If you have a rich American who already has a first world lifestyle, giving them a liter of gasoline barely moves the needle. Using their house, transportation choices, lifestyle, supply chains and so on the gasoline barely has any effect.
However, if you give a bicycle riding person in India a liter of gasoline, they can run a scooter to go 75 miles. This is a huge increase in their mobility and productivity.
Its like the diminishing returns are such that the rich western nations really cannot progress much using the resources compared to the gains in the developing world. Also, a small amount of resources is game changing in certain places.
A few years ago I heard this related idea.
If you have a rich American who already has a first world lifestyle, giving them a liter of gasoline barely moves the needle. Using their house, transportation choices, lifestyle, supply chains and so on the gasoline barely has any effect.
However, if you give a bicycle riding person in India a liter of gasoline, they can run a scooter to go 75 miles. This is a huge increase in their mobility and productivity.
Its like the diminishing returns are such that the rich western nations really cannot progress much using the resources compared to the gains in the developing world. Also, a small amount of resources is game changing in certain places.