Who is gouging us on oil prices?

[Gawain of Orkeny]

Well congress is looking into the oil companies gouging us on the price of gas. Its almost funny. Oil companies make a average profit of 7.7 cents per gallon . Here in NY you pay 62 cents a gallon in taxes per gallon. Now whos ripping us off? The state doesnt even produce or sell any gasoline.

[Tribesman]

Don't you mean the vendor that runs the filling station as a franchise for the oil company makes 7.7 cents profit , not the oil company itself .

[Xiahou]

I was just thinking about the same thing, while watching some coverage on those hearings. I think oil companies are just about the only industry in the country that is supposed to apologize for making a profit.

[Gawain of Orkeny]

No I mean the oil company itself.

An industry-wide study in the late 1990s showed that oil industry profits amounted to an estimated 7.3 cents on each gallon sold.1 More recently, ConocoPhillips reported that during the third quarter of 2005 earnings from its U.S. refining and marketing operations amounted to 9 cents per gallon, out of industry average retail price of $2.60 per gallon during the quarter.

[Papewaio]

Australians pay Aus 38 cents a litre.

Which converted to US dollars and Gallons is US $1.25 per Gallon.

[Taffy_is_a_Taff]

in the UK it's up to something idiotic.

Probably pushing $10 a gallon.

guess what most of that pays for?

[kiwitt]

The Yanks are only now complaining because they don'y have as much tax as other countries.

Die SUV Die

[KafirChobee]

in the UK it's up to something idiotic.

Probably pushing $10 a gallon.

guess what most of that pays for?

It pays for all of them having health insurance, it pays for them having an adequate social security system, it pays for them having a social structure that doesnot cowtow to the very wealthy, it allows for one of the best educational systems in the free world (the real one, not the US one), it forces conservation and it enforces environmental conformance - not to many Humvees in the GB, I bet (unlike Beverly Hills - the Gov. of Calif. owns like 5 of them).

The idea that the poor oil companys aren't gouging the f' out of us is BS. Look at the pump price, right there it tells anyone worth taking an interest what the taxes on a gallon of gas are. The oil companies are making an estimated 20 - 25 % profit margin at the moment, and claiming it is simply a supply side method of adjustment (demand - as they lovingly call it). Yeah, sure. Did you know they are selling it cheaper to the Chinese (fact - go look it up in Time, Nov 7, 2005). These guys are thugs. Their child molesters - and we are the children being molested.

An investigation is needed, and laws need to be passed prohibiting corporations from profits that exceed 7 % a year (prior to re-investment).

When Carter left office, two years after actually, an investigation was asked for by the Reagan "team" (Republicans in Congress) into why the price of peanut butter and peanut products had suddenly sky rocketted. Oh, dear. Jimmy did something to influence the market as President. Fact was, Reagan had requested that a surplus of peanut butter be stored for emergency - as was cheese (remember the great cheese and peanut butter give aways?). Reagan was quiet as a mouse, until it came out about his admin's involvement - then it was "oh, is that what y'all were talking about?".

This is, different. I know people that invested in oil company stocks (Exxon, etc) that are both gleeful and embarrassed about the checks they have receive (dividends) - they all wonder how it is.

It is, because we have an oil rich administration. We have a group (hell, Condi has an oil tanker named for her - former Exxon Emplyee, you know?) in power that owe their alliegance to a few men - all in oil (or the MIC).

Trying to make me feel that the poor oil companys are just making due, is like convincing me that a blow job is worse than creating a war.

[bmolsson]

Now whos ripping us off?

Nobody. They just want you to take the bus......