by Raymond Alexander Kukkee

Created on: May 12, 2008   Last Updated: August 01, 2008

The Price of Gas: Ask Questions

It does not take a genius to recognize the unjustified and exponential price increases of gasoline and other fuels that have occurred over the last decade. Increases have been accelerated uncontrollably and inexplicably . No reasonable or valid justification for such price increases is in evidence.
Upon "designated" bad news, prices are elevated virtually instantaneously, and country-wide . When the weekly "crisis" is over, prices seldom return to normal, or decline minimally, but always slowly. .

Apparent price gouging at the gas pump is the norm, rather than the standard . Lawmakers throw up their hands in feigned resignation. Pump prices may jump 0.10 a liter or more in one day. There is no justification for the blatant price gouging. Virtually all gas stations increase their prices equally and simultaneously, which , in spite of denials and "investigations" by everyone involved, looks like nothing more than monopolized, choreographed and legalized theft.
Why?

In 1900 the price of crude oil was under 1.00/barrel. . In 1972 the price of crude oil hovered around $3.00/barrel. Adjusted for inflation, that price might now be approximately $22.00/barrel in 2008 dollars
The price today instead, on a supposedly "tight" crude market, is an outrageous $126.00/barrel.
The reader is urged to access crude oil price trends, statistics and growth patterns on Internet sites such as WTRG Economics "Oil Price History and Analysis" at http://www.wtrg.com/prices.htm . What has happened in the oil industry since 1901 is an interesting study in artificially controlled prices, orchestrated production and economic manipulation.

Can there then be any reasonable justification for the price of gasoline, in 1970 , which was 0.37 /gallon to now be $1.35/liter? Clearly not. The same production facilities produce the same gasoline; the only real change made is artificial and arbitrary. Unheard of corporate profit levels suggest little if any justification for existing prices.

There is, as a result, little or NO public faith in the existing petroleum marketing system. Flimsy, opportunistic, and outrageous excuses are offered , at times almost daily, for excruciatingly high price increases for gasoline. Every excuse from inclement weather, international political instability, to piracy on the high seas is used to raise prices. Damage to pipelines, courtesy of terrorist activity, is exceeded only by corporate creativity at times.

The reader is invited to imagine

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