The Real Reason Gas Prices Are Soaring

Discussion in 'Peak Oil' started by tsneds, Mar 29, 2011.


  1. tsneds

    tsneds Monkey++

    Interesting article breaking down the underlying causes of soaring prices:



    Excerpt:


     
  2. Clyde

    Clyde Jet Set Tourer Administrator Founding Member

    Don't worry, if it crashes we will bail it out with worthless fiat currency like all the rest of the debacles.
     
  3. ghrit

    ghrit Bad company Administrator Founding Member

    There is a bunch of truth there, no question. Peak oil is real, no question about that either, but p.o. does not even come CLOSE to explaining the meteoric rise in consumer prices for petrochem products. Market speculation does that. I would hope that more regulation is not warranted since that will put it's own influential stamp on the price at market, and one that might be more trouble than it's worth if/when things stabilize. (For an example of how thing become fubar under regulation, have a peek at fanniemae and freddymac.)
     
  4. Seacowboys

    Seacowboys Senior Member Founding Member

    you can't have your cake and eat it too with a free market or a market restricted to those with a vested interest. It's an either/or situation.
     
  5. Clyde

    Clyde Jet Set Tourer Administrator Founding Member

    Keep the .gov out. We have enough regulation without additional input. If we built 30 more refineries, the price of gas would drop.
     
  6. Spartan300

    Spartan300 Monkey+

    Barrack will save us all! As soon as he gets this boarder-less world thing all wrapped up he will work on gas prices next....I just know it.[cmfrt]
     
    dragonfly and BAT1 like this.
  7. Witch Doctor 01

    Witch Doctor 01 Mojo Maker

    Just require the speculators to take posession of their oil in EPA approved storage containers prior to selling it... that should bring down the price of oil...
     
    ElleShu, dragonfly and Quigley_Sharps like this.
  8. -06

    -06 Monkey+++

    The oil giants have us, the country, and the gub by the "family jewels". Until we get fed up with being robbed we will not do anything about it. The entitlement crowd doesn't worry because we feed, house, medicate, and educate them so the only thing they have to do with their dope money is to buy gasoline. A lot will only pass it on to those who consume their goods/services and we will bear the brunt of it.
     
  9. TXKajun

    TXKajun Monkey+++

    We went through this speculator caused artificial rise in crude oil price and gasoline prices, what, a year ago? Year and a half ago? Gas got up to almost $4-5/gallon. The speculators were bidding prices to totally ridiculous levels. What happened? Joe Sixpack found out thru decent reporting, started raising a stink and prices fell. Not back to where they were or where they should be, but they did fall. Seems like they NEVER go back all the way down.

    So where's the rabble-rousing Joe Sixpack today? Seems to me between Japan, Libya, Egypt, being unemployed for 101 weeks, inflation eating away at any and all extra cash, house upside down and still falling in value, Joe must not be driving much. Or maybe he just ain't got the energy left (pun intended) to start screaming like last time.

    Kajun
     
  10. Seawolf1090

    Seawolf1090 Retired Curmudgeonly IT Monkey Founding Member

    We should BAN all oil speculation. Let the market set the value.

    Myself, I'd gladly pull the lever on oil speculators - hang the barstages high!!
     
    ElleShu, dragonfly and UGRev like this.
  11. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    Asking the GOVERNMENT to regulate the CORPORATIONS is just like asking a burglar to keep an eye on the safe robber for you. Seriously.

    We need to hunt these pirates down and hold every last one of them accountable. Greedy pigs, that's all they are. Treasonous, inbred sycophants! We should not justify robbery any longer. Every single corporate oil exec -find them, haul them into the street, tar-feather-incarcerate what's left. Every last tyrant, all the minions, every last treasonous parasite, find them and try them. Anybody who has a problem with it, can take it up with the complaint department, they can call 1-800-000-1776.

    Sickening. It's like the people have been reduced to being little frightened sheep in a field surrounded by wolves howling in the night. Enough!
     
    Quigley_Sharps likes this.
  12. Tikka

    Tikka Monkey+++

    As they do nothing well the worst possible thing would be the government getting involved.
     
    thebastidge likes this.
  13. Mousetrapper

    Mousetrapper Monkey+

    Here's an additional take why there are high fuel prices. An unabridged version of a piece in the Washington Post.

    Debunking Five Myths about Gas Prices

    In my opinion the Robert Rapier has one of the most thoughtful and balanced views of peak oil and the potential outcomes.
     
  14. Spartan300

    Spartan300 Monkey+

    Another brilliant thing we have done in this nation is destroy our corn supply to put in gasoline! Ethanol is another failed governmental program. Ethanol was supposed to bring down the cost of gasoline....yeah right. Now not only have we increased the price of gas, we have also increased the price of corn based foods, which is most every food you can think of. So what does the government want to do? Increase ethanol from 10 percent to 15 percent in gasoline. Brilliant.
     
  15. Mousetrapper

    Mousetrapper Monkey+

    Just a thought:- Why not remove all subsidies and mandates for mixing ethanol into gasoline, but mandate that all new vehicles be fully flex-fuel, i.e. 0-100% ethanol compatible. Let the market decide if ethanol is economically viable as a fuel (note I didn't say ecologically viable).
     
  16. VisuTrac

    VisuTrac Ваша мать носит военные ботинки Site Supporter+++

    Do you really want to know how to get the speculators out of the market? Open the taps on the Strategic Petroleum Reserves. One of two things is gonna happen. The speculators are gonna get fricken hammered due to the flood of oil driving down the price
    OR
    the rest of the world panics thinking that the US is afraid / showing fear and the price of oil doubles. But after it cools down and we find out we (the collective population) shouldn't have freaked out, then the speculators will really be taken to the woodshed and the price drops down again.

    Again, that's just my opinion of what could happen. Either way it would be an interesting experiment.[aiw]
     
  17. BAT1

    BAT1 Cowboys know no fear

    Agenda 21. DHS wants us all on a bus, or a train so they can 'screen' us and get us used to being transported around to our containment camps. At $5.00 a gal the dollar falls, and then the SDR's take over. All about the NWO coming to fruition.
     
  18. Mousetrapper

    Mousetrapper Monkey+

    SPR release?

    As an interested outsider I've notice at least one call in this thread to 'open the taps' on the SPR.

    I was just wondering how / if this marries up with the general ideology of reducing the influence of big government.

    Surely it would make the government an oil speculator, trying to sell the oil at a high price and refill when the price comes down.
     
  19. tsneds

    tsneds Monkey++

    I do not really agree with everything in the original piece I posted,even IF a few people could artificially raise the price of say cotton during a given season, the net effect would be MORE cotton production next year. That's why these industries are called 'cyclical'. No one knows the exact demand of cotton next year. However, given the information on current markets, and past demand, growers can estimate the amount of cotton they need to grow to maximize their yield.

    I guess my point is, if you think speculation is a problem in markets, then you need to look at what happens to markets that outlaw speculation. The French market outlaws speculation and growth is stagnant. The reason is speculators have a vested interest in digging up information that confirms or denies their theories. They're putting their money where their mouth is on whether they think oil production will increase or decrease in the upcoming years. In this case, the reason these speculators are leaning towards longing oil is they're done their research, dug into oil production, and have discovered that OPEC is vastly overestimating it's oil reserves and it's current oil production.

    This is leading them to believe there will be future shortages of oil, driving up future prices. It's not the speculation that cased prices to raise, it's the valuable information discovered BY the speculators that let everyone realize we're heading for shortages, which is priced into the current crude supply. Don't blame the speculators, they're just the messenger. Without them you'd be paying $2 a gallon for the next decade until we woke up one day and realized that OPEC literally ran out of oil.
     
    thebastidge likes this.
  20. fortunateson

    fortunateson I hate Illinois Nazis!

    The article is exactly right.

    The rise in the price of oil is due primarily to speculators bidding it up on the commodity markets.

    Commodity markets originated as a way for people in that business to buffer their prices by locking in a contract price way in advance of delivery.
    NYMEX crude oil contracts, are broken down in 1000 barrel increments (42,000) gallons.

    I remember hearing someone comment on this a few years ago during the last price spike. Might have been Buffet, not sure.
    He basically said that if you could NOT take delivery of 42,000 gallons of oil, you had no business buying and selling contracts.

    The regulation could be as simple as that.
    Only allow players who are in the business to buy and sell contracts and futures.
     
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