I don’t understand why there’s no secondary option if Strait of Hormuz goes down. Obviously there are alternative routes out there but why big gas companies even governments did not see this coming. Are they okay losing billions? Or do they actually have a plan that ordinary people don’t know about?
But this isn’t worst case. Its something like 20% supply so things are more expensive for a while and for as long as people see this as a risk people will work to improve other transport options
Also, here is a simple alternative view:
You have a water tank that you share with a neighbour and a pipe you share to your house.
A storm hits and the pipe is damaged.
You both could have buried the pipe deeper, or made a backup pipe but you chose not to. Not a great capitalist failure: it’s thinking the risk wasn’t high so not spending your time on something you think you don’t need. You’re also not dying of thirst, you can still walk out and bucket water, it’s just slower and more problematic.
Not a perfect analogy bit wow on parts of this thread
And in this case, I’m not convinced that the government setting prices and supplies, like in communism, would have helped since most people seemed to not think this was not a huge risk and really didn’t expect the US to ignore simulations and blaze ahead quite this unconcerned for negative outcomes.