Najprej kratko pojasnilo Liona Hirtha (Poslovna šola Hertie, Neon energy consulting), nato pa še politična realnost (Reuters). Če na kratko povzamem Hirtha: EU je razdeljena v dve skupini držav – prva (15 držav) še ima “proste uvozne kapacitete” (beri: proste plinovode ali LNG terminale), druga (predvsem srednjeevropskih 6 držav) pa ima že zasedene vse LNG kapacitete ali ne more dobiti več plina po plinovodih). Prve si želijo nižjih cen, druge pa višjih cen, ki bi znižale povpraševanje. Po uvedbi cenovne kapice prvim naj ne bi bilo treba uvajati redukcij plina (saj imajo še vedno proste kapacitete in lahko po potrebi tudi plačajo več), druge pa bodo ob uvedbi cenovne kapice zaradi zmanjšanja ponudbe morale uvesti redukcije plina.

Europe is divided on a gas price cap. Why?

I believe the answer not to lie in ideology (pro markets or not) but economic interests.

To understand why, we need to understand price formation on short-term spot markets and pricing rules in long-term contracts.

But first: what happened?

This week, 15 countries have suggested a wholesale cap on gas prices. Those are almost exclusively countries with spare import capacity. Spot prices here are essentially determined by world market prices for LNG. Let’s call that group “world market countries”.

The 15 countries are Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain.

The countries that oppose such a policy most are primarily from a region that cannot import more, because LNG terminals are running at full capacity. I call them “TTF countries”, because in that group prices spot prices converge at the TTF. Fig from Refinitiv Eikon, highlighting by Ingmar Schlecht

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Dobra in nazorna razlaga kolega Liona Hirtha iz poslovne šole Hertie, sicer pa konzultanta s področja energetike, o tem, zakaj cenovna kapica na plin ne more delovati brez fizičnih omejitev dobav plina (redukcij). Ko pa te uvedemo, postane cenovna kapica nepotrebna. (kliknite na sliko za zagon videa)

To bo ključna usmeritev letošnjega leta za večino Evropejcev. Po zaustavitvi dobav večine ruskega plina v Evropo, razen delno prek Ukrajine in Turčije, je ključno vprašanje, za koliko časa lahko vzdržijo dvomesečne rezerve plina v skladiščih ter povečane količine utekočinjenega zemeljskega plina (UZP). To pa je v največji meri odvisno od temperature to zimo ter prostovoljnega zmanjšanja porabe plina.

Vse evropske države niso v enakem položaju. V najtežjem položaju so srednjeevropske države, na čelu z Nemčijo in Italijo, ki imata močno industrijo in ki so med skoraj 50 in 100-odstotno odvisne predvsem od dobav ruskega plina. Italija naj bi sicer od marca naprej pretežni del odvisnosti od ruskega plina že nadomestila z dobavami iz Alžirije. Španija, Portugalska in V. Britanija večji delež plina dobivajo v obliki UZP, Nizozemska ima dodatno k temu lastna nahajališča plina, Francija pa dobiva alžirski plin, medtem ko je njena odvisnost od ruskega plina zgolj četrtinska.

Poglejmo podatke, kako dobro so se države pripravile na zimo in kakšne učinke lahko pričakujemo. Bloombergov Energy Crisis Index kaže, da so najbolje pripravljene Španija, V. Britanija in Francija, ki imajo več kot 90% napolnjena skladišča plina in ki se soočajo z relativno nizkimi (glede na ostale države) cenami plina in električne energije (EE). Nemčija je v najslabšem položaju. V Nemčiji so denimo cene plina in EE za 2.5-krat višje kot v Franciji, pri čemer Francija večino EE pridobiva z jedrskimi elektrarnami, Nemčija pa bo ne samo pri industrijski porabi, ampak tudi pri proizvodnji EE dramatično močno odvisna od razpoložljivosti plina.

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Roger Waters, nekdanji frontman skupine Pink Floyd in avtor njihove monumentalne kritike totalitarizma “The Wall”, je pripadnik generacije iz 1960. let, ki se je borila za mir. Njihov projekt odpora je bila ameriška agresija na Vietnam in nepotrebno umiranje ljudi na obeh straneh. Waters se je zato tudi v primeru ukrajinske vojne postavil na stran miru. Nekajkrat se je javno izpostavil, tukaj je denimo njegov zelo znan intervju iz začetka avgusta letos:

In seveda bil deležen številnih kritik s strani liberalcev in libertarcev sedanjih generacij. Zdi se, da je med slednjimi danes šel v pozabo zgodovinski spomin na devastacije, ki jih prinašajo vojne. In da jim slab mir ne pomeni več kot vojna. Waters je postal nezaželjen v medijih in nekaterih državah, na Poljskem so mu prepovedali koncert.

Toda Waters nadaljuje svoj boj za mir, čeprav je to skrajno nepopularno. V začetku septembra se je  angažiral z odprtim pismom Oleni Zelenski, ženi ukrajinskega predsednika:

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On 17 December 1938, chemists Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann discovered nuclear fission at the Emperor Wilhelm Institute in Berlin. On 16 July 1945, American scientists, building on Hahn’s research as part of the Manhattan Project, detonated the first nuclear weapon in Jornada del Muerto, New Mexico. In less than a decade, the nuclear age had become a reality. By 1958, the world’s first full-scale nuclear power plant came online at Shippingport, Pennsylvania.

At this point, the world seemed ready to enter a new age of abundant energy – all fuelled by this incredible new power source. It was a moment when it felt as if science was leading the way forward, towards a more prosperous, technologically advanced future, unconstrained by the failed political ideologies of the past. American sociologist Daniel Bell even heralded ‘the end of ideology’ in a book of the same name, published in 1960.

Bell and others could not have been more wrong. New ideologies simply took the place of the old. In the late 1960s, new political movements, driven mainly by students, emerged throughout the West. These started to question the gains of technological progress, the authority of science and man’s aspiration to master nature. And they were almost invariably aggressively opposed to modern sources of energy production, from fossil fuels to nuclear power. These new social movements culminated in the formation of Europe’s Green parties.

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To zombi idejo, da znižanje davkov na najvišje dohodke vpliva na povečanje investicij in zaposlenosti ter pospešitev gospodarske rasti, smo večkrat razkrinkali kot povsem neutemljeno in je bila v empiričnih študijah vedno zavrnjena. Glejte denimo “Ti nesrečni davki“. Se pa ta zombi ideja vedno znova vrača z vsakim novim valom neokonzervativcev – donedavno v ZDA s Trumpom in zdaj s Trussovo v V. Britaniji. Zato še enkrat kratek povzetek najbolj kredibilnih empiričnih študij, ki sistematično zavračajo to “trickle down” hipotezo.

V resnici velja ravno obratno: znižanje davkov ali povečanje transferjev tistim z najnižjimi dohodki pospeši gospodarsko rast (ker ti sloji praktično ves dodatni dohodek takoj potrošijo, kar dvigne agregatno povpraševanje, medtem ko premožnejši ta dodatni dohodek večinoma prihranijo, kar je iz narodnogospodarskega vidika večinoma neproduktivno*).

The empirical evidence is just not there for the ‘trickle -down theory or the Laffer curve. Analysis published in 2012 by the Congressional Research Service found that reductions in top tax rates were not correlated with economic growth  Instead they were much more associated with rising income inequality. A 2012 study by the Tax Justice Network indicates that wealth of the super-rich does not trickle down to improve the economy, but it instead tends to be amassed and sheltered in tax havens with a negative effect on the tax bases of the home economy.  A 2015 paper by researchers for the International Monetary Fund argued that there was no trickle-down effect as the rich get richer: “[I]f the income share of the top 20 percent (the rich) increases, then GDP growth actually declines over the medium term, suggesting that the benefits do not trickle down. In contrast, an increase in the income share of the bottom 20 percent (the poor) is associated with higher GDP growth.”

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Tale izjava ameriškega predsednika Bidna je iz dne 7. februarja letos, slabe 3 tedne pred ruskim napadom na Ukrajino.

No, slabih 9 mesecev kasneje se je to tudi zgodilo – Američani ali “neznani storilci” so našli način, da “naredijo konec Severnemu toku 2“. V ponedeljek so “neznanci” v mednarodnih vodah med Švedsko, Dansko in Poljsko z eksplozivom (švedski preiskovalci pravijo, da moč detonacije ene cevi ustreza okrog 700 kg TNT) razstrelili dve cevi Severnega toka 1 (ST1) in eno cev Severnega toka 2 (ST2). Po informacijah Reutersa je ena cev ST2 ostala nepoškodovana.

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David Ellerman

The late Joze Mencinger was the dominate voice in the privatization debates of the early 1990s arguing for pragmatism and gradualism as opposed to the shock therapy approach. Yet other smears are sometimes associated with his name, so now that he is no longer with us, I would like to set the record straight. The shock therapy approach advocated by the World Bank and other major western development advisory institutions (“The Washington Consensus”) was implemented in its purest form in Russia with devastating results for most of the population and with the creation of a domineering class of oligarchs and tycoons. We feel the repercussions today in the Russia’s Putin-fueled resentment against the West.

But there were opposing voices such as the World Bank’s Chief Economist, Joseph Stiglitz, who suggested that the shock therapy approach was a major error (“Whither Reform”, 1999 [Full disclosure: I was Stiglitz’s speechwriter]). The shock therapy approach did not fully prevail in Slovenia in spite of the intervention and advocacy by Jeffrey Sachs in 1991 in opposition to the Mencinger (or Korze-Mencinger-Simoneti) draft law on internal privatization. I was the American consultant to the Mencinger team concerning the US model of employee ownership, the Employee Stock Ownership Plan or ESOP. The Sachs approach tried to detach workers from ownership claims in their own enterprise in favor of certificates tradeable for shares in investment funds or the stock market.

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