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How I Conveniently Travel To The United States, Europe and Asia #QualityEssentials

How I Conveniently Travel To The United States, Europe and Asia #QualityEssentials

This post was brought to you by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers via sheblogs. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. 

Take a moment to consider what our lives would be like without all the conveniences provided by the oil and gas industry. We might as well plunge ourselves back into the 1800s or early 1900s, because for all intents and purposes, that is exactly what would happen. Our quality of life would drop drastically, but more than that, the economy would suffer hugely. There are jobs, there’s employment, there’s schools and hospitals and homes, there’s the tech industry, the transportation industry, and pretty much every single industry that exists today. Without all that, we’d go back to living in Roman times, but probably without even that much civility. You know all those TV shows that keep dealing with a post-apocalyptic future without power? Yeah, that’s exactly what would happen to us.

As someone who travels more than I stay at home, I can definitively say that without crude oil, I wouldn’t be able to do my job. Not only that, but I wouldn’t be able to go to places that I want to travel to without a huge inconvenience, including across the world to Asia, Europe, and South America. We’d basically have to resort to horse riding, buggy carrying, and taking ships across the ocean. Sure, there’s been a huge movement with electric cars lately, but right now, the prevalence of gasoline run cars far outweighs that of electric cars. The convenience of cars and planes? Forget it. It would literally be like the apocalypse, except worse because we’d all be stuck in our homes and our communities without a fast means of transportation.

Not only that, but just counting among my close friends and family, there are at least 5 people who work in the transportation industry, two who work directly in electricity and power, and two who work at a gas company. Eradicate crude oil and oil companies, and you’re left with millions of people without jobs. Barring a catastrophic effect on the economy, that’s also a loss on a very personal scale that most people wouldn’t recover from. In Canada alone, the oil and gas companies make payments that average $18 billion per year to the government, which then goes towards schools, hospitals, roads, social programs, welfare, and other things that allow us to keep our standard of living one of the highest in the world. Free (subsidized) healthcare and wonderful infrastructure and great roads and fantastic education are all made possible in part because of that money. The industry has become an essential part of our lifestyle, and also happens to employ more than 550,000 people in Canada.

As I mentioned, there’s also a business effect, especially on major industries like travel and transportation. The oil and gas industry is very directly tied to the travel industry, since we rely on the gas to allow us to go places – whether by car or planes. Plus, the industry allows businesses direct access to goods and services, and in 2013 alone, had almost 2000 companies that used the Oil Sands for access to what they needed. And if that doesn’t change your opinion, perhaps this will: the industry basically makes up 20% of the TSX, Canada’s main stock exchange. In other words, it’s not just travel that would be abruptly halted without the Oil Sands and the oil industry – it would be the entire Canadian economy.

So educate yourself about the oil & gas industry, no matter your feelings or preconceived notions towards it. For more information about the Oil Sands industry visit oilsandstoday.ca – And next time someone tries complaining about the oil industry just to try to be ‘environmentally aware’, tell them about all the good they do and how environmentally conscientious Canada’s oil and gas industry is. Tell them about all the things that would go missing from the Canadian economy without them, and then try telling them to live without oil or gas for a week – and then see how they manage it. Not only will they eat their words if they even try that, but educating yourself on the situation at hand is always a sure-fire way of getting a well-rounded view on a sometimes controversial topic.

This post was brought to you by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers via sheblogs. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.