Fine, but let's see a reasonable fraction of those profits go into new refineries and infrastructure. It would be good for the overall economy to put some stability into the fuel price structure.
On Charlie Rose last night, Raymond pointed out that they have been expanding refinery capacity steadily by enlarging existing refineries. Too hard, too expensive to build refineries at new locations. Nonethless, it shopuld be evident that they are putting too many eggs into two few baskets. Baytown is the largest refinery in the country. If Rita had hit head on, they we would have been in a world of hurt.
"Fine, but let's see a reasonable fraction of those profits go into new refineries and infrastructure. It would be good for the overall economy to put some stability into the fuel price structure."
You're right! In fact, let's do that with the rest of the economy, too. For example, let's do the same thing with all the people who made windfall profits from selling their houses. We should start by forcing them to take their money and invest in low-income housing or building multifamily housing, or tree farms, or directly subsidizing construction companies. All those things would help future housing prices drop, which might be counter to the profit-takers' interests in owning houses now, but hey, the objective is to be FAIR, right?
Also, since the oil companies made almost 10% (imagine!) profit on every dollar they earned last year, and it's widely accepted we should also tax heavily their profits now because they've accrued that phenomenal profit margin, we should do the same for homeowners who sell, make them give any profit over, say, 1%, to their community or to the state.
I think both those reasonable ideas would be widely acceptance by the public, don't you? After all, the same basic law should apply to everyone--from each, according to his abilities, to each, according to his needs.
Preferably in the pockets of their shareholders, of course.
Diall 1-800-CONGRESS. To ALLOW the oil companies to explore, drill, refine and distribute product to the market.
People who DO NOT UNDERSTAND this industry really twist my shorts. Everyone is a friggin' expert, but have no clue as to complexity of the industry. It is not as simple as thawing a sirloin in the microwave./rant
Fine, but let's leave those decisions to the people who OWN the businesses, have made the investments, took the risks, and paid for all the equipment.
I SAY: BURN THEM!!! BUUURRN THEM!!!!
;-)