4 ms·

Gas and oil is all they have to trade and they have a lot of it.

phkahler 5y ago
If only they used the profits to build a great economy with more to offer. They have no shortage capable and even brilliant people, but they've got a management problem at the national level.
- MisterBastahrd 5y ago
  See also: Louisiana. It's understandable that there are a ton of chemical refineries near the mouth of the Mississippi because it allows for easier transport of refined goods to other countries. Less understandable when they're everywhere else in the state, except for the part where local governments give quarter-century and longer sweetheart tax break deals for these companies to come in, pollute the local environment, and pay no taxes on the real estate they're operating on. One of the main reasons that the education and social services systems in the state are so horrendously poor is because there's no tax revenue. And even by those standards, Russia is a kleptocrat's wet dream.
- bobthepanda 5y ago
  The resource curse tends to be the rule, not the exception.
  - MandieD 5y ago
    Norway seems to have avoided it the past few decades by following the advice Tony Montana didn’t: don’t get high on your own supply. They dampen the effects of easy oil money by putting most of the profits into their sovereign wealth fund and, unlike just about every other oil producing country, taxing fossil fuels even harder than countries like Germany and Denmark (which tax them pretty hard).
    - pydry 5y ago
      Norway is the exception.
chinathrow 5y ago
They will have even more of it in the future as the world will stop buying.
okl 5y ago
They also have significant market share exporting certain commodities like Nickel, Palladium &c. -- but not close to gas/oil, true. Since new investment into fossil fuel projects will go to nearly zero from here (and old equipment becomes defunct unless it is replaced), expect there gas/oil exports to decline significantly in the next years/decades. Putin didn't only mess up Ukraine now, he also wrecked his own country for at least a generation to come.
- tobi_spaceship 5y ago
  Same could be said for Biden.
  - ben_w 5y ago
    As a foreigner, I can say that whatever it is you’re thinking of isn’t even newsworthy on the international stage. What Putin has done to Russia is like if an American president had invaded a neighbour and the result was simultaneously $4 trillion central bank assets held abroad getting frozen, most of the billionaires becoming personae non grata in half the planet, a lot of smart people leaving the country as quickly as possible, the stock markets crashing about as hard as the Great Depression, direct refusal by major shipping companies to deal with the nation, and the currency halving relative to everything else, while also finding the hard way that all the military hardware had been “maintained” with cheap lookalike products and the cost difference pocketed by corruption at an unknown part of the chain.
  - KarlKemp 5y ago
    what?
    - MandieD 5y ago
      He probably believes what most of my relatives (most of whom are Texans) do: this is all Biden’s fault for not letting petroleum producers drill and frack wherever and however they want; Putin never would have tried this if he knew the US could just overwhelm the oil market. They can’t bear to consider that this is something of a last hurrah as Europe tries to wean themselves from the petro drug. There’s plenty of non-petroleum-related business going on in Texas, but the semi-rural power base relies on oil to stay rich.
FpUser 5y ago
Metals, wheat and some other stuff. All soon to be halted if not already.

If only they used the profits to build a great economy with more to offer. They have no shortage capable and even brilliant people, but they've got a management problem at the national level.

MisterBastahrd 5y ago
See also: Louisiana. It's understandable that there are a ton of chemical refineries near the mouth of the Mississippi because it allows for easier transport of refined goods to other countries. Less understandable when they're everywhere else in the state, except for the part where local governments give quarter-century and longer sweetheart tax break deals for these companies to come in, pollute the local environment, and pay no taxes on the real estate they're operating on. One of the main reasons that the education and social services systems in the state are so horrendously poor is because there's no tax revenue. And even by those standards, Russia is a kleptocrat's wet dream.
bobthepanda 5y ago
The resource curse tends to be the rule, not the exception.
- MandieD 5y ago
  Norway seems to have avoided it the past few decades by following the advice Tony Montana didn’t: don’t get high on your own supply. They dampen the effects of easy oil money by putting most of the profits into their sovereign wealth fund and, unlike just about every other oil producing country, taxing fossil fuels even harder than countries like Germany and Denmark (which tax them pretty hard).
  - pydry 5y ago
    Norway is the exception.

chinathrow 5y ago

They will have even more of it in the future as the world will stop buying.

okl 5y ago

They also have significant market share exporting certain commodities like Nickel, Palladium &c. -- but not close to gas/oil, true. Since new investment into fossil fuel projects will go to nearly zero from here (and old equipment becomes defunct unless it is replaced), expect there gas/oil exports to decline significantly in the next years/decades. Putin didn't only mess up Ukraine now, he also wrecked his own country for at least a generation to come.

tobi_spaceship 5y ago
Same could be said for Biden.
- ben_w 5y ago
  As a foreigner, I can say that whatever it is you’re thinking of isn’t even newsworthy on the international stage. What Putin has done to Russia is like if an American president had invaded a neighbour and the result was simultaneously $4 trillion central bank assets held abroad getting frozen, most of the billionaires becoming personae non grata in half the planet, a lot of smart people leaving the country as quickly as possible, the stock markets crashing about as hard as the Great Depression, direct refusal by major shipping companies to deal with the nation, and the currency halving relative to everything else, while also finding the hard way that all the military hardware had been “maintained” with cheap lookalike products and the cost difference pocketed by corruption at an unknown part of the chain.
- KarlKemp 5y ago
  what?
  - MandieD 5y ago
    He probably believes what most of my relatives (most of whom are Texans) do: this is all Biden’s fault for not letting petroleum producers drill and frack wherever and however they want; Putin never would have tried this if he knew the US could just overwhelm the oil market. They can’t bear to consider that this is something of a last hurrah as Europe tries to wean themselves from the petro drug. There’s plenty of non-petroleum-related business going on in Texas, but the semi-rural power base relies on oil to stay rich.

FpUser 5y ago

Metals, wheat and some other stuff. All soon to be halted if not already.