Reducing my carbon footprint

Great discussion !

Sounds like a debate between Capitalist and Socialist ideologies, with some merit on both sides. However, it misses the real point as to the difference between wealthy and poor nations.

At the core of this is the industrial revolution, which transformed how wealth was created and distributed. The principal difference between first and third world nations is the degree of industrialization. China went from third to first world status because of massive industralization, even though its political system is different than in the USA.

Also, it's important not to confuse individual wealth with national wealth, because it fails to account for the unequal distribution of wealth. So when bertsmobile1 says that Americans benefit from the value of stock ownership in American corporations, he fails to understand that most Americans do not own any stocks at all, and most in fact do not have have any savings, living paycheck to paycheck. The housing contractor example of wealth creation from "nothing" made by TonyPrin, is simply an example of trading a service for a monetary credit to be spent elsewhere. Wealth was neither created nor was it destroyed, it was simply a form of barter, a service in exchange for a monetary unit. In pre-industrialized times, the contracter might have been payed in livestock instead of a bank credit.

Finally, it is disingenuous to suggest that powerful countries like the USA do not exert control over lesser countries. The USA is notorious for supporting cruel dictatorships in poor countries around the world in order to have them do our bidding.

Tony is right.

Currency is a way to store, transfer and, - uh - 'represent' wealth/labor.

only the g'mint has a license to counterfeit currency. Normally, it's an OK system. But it can go terribly wrong.


going grocery shopping in Zimbabwe;

The market share of cordless outdoor power equipment is growing at a fast pace and will continue to grow for a long time. If I were still selling lawn equipment, I'd be latching on to a well rounded line of cordless outdoor power equipment. I think that in the years to come, there is a very good chance that cordless equipment will dominate the homeowner segment of the outdoor power equipment market.

cashman said:

The market share of cordless outdoor power equipment is growing at a fast pace and will continue to grow for a long time. If I were still selling lawn equipment, I'd be latching on to a well rounded line of cordless outdoor power equipment. I think that in the years to come, there is a very good chance that cordless equipment will dominate the homeowner segment of the outdoor power equipment market.

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It's mostly a matter of economics. As the cost of large lithium-ion batteries continues to decline, cordless tools become a more competitive alternative to gas powered tools. Five years ago there were very few choices in full sized Li-Ion powered lawn mowers, and they were very expensive. I recently bought a full size 60 Volt Li-Ion mower for $349, which is about the same price as a high quality gas push mower. I agree that this applies mostly to the homeowner residential consumer, and that commercial application is still many years away.

with allowances for 2-stroke needing oil vs 4 stroke, fossil fuel devices use the same power source across brands.

But, instead of decades of using D cells and AA cells - the nicad and LI-ion powered devices do not 'share' battery modules. You may get a great mower, but be stuck with a mediocre leaf blower to use the same battery family - or, be forced to use a completely different charger and battery. (yes, I know on the inside they all use 18650 cells, but they aren't built to be consumer swappable)

Audio and video manufacturers have often gathered to select standards in the past - I wish lawncare and handtool manufacturers could do the same.

but, for the typical suburban homeowner, MM is right, the present offerings are adequate replacements for gas powered equipment.

1 Lucky Texan said:

Audio and video manufacturers have often gathered to select standards in the past - I wish lawncare and handtool manufacturers could do the same.

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Of course they can, you and I know that, but they have chosen not to do so in order to hold the consumer hostage to their respective product lines. Greenworks, Kobalt and Snapper are basically the same products made in the same factories by the same companies and then branded differently with proprietary battery interfaces to make them incompatible with each other. Nonetheless, once you have found the products you like the best, you can continue to use them for a very long time.

As a user of both gas and electrical lawn equipment, I cannot really take a stand on either side of the energy issue. However, since the amount of electricity used to refine a gallon of gasoline is about the same as needed to charge a battery powered mower enough times for the same acreage of mowing as a gallon of gasoline; doesn't it stand to reason that we are all burning about the same amount of coal!

TonyLawnMan said:

As a user of both gas and electrical lawn equipment, I cannot really take a stand on either side of the energy issue. However, since the amount of electricity used to refine a gallon of gasoline is about the same as needed to charge a battery powered mower enough times for the same acreage of mowing as a gallon of gasoline; doesn't it stand to reason that we are all burning about the same amount of coal!

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TonyLawnMan, you make an interesting comment - as all Tonys do. But, I'm curious about where you get your data. How can you tell how much electricity is needed to refine a gallon of gasoline.

TonyPrin said:

TonyLawnMan, you make an interesting comment - as all Tonys do. But, I'm curious about where you get your data. How can you tell how much electricity is needed to refine a gallon of gasoline.

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It's been pretty widely reported as either 5 or 6 kWh per gallon output for energy usage in refining processes. Since there haven't been any oil companies disputing these claims, the real number might be higher. The biggest available battery from the EGO brand mower could therefore be recharged about 10 times (550 watt charger X 1 hour X 10). That should get enough mowing done to meet or exceed what 1 gallon of gasoline would get done.

TonyPrin said:

Bertsmobile1, I think we're almost there. You are obviously knowledgeable, so here goes; your previous comment was:



Most of what you say is correct, but it has to do with money, not wealth, and has nothing to do with poverty in 3rd world countries. Although wealth is measured in money, they are not similar. Money is printed all the time by 3rd world countries but it doesn't make those countries wealthy. Printing more money results as you state in inflation, not wealth.

A country's cumulative earnings - called prosperity - is measured in GDP. As a country becomes more wealthy, its GDP increases. The increase in US GDP has nothing to do with poverty in 3rd world countries it has to do with value created in the US.



You insist on the zero-sum game approach to wealth - that one person's wealth creates another's poverty - but that's not the premise of double entry bookkeeping at all. When those entries are closed out, the offset is income or loss. The country-wide change in that income in the US is the country's increase in wealth shown as an increase in GDP.

Finally, I'll illustrate what I meant. When a contractor builds an addition on a home at a price of $50,000 but a cost of $40,000 he creates an increase in his wealth of $10,000. While that increase is the result of his skill and efforts, he creates it from nothing - i.e., it doesn't come from someplace else. If you don't believe wealth comes from nothing, look at the world in the past 50 years and let me know where all that wealth came from.

Firstly the builder did not create wealth, he took a pile of lumber , hardwear & paint . He then added $ 10,000 worth of his labour to value add to the materials, thus increasing their VALUE, but only to the home owner.
The home owner exchanged $ 50,000 worth of his labour to pay the builder, or he borrowed against his future labour to pay the builder with a bank loan.
The builder is not $ 10,000 richer than he was before he started because in the mean time he has eaten, slept in a building , used fuel to power tools, vehicles & heat/cool his house & cook his food, pay for the kids education, flowers for the missus and if he is lucky a few beers.
All he has done is exchange his skilled labour for something which is universally accepted as payments for other peoples labour.
If he has been paid, more than he spent then he has made a profit but he has not created wealth
The home owner now has an asset which is ( in theory ) worth more now than it was without the porch provided that some one else wants it at that price.

You are right about inflation, create too much money and the value of money decreases too fast.
As the VALUE of money decrease the NUMERICAL COST of assets increases.
When I Started work full time I was earning $ 4000/ pa as a freshly minted engineering graduate.
On that I could happily pay expensive city rent, pay off the remaining mortage on my parents house, run a car ( used ) two motorcycles and go to concerts & live theartre one or two nights a week and still save enough money to get a home deposit in 5 years.
$ 2 filled the fuel tank, ¢ 50 bought a beer and a 3 bedroom brick veneer California Cottage on a detached 1/4 acre block was $ 35,000.
The last salary job I had paid $ 85,000 / pa but $ 65 now fills the tank a beer is $ 5,00 and a house is $ 500,000.
The only thing that has changed is inflation has increased my numerical labour rate from $ 3.85/hr to $ 46.70 /hr .
But the entry level graduate on $ 45,000 can not afford to pay city rents, pay a mortage, run multiple vehicles , go out 2 nights a week and save for a home deposit so inflation has actually reduced the spending power to less than it was in 1966.
SO he is nowhere near as wealthy as I was at his age because his hour of labour buys significantly less than my hour of labour did back in 1966. However when measured he is considered "wealthier" because he has a thicker wallet that I did.
People on factory wages are hurting even more as many live from pay check to pay check with no chance of making any savings and now we have private enterprise making profit on energy supply at 3 levels, we have gone from the cheapest electricity to the most expensive energy and people are now litterally freezing to death in their houses because they can not afford heating, or suffocating by heating their homes with patio heaters running of the cheaper auto lpg.


Wealth has not increased, the value of what we use to measure it by has.
Further more "Word Wealth" is a very artificial concept.
If you want the perfect example look at Ireland .
In order to change from the dirty manufacturing utility for England they dropped business taxes to nearly nothing and thousands of very wealthy companies mover there, creating a housing shortage making all Irish property owners millionairs over night.
SO by your terms, Ireland had become a world wealth super country. But the Irish workers were no better off as prices also rose to the extent than many had to sell their homes just to be able to eat.
Then changes to international taxation laws meant Ireland was no longer the cheapest country to have your head office so the corperations moved out property values plumeted and thousands then found themselves homeless with no assets , no job & no future.
All that is happening is real wealth is being concentrated into a continually reducing pool of super wealthy.

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