But most people seem to worry more about the increasing scarcity of natural resources like fuel and building materials. The only problem is, those things tend to become less scarce over time, not more. That seems counterintuitive. The confusion comes from people thinking that a fixed amount of some raw material has a fixed value. The reasons they don't are that we get better at extracting them, and we need less to accomplish something.
Oil is a good example.
Yes, we will eventually run out of oil. Or, more accurately, extracting oil will eventually cost more than we're willing to pay. But there is not one price where we all decide it's not worth it. It's already too expensive for some uses, and inexepensive enough for others. But the most important point is that we don't need oil, we need energy .