I'm not denying peak oil, I'm arguing that oil prices (and other energy prices) have not gone up so much in recent decades that they have smashed the economy. They must impact the economy, but I sure would point to things like increased size of the domestic labor force, the skill hoisting of the global labor force and automation before I would point to energy prices. And then things like expectations of skilled labor in the U.S. have changed substantially.
I guess we'll see soon enough. I think oil price is the real reason behind the economic trouble.
I think we're in for several more 2008-style stair step economic crashes over a longer period of time, with little growth between them. At least until we can truly replace oil as a transportable high density energy source. (Or until political and societal systems break down.)
Hopefully we get some major new energy source, like cheap fusion or space based generation, like orbital mass production of photovoltaics panels and beaming it back to earth in microwaves. Given sufficient energy, we could just synthesize the liquid fuels we need.
There's unfortunately a low chance we get this magic energy source in time, but let's hope for the best.
