulated by the federal government
-Federal government only encourages energy production on federal lands when energy is scarce
-Time to permitting was lowest in Trump admin
-Biden increasing permitting time for onshore shale barely slows anything down due to how fast shale wells can be set up
No wonder why Nevada is so fucked.