High Gas Prices

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High Gas Prices
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flag sean-xd
Posted: Jun 17, 2008 at 17:04 Quote
some places in the uk are selling petrol and diesel for £1.99/L
flag devonvig
O+
Posted: Jun 17, 2008 at 18:58 Quote
laurie1 wrote:

Thanks! I can't believe how well it held up...I still think that the shell of smugness is responsible.
flag frozenfire
Posted: Jun 17, 2008 at 22:44 Quote
sean2k8 wrote:
some places in the uk are selling petrol and diesel for £1.99/L

Wow and i thought $1.50 / l CD is bad
flag laurie1
Mod
Posted: Jun 17, 2008 at 22:53 Quote
Europe has always been expensive as far as gas is concerned as they are really pushing people to use the advanced network of public transportation that is available at their disposal. If every country had a public transportation network like London, there would be fewer drivers on the road!
flag devonvig
O+
Posted: Jun 18, 2008 at 7:30 Quote
greasemonkeys wrote:
sean2k8 wrote:
some places in the uk are selling petrol and diesel for £1.99/L

Wow and i thought $1.50 / l CD is bad

If you think about it, $1.50 is still pretty cheap. It's not Venezuala or anything but I'm not complaining.

Most of Europe phased in high gas taxes/congestion charges/surcharges/taxes upon taxes over several years to decrease automobile use and provide money for public transport/train lines etc. Cheap gas is the reason that North America doesn't have these types of facilities in abundance. Although the primary goal of gas taxes in Canada was to provide revenue for road work, it is technically a tax on externalities of excess fuel use (congestion, pollution...obesity). The tax just isn't high enough to make much of a difference. The government should have increased rates over the last few years but that would be political suicide as short-sighted, selfish Canadian drivers would have actually 'gasp' voted to remove such a government. As always, the market took care of things for them. I get a kick out of everyone believing that it's oil companies, refiners, OPEC, and speculators that are to blame. Speculators follow trends and amplify them, they don't create them. No matter what you read, all of these are just scapegoats for government short-sightedness and bad energy policies.

It's the low US dollar and uncertainty about future supply stability/demand increases that are to blame. There are definitely other factors that compound the issue but "price gouging" isn't one of them.
flag devonvig
O+
Posted: Jun 18, 2008 at 7:31 Quote
laurie1 wrote:
Europe has always been expensive as far as gas is concerned as they are really pushing people to use the advanced network of public transportation that is available at their disposal. If every country had a public transportation network like London, there would be fewer drivers on the road!

And that would be amazing.
flag marty660
Posted: Jun 18, 2008 at 15:07 Quote
As far as I'm concerned, high gas prices, while they're like taking it up the arse, are necessary - we drive too much with vehicles that guzzle too much. The environment needs to be fixed, and if gas were .10$ a litre, it wouldn't help too much.
flag AmirB
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 5:37 Quote
guess i wont have a wrx after all Frown
flag devonvig
O+
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 7:11 Quote
marty660 wrote:
As far as I'm concerned, high gas prices, while they're like taking it up the arse, are necessary - we drive too much with vehicles that guzzle too much. The environment needs to be fixed, and if gas were .10$ a litre, it wouldn't help too much.

Very true. It's a bad thing that it's gone up so fast (wouldn't have happened had taxes been increased a long time ago!) but it's good that it's going up. You're far too reasonable to be 16...maybe PB isn't the place for you. Haha.
flag sam-davies
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 9:05 Quote
sean2k8 wrote:
some places in the uk are selling petrol and diesel for £1.99/L

You live in a different UK to me. The highest in the UK is about £1.40
flag onemanarmy
FL
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 9:25 Quote
AmirB wrote:
guess i wont have a wrx after all Frown

yeah... I'm dumping $4.75 a gallon gas into my car and getting about 22mpg. I'd say I spend on average $15 a day on gas.
flag onemanarmy
FL
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 9:38 Quote
devonvig wrote:
marty660 wrote:
As far as I'm concerned, high gas prices, while they're like taking it up the arse, are necessary - we drive too much with vehicles that guzzle too much. The environment needs to be fixed, and if gas were .10$ a litre, it wouldn't help too much.

Very true. It's a bad thing that it's gone up so fast (wouldn't have happened had taxes been increased a long time ago!) but it's good that it's going up. You're far too reasonable to be 16...maybe PB isn't the place for you. Haha.

no he just doesn't have to pay for his own gas to drive to work.


expensive gas with a purpose I'm fine with... i.e. paying for mass transit systems like europe has. Expensive gas for NO reason I'm not fine with. They think it's going to deter people from driving? WTF? This is American and we have NO CHOICE. Most people do to insane prices on homes... especially in california... are forced to live like myself over 30 miles from work and like some folks I know 100 miles from work. There is an absence of decent public transit or people would use it. I used to ride the train EVERY day when I worked in S.F. Now I can't do that. I HAVE to drive.

This country was designed around a highway system built during the red scare. Taxes would NOT get used to build better highway systems and better public transpo. They'd get used by greedy politicians to buy vacation homes and bigger SUV's. That's the sad truth of it. Something needs to change and hopefully ridiculous gas prices will help that change come about. Otherwise stock in lube is gonna go way up because we'll have no choice but to continue to take it up the rear end.


speculation. price gouging. political dimwits. a crappy president. a crappy downturning economy. increase GLOBAL use of crude... china/india, etc. OPEC holding out. an oil man in the most powerful political position in the world. failed alternative ideas like corn. all these things have combined to drive prices up at an unreasonable rate.

Gas went up 12 cents in one day last week. over 30 cents in 2 weeks.

going up is one thing. record profits is another.
flag sean-xd
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 9:39 Quote
samthebiker wrote:
sean2k8 wrote:
some places in the uk are selling petrol and diesel for £1.99/L

You live in a different UK to me. The highest in the UK is about £1.40

it was on the news the other day when the shell tankers were on strike some of the petrol stations put their prices up to 1.99
flag sean-xd
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 9:46 Quote
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7456458.stm
flag devonvig
O+
Posted: Jun 19, 2008 at 9:54 Quote
onemanarmy wrote:
devonvig wrote:
marty660 wrote:
As far as I'm concerned, high gas prices, while they're like taking it up the arse, are necessary - we drive too much with vehicles that guzzle too much. The environment needs to be fixed, and if gas were .10$ a litre, it wouldn't help too much.

Very true. It's a bad thing that it's gone up so fast (wouldn't have happened had taxes been increased a long time ago!) but it's good that it's going up. You're far too reasonable to be 16...maybe PB isn't the place for you. Haha.

no he just doesn't have to pay for his own gas to drive to work.


expensive gas with a purpose I'm fine with... i.e. paying for mass transit systems like europe has. Expensive gas for NO reason I'm not fine with. They think it's going to deter people from driving? WTF? This is American and we have NO CHOICE. Most people do to insane prices on homes... especially in california... are forced to live like myself over 30 miles from work and like some folks I know 100 miles from work. There is an absence of decent public transit or people would use it. I used to ride the train EVERY day when I worked in S.F. Now I can't do that. I HAVE to drive.

This country was designed around a highway system built during the red scare. Taxes would NOT get used to build better highway systems and better public transpo. They'd get used by greedy politicians to buy vacation homes and bigger SUV's. That's the sad truth of it. Something needs to change and hopefully ridiculous gas prices will help that change come about. Otherwise stock in lube is gonna go way up because we'll have no choice but to continue to take it up the rear end.


speculation. price gouging. political dimwits. a crappy president. a crappy downturning economy. increase GLOBAL use of crude... china/india, etc. OPEC holding out. an oil man in the most powerful political position in the world. failed alternative ideas like corn. all these things have combined to drive prices up at an unreasonable rate.

Gas went up 12 cents in one day last week. over 30 cents in 2 weeks.

going up is one thing. record profits is another.

I'll agree that the recent rise in prices has been too fast (and speculators do tend to accentuate existing factors) but it would have happened eventually. The only thing you can blame energy producers for is not drilling enough when prices were low (and can you fault them there?). It's not their fault that they were kicked out of half of their productive fields (which they discovered and developed mind you) You can partially blame some of the stupid producer nations that decided to nationalize their energy industries, even though they're completely incompetent and can't maintain production. Thank god for the Saudis Aramco, the only national oil company that runs itself like a business, not like an arm of foreign policy. The industry has been neglected for decades. You wouldn't know it, but despite their current record profits (which you can't blame them for either...that's just business) companies like Exxon are in serious trouble. Their reserves are shrinking rapidly because they've been kicked out of so many areas and haven't been drilling enough to replace reserves. Contrary to popular belief, Exxon is only the 14th largest producer in the world. The top spots are all held by nationalized oil companies, many of which are incompetent, corrupt and wasteful. Exxon, BP, Conoco etc. don't have a major effect on prices anymore. They could barely manipulate the market even if they wanted to.

I know that it hurts to pay these prices, but I think that they're here to stay so the world had better adapt.

You're right to blame government though. They should have seen this coming since the 70s but no one had the integrity to do anything about it (ie. raise gas taxes and improve transit and alternative energy researcg). I know that I sometimes sound judgemental, but I don't blame everyday drivers as their lives have been purposefully built around the car. Sadly, this way of life will have to change and yes, it probably will be painful for most in the short term.

As per those who live 100km from work because they wanted an acreage or a McMansion in the suburbs, I feel NO sympathy. That's just a dumb, selfish, short-sighted choice.

 


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