“Buy Local” Campaigns May Actually Work

Buy Local Campaigns worked this Christmas, says new study.

It’s easy to get cynical about “buy local” campaigns when you compare the traffic at Main Street shops with the parking lot at Wal-Mart.

Is Buy Local any more effective a slogan than Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No”?

A new survey just says yes. The study, put out by a coalition of business groups, shows that the little guys actually outperformed the big guys this Christmas season. And further, that Buy Local campaigns made a difference.

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Energy Key to Recovery

Richard Heinberg says that high oil prices caused the current recession.

We need to burn fewer fossil fuels and release less carbon to slow down climate change. And because of rising demand from developing nations and decreasing supply, it’s easy to see that our economy needs to kick its addiction to fossil fuels for purely economic reasons.

Richard Heinberg and others argue that it was not the subprime mortgage crisis that led to today’s recession, the worst downturn since the 1930s, but that high energy costs were the true culprit.

We all remember paying $4 for gas just before the collapse of September 2009. Similarly, the previous half dozen recessions were all preceded by high energy costs.

Coincidence?

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