The junkie may bitch, moan, cry, beg, plead, etc. over the price of his fix, but he still buys it.
In case you're wondering why crude oil prices are down from last year, hanging around at about $60 a barrel, while gasoline prices have soared past $3.10/gallon nationwide, just check out the latest profit reports from the oil companies. They are at record levels.
The answer for this seeming contradiction is simple: Americans are being robbed blind by the oil industry.
I disagree. Americans aren't being robbed blind. Americans know damn well exactly what is happening to them and through their refusal to change their own actions have consented to what is happening to them. As much as I hate to admit it, that includes myself.
Sure, the oil companies, and their PR and lobbying agency, the American Petroleum Institute, will give you all kinds of reasons for higher gasoline prices at a time of falling crude prices: problems at two refineries in Texas and Oklahoma, rising demand or whatever. But the real answer is that there is simply no competitive market in this industry.
And if you were to point out that not only is there no competitive market but that there was a tremendous surge in SUV advertising and a push to make them chique along side government tax incentives to purchase them as business vehicles that resulted in a 50% market share for SUV's
right before the first gas price surge (that has continued ever since), then I'd have to call you a wacko conspiracy theorist. You're also a media zombie if you fell for it.
Oh what we won't do for one more tank of juice. They've got us by the balls because we placed them there.
1 comment:
As crooked as the oil companies are, they haven't come around to my house forcing me to fill up my car. If I wanted to take the bus to work I could. I just prefer to have a 30 minute commute over an hour commute. If the prices get too high I may change my mind. Or move closer to work. Or find a job closer to home.
Of course I'm fortunate enough to be in the situation where I can afford any one of those alternatives. The ones really getting the shaft are the rural poor. But that's the least of their problems these days.
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