Originally Posted by Ken Fitzgerald
Exactly! Kids these days!
Member
Exactly! Kids these days!
Moderator
I normally scoff at the pump prices since I use a bicycle to get to work (30 mile round trip) but the fuel I need is also going up!
Contributor
What I noticed is that gas is cheap where you folks live, why are you complaining?
I paid $1.38 per litre yesterday morning which is about $5.22 per US gallon.
High fuel prices are good, they encourage conservation and innovation, and reduce pollution...........Regards, Rod.
Member
To a country used to stable prices and low inflation such rapid and wild price fluctuations seem unnatural. For almost everything else we buy every day we are shielded by the manufacturer from fluctuations in commodity prices. Add in the record profits and what we’ve learned about who knew what in the banking crisis and I can see why people think that there is price gouging going on.
Guest
I think it has a lot more to do with debt policy and currency strength. If the dollar weren't so weak, and the economy weren't so weak, it wouldn't be so profitable to speculate on high-priced commodity contracts.
Contributor
Ben, I think it's like everything else, they charge what we will pay. If they charge too much we modify our consumption patterns.........Regards, Rod.
Member
No, high prices are bad.
They decrease our standard of living, increase the cost of food, decrease domestic spending, increase costs to visit family and travel, increases unemployment, increase inflation and generally makes us a LOT POORER.
Low energy costs allows us to be a richer country. Enviromentally, richer countries pollute less and can afford more expensive protections of water and air. Socially, richer countries are more stable. Human rights tend to improve in richer countries. Science and technology advances better in richer countries too.
I could go on and on, but if I hear one more person say it's better if we would be "poorer" I'm going to buy them a one way ticket to bangledesh.
Eventually we will need to move on from oil. But there is a long time for that transition and almost certainly we will come up with even more powerful and cleaner energy sources by then.
-Steve
Member
Steve Griffin....well said! My sentiments exactly, even the bangledesh comment.
David
Member
I am lucky, I live in coastal Texas where prices are "cheaper" than almost everywhere else in the country. I filled up my Saturn this morning, for $40.00...
At lunch time, I got a call from LOML saying that her brothers car (she drives him around in his car, disability thing...) wouldn't start. I ran home, got the pickup that needed gas, and stopped by the gas station on the way back to work. I put $40.00 in it as I don't drive it much. Now mind you, when I first bought that truck, $40.00 would have been a full to the top tank. Now it is around 1/3 of a tank of gas...
I will reserve my political comments as they are inappropriate here, but let's say that the reasons given for the price spike in 2007, can't be the same reasons given in 2011 can they?
What scares the snot out of me is that there are people that think that $4.00+ a gallon gas is a good thing... The toll on the economy, and people's lives / families is staggering.
I personally and very strongly believe that the 2008 economy downfall was triggered by the 2007 hurricanes followed by the gigantic spike in fuel prices. And with the U.S. economy suffering as badly as it has been, as long as it has been now, global economies are following right along with us...
Last edited by David Hostetler; 05-13-2011 at 5:36 PM.
Trying to follow the example of the master...
Member
I think the gas prices are staying high to us because of inflation... our wages are not keeping up. Everything is getting more expensive and I've been making less money now than in 2007... if you factor for the inflation we know about (nobody really knows how much money is printed) I make less money now than I did in 2000. The number has gone up but my purchasing power has gone WAY down...
Member
Wait till the refinery's go under water. The gas prices here are always 10-20 cents higher than San Fransisco. The problem here is the prices are set for the tourists but the minimum wage locals pay it all the time. That is the price we pay for living here.
Member
Steve, necessity is the mother of invention. Oil is a diminishing resource. As prices go up, other options become economically feasible. Once those options become economically competitive when compared to high oil prices, they will take hold. At that point the alternatives can scale up and cost will go down. Oil will go down as well once there is competition.
As for pain at the pump, you can a little more now or a lot later.
Last edited by Ken Fitzgerald; 05-14-2011 at 1:34 PM. Reason: removed political comment
Measure twice, cut three times, start over. Repeat as necessary.
Member
Granted I am not an economist, nor did I stay at the Holiday Inn express last night but from what I remember is people sell products at prices which it will sell. When the demand goes down because people don't buy the price goes down.
In gasoline (and other fuels) I expect that demand will do down because of innovations in alternative fuels.
If ethanol fuel dropped to $2.00 a gallon I bet every E85 vehicle in the country would use it exclusively. I am thinking it is a little more complicated than a direct comparison to oil prices.
Joe
JC Custom WoodWorks
For best results, try not to do anything stupid.
"So this is how liberty dies...with thunderous applause." - Padmé Amidala "Star Wars III: The Revenge of the Sith"
Member
Why are you complaining? Here in Sweden we pay 14.30 Swedish kronor per liter which is the same as 8.78$ a US gallon.
Kurt Johansson
Member
Scott, companies increase price at the pump within hours of some quickly propped up reason for the increase in the price of crude. It takes them days, sometimes weeks, to lower it.
Not really. They are good for those who sell gas. Record profits, and increasing year by year. If governments were serious about conservation and reduction of pollution then ours wouldn't subsidize the sand oil mining, which is as far from pollution reduction as you can get.
If the gas prices as as important to any country's security (and economy) then in the interest of that security we could limit the engine sizes of personal vehicles. Say, by 2015 nothing more 2.0 liter, unless you're a farmer or operate a business requiring larger vehicles (businesses such as dental practice would not be among those).
Prices at the pump have absolutely nothing to do with anybody's environmental conscientiousness but everything with the quick cash grab and the fact we, yet again, there is virtual monopoly on gas production in the US and Canada and Standard Oil (ESSO) is back.
In 2008 crude highs were between $104 and $126 pbb. The highest price I saw then was $1.29/liter. Right now crude stands in the $90's but the prices went all the way to $1.41. So compared to 2008, crude prices are 25% lower but gas at the pump is 10% higher. Nothing to do with supply and demand or even with availability and proven reserves.
Refineries' capacity?
I'm not sure if gas consumption increased by 25% in the last year. Did it?
Kurt, in Canada we are complaining about it because, unlike Sweden, we are an oil exporting country, with second largest proven reserves. In other oil producing countries people fill their tanks for pennies a liter. We pay more than those we export to.
To understand recursion, one must first understand recursion
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