Globalization as Energy Rent Seeking

Provides an alternative account of the forces underlying globalization. Argues that energy rents in general and the search for new sources of energy rents following the productivity slowdown in the 1980s in particular lie at the root of globalization. Prior to the two energy crises (1973 and 1979), energy rents were generated by massive energy deepening. Wanting to restore growth levels in their aftermath, the West turned to globalization as a means of increasing energy availability and energy rents. It is shown that while globalization has restored energy rents to investors, it has failed to restore growth to its former level (i.e. pre-Productivity Slowdown). Also, it has prompted the transfer of massive energy rents from the South to the North as the result of the delocalization of manufacturing (i.e. from the North to the South).