Gas Prices Through The Roof
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When i was driving in germany in march 2005, i was paying $7/gal and loving every minute of it. Of course, there I was able to go 130mph legally for minutes at a time
I don't see why there's all this angst towards "big oil". They don't set retail gas prices -- the government has a much larger say in retail gas prices than any "big oil" company does. No major player in the drilling, pumping, refining, or transporting business has enough of a lock on the US market, much less the world market, to set prices at a level the market doesn't support.
Also, when markets are having their prices artificially inflated due to monopoly maintenance, there are other telltale signs that aren't present in the retail fuel market.
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Thrash you of all people should know though that when demand for a product is as inelastic as gas/oil they have much more freedom in screwing the consumers over without seeing a hit in sales. Record profits are pretty convincing support to the thought that the price hikes are almost purely for profit.
My Government teacher was a former lobbiest for major oil companies (among other jobs that allowed him access to tons of information) and was telling me that the prices are WAY to high for current market conditions to be the factor.
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Working in the industry and seeing the prices that most people don't see I can tell you this: Stop-N-Go jumped up to $3.09 yesterday while we stayed at 2.89 (and holy shit did Tesoro chew our asses for that one), we sold a little over 3,000 gallons of regular between 10 am yesterday and noon today. Our price on gas was 2.86 which means we made .03 per gallon (a whole $90 made off of 3K gallons of gas). Unfortunately that $90 won't go into my boss' pocket due to credit card companies. Due to the card companies RAPING the industry we have to make $.12/gallon just to break even...what does all this mean, we actually lost $270 by staying .20 lower than everyone else yesterday. We could have made a whopping $330 if we would have jumped with them.
Now today we got a new gas load (after almost running out of regular this afternoon), this load was $2.99/gallon and we jumped to 3.06 (still not making money).
I guess what I am getting at is this: blame whoever you want for gas prices, but I know damn well the (independent/small) station owners aren't getting rich. I've seen my boss drop $60,000 on gas in one week to see a return of $60,180 (a $180 return on a $60,000 investment isn't much to brag about). So please don't be the person that bitches me out about gas prices when you come in to pay because guess what...my car is on E and I've got to fucking pay for it too.
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DaveH;193048 wrote:
Supply and demand does have a little to do with it, but it's mostly the commodity speculators jerking our chains.DING DING DING DING DING!!!! WE HAVE A WINNER!!!!! Take sweet crude of the commodity market and watch the prices fall as much as $20 to $30 per barrel.
Also, the weak US dollar has a lot to do with it as well. Our dollar doesn't buy what it used to (Canadian dollar is $1.07 compared to our $1.00) and therefore we aren't able to buy the oil as cheaply as before. The flip side of that is that we are now able to export more goods (wheat, etc...) on account of this.
(wait, did Dave and I just agree on something?)
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Biodiesel perhaps??
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Actually while it's often said that fuel is an inelsatic market.. 2 summers ago when GWB was on saying "everyone use less gas please" and it got up to 3.30 or 3.50/gal for premium (or whatever it was).... retail fuel consumption dropped like 10% that week or something.
10% drop in demand is HUGE.. and is bigger than the percentage of price fluctuation we're seeing.
Also, like I said... there's no company that owns enough of anything to corner the market and have their way with prices.
I agree that retail gas is more expensive than the true market price... after all, each gallon is taxed over 60 cents
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thrash;193227 wrote:
Actually while it's often said that fuel is an inelsatic market.. 2 summers ago when GWB was on saying "everyone use less gas please" and it got up to 3.30 or 3.50/gal for premium (or whatever it was).... retail fuel consumption dropped like 10% that week or something.10% drop in demand is HUGE.. and is bigger than the percentage of price fluctuation we're seeing.
Also, like I said... there's no company that owns enough of anything to corner the market and have their way with prices.
I agree that retail gas is more expensive than the true market price... after all, each gallon is taxed over 60 cents
Ron Paul '08 Baby!
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tjamz;193222 wrote:
Biodiesel perhaps?? -
Yeah I saw #1 diesel was 3.95 last night too... yikes, cold weather stay away
I have a Question that hopefully someone can answer, so i dont have to start a thread
Is all the diesel at the pumps in town ULSD? Because even the truck stops still have a ULSD sticker on the bottom of the pump... whats the deal... or is clear only offered in ULSD now, for emissons?
Because i want non ULSD in the old girl
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its less than $3 a gallon for 92 premium in enderlin,....has been for about 3-4 months now..
worth the drive just to fill up there almost
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MisterCMK;193230 wrote:
Do you happen to know what the various federal and state taxes are on gas?I found this link: http://www.energy.ca.gov/gasoline/margins/index.html
.. for the state of california. Note that CA has special fuel laws/formulations so its costs may be different than other places.
From wikipedia:
The U.S. federal gasoline tax as of 2005 was 18.4¢/gal (4.86¢/L), and the gasoline taxes in the various states range from 10 cents to 33 cents, with an average about 22 cents per U.S. gallon (5.8¢/L), making the average combined tax on gasoline 42¢/gal. Unlike most goods in the U.S., the price displayed includes all taxes, rather than being calculated at the point of purchase.
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tjamz;193193 wrote:
DING DING DING DING DING!!!! WE HAVE A WINNER!!!!! Take sweet crude of the commodity market and watch the prices fall as much as $20 to $30 per barrel.> tjamz;193193 wrote:
Also, the weak US dollar has a lot to do with it as well. Our dollar doesn't buy what it used to (Canadian dollar is $1.07 compared to our $1.00) and therefore we aren't able to buy the oil as cheaply as before. The flip side of that is that we are now able to export more goods (wheat, etc...) on account of this.(wait, did Dave and I just agree on something?)
Without all of the speculation it would take considerable time for today’s jump in crude to trickle down to the pumps. If a barrel is purchased by the refinery today, how long does it take until it actually shows up at our local gas station? A month? A week? Either way, the oil company will jack the price of gas today based on today’s market speculation. When the oil market goes stagnant for a few days and crude sits still or trades lower, the gas prices still stay high for a few days. I have a feeling all of the record profits being scrubbed by the oil companies the last few years can be attributed to this simple notion. They are much quicker to raise their prices due to speculation than they are to lower their prices due to the actual market price of crude.
My $.02.
Lucas
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Biodiesel FTL!
Yes its an alternative..... But its something I would never do if I had a diesel truck. Some of you may know where I get my opinion.
I didnt go as far as buying a honda yet, but I bought another 240 for a year round DD. Hopefully we dont get the modding fingers for this one.
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