Gas Prices and Oil Company Profits - What is the real deal on gas prices and Big Oil Company Profits ? Why is gas costing so much yet Big Oil Companies Quarterly Profits Soaring - and Why doesnt the Government do something to limit the Profit that can be made off of comsumers?
Gas Prices and Oil Company Profits -
(1) The small oil companies are gone, so the really large ones keep tight control on oil distribution. For example, while they run ads on CNN telling us how wonderful & dedicated they are, they actually leave a tankers full of oil out at sea for an extra month to keep it off the market & drive up the price.
(2) They are shameless and greedy.
(3) There are no true American oil companies, there are only oil companies with headquarters here. They have no loyalty to the USA. They sell their oil on a global market. Maybe if they HAD to keep domestically produced oil here we might see some benefit, but that will NEVER happen because of (4) below:
(4) Many of our legislators accept money from the oil companies. This is why they do nothing to help us. Sure, they drag the big oil CEOs into hearings once in a while, but the lawmakers gave them their huge tax breaks in the first place.
(5) Oil companies will use ANY excuse to create fear & drive up prices. Instability in the Middle East? Cha-ching. Switching over to summer or winter formula gasoline? Cha-ching. Scheduled maintenence on a refinery? Cha-ching. There is currently a glut of oil & consumption is down, but we’re paying $4.00 a gallon. There hasn’t been a major interruption in the supply – it only takes the FEAR of an interruption to drive up the cost. So much for supply and demand.
(6) It is in their best interests to keep the supply questionable and unreliable. Why would they pump a reliable supply of $30/barrel oil when they can restrict the flow, pump less and make 3-4 times as much money?
(6) In an recent report by Reuters, I see that last year Rex Tillerson, the CEO of Exxon/Mobil received an 8 percent pay raise (now $2.39 million salary) and a 40 PERCENT increase in his bonus (now $3.36 million) as well as 225,000 shares of stock in the company (valued at about $15.6 million at the time.) Do you think that a guy who makes over $20 million a year has any concern for the struggles you and I face just rying to get to work, heat our homes & buy our groceries? I doubt it.
I love cars & driving, but I HATE spending a hundred bucks to gas up my Jeep, and I can’t afford the $1000.00 it would take to fill the oil tank at my house. It has been YEARS since I had a full oil tank. Back in the ’70′s we used to hear about the Alaska pipeline bringing an inexpensive and stable supply of oil to the rest of the U.S. Nowadays I hear that they export most of that oil. How much of our tax money went into that project just so the oil companies could get richer? I also remember in each “energy crisis” back then they kept the level of fear high by telling us that by the year 2000 the Earth would run out of oil.
Yet here we are in 2011 and the biggest profits are reported by the oil companies. Of course, they still use this tactic – they just bumped the date we’ll run out back a few decades.
By the way, they pay through the nose for gasoline in Europe because of the incredibly high taxes there. Would you like to pay an extra $5 a gallon in taxes? That would be outrageous.
This is Capitalism at it’s best, how can you not understand the founding principles of our country : what the market will bear.
As long a “we the people” insist on our lifestyle regarding Suv’s and not mass transit / light rail, and as long as it is important to CHOOSE to drive with 1 person in the vehicle, oil companies will make profit.
Please note, Oil Companies are independent businesses… just like your local restaurant (except you can choose to be responsible for cooking your own food). Just as the government cannot tell YOU that YOU cannot earn money, the government cannot tell a business that they cannot earn money.
The only people in America who can tell big oil companies how much money they can earn is YOU – the consumer. Stop buying and wasting so much of their product. The American Choice of LIFESTYLE is the root cause of your question. Begin to understand that if we were not forced into the interstate highway system & personal car and instead had developed all forms of mass transit throughout this nation and the world, the benefits we could be living with….clean air and clean water to name a few.
And do, please, understand, if you believe Big Oil is gouging the American Consumer, then please move to an EUROPEAN country where they have been paying double our prices (and More) for decades.
Our nation was founded on one basic business principle only : “Freedom to Make as Much Money As Possible.” As long as We Choose to pay it…They will Make More Money.
This question of “Values” is the root cause of the eventual destruction of the “Great American Way” in everything we do. It is the same dysfunctional reasoning we use to explain how we pay undereducated idiots millions of dollars to “play a game” and we can’t have enough money to help our children catch up to the rest of the world in Mathematics, Science, and (as you so plainly illustrated in your question) Spelling.