Cheaper oil is a slippery business

THE global growth dividend from falling oil prices risks getting overhyped. Crude's sharp decline is widely seen as good for a still struggling economy. Yet its main impact isn't to boost total world output but change the distribution of income. And even this GDP shift from oil-exporting to oil-importing countries is likely to be much less than one per cent.

If the price of oil closely reflected its cost of production, the …