I've waited a while to really throw it the face of my friends who are denziens of the Anti-Christ, but now I get to say it.... Don't blame me, I voted for Kerry!!!
God, that is so sweet to be able to say it. With a 38% approval rating for the Anti-Christ, hopefully this is the beginning of the end of the Evil Empire.
I topped off the Jeep last night. I had a little under 1/2 a tank. It was the strangest thing to see the amount going up so quickly and the gallons creeping up. My total? $36.00; thankg God I had a 1/2 tank already or it would've easily crept towards $60.00.
Actually, I am hoping Lindsay can shed some light on this. She is a grad student in London who is studying exactly these sorts of issues. So be sure to check the comments section because I'll see if I can cajole her into giving us an explanation as to what is going on.
8 comments:
I love to say "I told you so."
Me too. Do you think George W. reads our blogs?
I'm having "I told you so" tattooed to my forehead and ass so I can say it with style and gusto.
Cincy! $36 for HALF a tank??? Dear God!!!
Basically, there's a ton of factors that are causing this spike in gas prices. First, demand for oil has skyrocketed. The Indian and Chinese economies are using up a TON of oil and will continue to do so in the future (an interesting aside, checkout the fight between their state oil companies for oil in the Caspian). U.S. oil demand is also expected to grow. Even with these high gas prices...people are still buying H2s so they can navigate the mean streets of their suburbs.
Oil producers can't keep up with this demand. This isn't like the 1970s, when the shocks were due to a political embargo by OPEC. Bush can "pressure" all he wants, but OPEC members are pumping at full capacity. OPEC (nor Russia) itself isn't a huge fan of these high prices...Russia would usually like to see $30-35 barrel. They're afraid that if oil prices are too high, it will cause a rcession, demand will drop, resulting in huge economic losses for them (and oil is the ONLY income for these countries, so it's disastrous) so they are pumping all they can to bring some equilibrium back to the market. Iraq won't be producing at full capacity for awhile...pipelines are constantly blown up, and many oil-producing countries aren't politically stable - rioting workers, shutdown refineries, etc. The areas where oil is cheap and easy to produce are drying out, whereas there is a ton of oil under the Caspian and the permafrost of Siberia, but it's extremely expensive to get out of the ground.
Of course, cars don't run on oil - it has to be refined into gasoline, which is another problem. There haven't been any refineries built in the U.S. since the 1970s. People don't want them in their communities, and oil companies don't want to build them - they're expensive and the profit margins from refining aren't that high (hard to believe, eh? lol). So, a huge growth in gas use, and no new refineries that can keep up with this. Also, states have different rules on what can and can't be added to gas. In California, for instance, the gas prices are always higher due to environmental regulations that stipulate the gas has to be "cleaner." So companies can only sell this specially refined gas in that state and can't draw on stocks from say, Texas.
And on top of this, the Gulf region is devastated...they produce a third of U.S. domestic oil supply...that's 1.5 million barrels a day that aren't reaching the market. Refineries are sitting under several feet of water, oil rigs are drifing around...it will be awhile before production is up again.
When I eventually have enough money to buy a car, I seriously think it will be a hybrid...I don't see these prices going away anytime soon.
Hope that helped...off to the pub now! :)
YNH-
Isn't it sweet to say "I told you so?" ... if only the drones would listen
Kris-
He probably does. We're probably all in the Homeland Security computer system now!
Andi-
Then we you told me to kiss your ass, I'd gladly do so with gusto and with lust!!
Lindsay-
This post was so good I had to repost it!
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