Again I ask, what statistic posted in Post #79 is incorrect?
What kind of profit level would NOT be considered obscene, in your eyes, given the volume of product these companies sell? Yeah, they make billions, but they sell tens of billions. esides, the government gets a far larger cut than the people who actually make the stuff. Why not bitch about that?
Many industry analysts claim that rising demand in China and India are the big reasons why the price of oil exceeds $60 a barrel. However, they neglect to mention the role U.S. demand plays in setting global crude oil prices. Americans consume 25% of the world’s oil every day (see chart comparing global oil consumption). China, the next biggest consumer, uses less than 7% of the world’s oil each day. America’s huge appetite for oil combined with the fact that the United States is the world’s third largest producer of it (only Saudi Arabia and Russia produce more than we do) creates a strong argument that the United States holds a lot of sway over world oil prices.
Oil price are now set by the margin demands, not the bulk demand. Demand is almost at (or at) the production capacity, so a small amount of increase or decrease in demand is going to cause large price swings for the entire world. The ability of the US to influence world prices is minimal now that we import over 60% of our crude consumption (and ~5% of our gasoline to boot). Refusal by Congress to rescind drilling bans in ANWR and off the Florida and California coasts are one reason.
The energy bill that President Bush signed in 2005 does nothing to address the U.S. factors that are driving oil and gas prices to record highs. Congress and the White House explicitly rejected efforts to improve fuel economy standards for our cars and trucks (which account for 60% of our oil consumption) or adequately fund fossil fuel alternatives.
Government mandated fuel economy standards will do nothing to curb consumption or increase fleet efficiency. Again you seem to want the socialist solution, not the market driven solution. Ditto for adequate funding of fossil fuel alternatives. There are no alternatives to replace the petroleum derived fuels. At best bio fuels would supplant ~10%-12% of gasoline/diesel consumption and drastically raise food prices. (BTW windfall profits taxes on food producers/processors anyone???) Hydrogen?? Another joke, hydrogen production is a worse net energy loser than ethanol/biodiesel. Also your buddies at Public Citizen would have a meltdown over that, since a hydrogen economy would require a massive nuclear fleet expansion.
As Americans shell out more dollars at the pump, the profit margin by U.S. oil refiners has shot up 158% since 1999 (the year Exxon and Mobil merged).
Well, let's see. In 1999, I can seem to remember paying roughly $1.00/gal for regular unleaded in January/February. If they are making margins of 8-10% now, call it 10%, so in money, that means at $3/gallon, the refiner is making 30 cents.(much less than the taxes BTW) Dividing it by 1.58 means they were making roughly 19 cents per gallon back in 1999.
Meanwhile, gas prices continue to go up up up - and no oil company is reinvesting their profits into the things that will benefit motorists.
Since when is it a requirement of a company to invest in things that someone else outside the company decides is of a benefit to their customers???? Good profitable companies base their re-investment decisions upon what brings the best return on investment (ROI). Customers do figure in on these decisions, but stockholders have a vastly greater say and rightly so. Again, the implication is that government as a proxy for the "people" will make these decisions, again socialism.
How much should they have made? How much less profit would end your whining?