More than my fair share?

I’m really tired of the line

We consume more than 20% of the world’s oil, but have less than 2% of the world’s oil reserves.

used by many (most recently in last night’s Presidential address) to indicate that we have an unhealthy appetite for oil. Yes we use a lot of oil, but I use a lot of food and I’m not a farmer.

I consume some of the world’s food but I produce exactly 0% of that food. Does that mean I need to stop eating?

A market economy is defined by different groups who have different resources. If we all had what we needed we would just sit around in our underwear watching TV forever.

We may have valid reasons to reduce our dependency on oil but its not because we are hogging it all.