Gas Tops $4 A Gallon

[FinanceDude]

Originally Posted by Wags

Maybe Mr. Bush should go to Venezuela to hug, kiss and hold hands with Hugo to see if he can give us some of that $0.15 a gallon gas.

Your lack of knowldege at times is staggering.............

[Wags]

Originally Posted by FinanceDude

Your lack of knowldege at times is staggering.............

Thank you Mr. Bush and I will consider your quote as a sign of compassion and understanding.

Let me know when you will be going to Iraq to fight for freedom and to assist with your failed plan for nation building.

FWIW a meeting with Hugo might be a good thing from what I hear he does not kiss and tell.

God Bless Us All

[FinanceDude]

Originally Posted by Wags

Thank you Mr. Bush and I will consider your quote as a sign of compassion and understanding.

Wow, now I am the Prez? I better send that Secret Service detail to get me some Starbucks......

FWIW, nations where the price of gas is absurdly low are heavily subsidized by goverment...........

Let me know when you will be going to Iraq to fight for freedom and to assist with your failed plan for nation building.

Come along with me, we can go together. Something tells me the troops at Camp Victory will really like your defeatist attitude........

[RetiredGypsy]

Still $4.59 a gallon here. $4.39 on base, down $0.05 since I last filled up.

Has anyone's local news station been doing segments on people trying to find work closer to home at a lower salary?

[Wags]

Originally Posted by RetiredGypsy

Still $4.59 a gallon here. $4.39 on base, down $0.05 since I last filled up.

Has anyone's local news station been doing segments on people trying to find work closer to home at a lower salary?

No, local news segments on people taking lower paying jobs for the purpose of being closer to the homefront.

But there was an USA Today article - Home buying practices adjust to high gas prices

Home buying practices adjust to high gas prices - USATODAY.com

Excerpts from the article

In his hunt for a new home, Demetrius Stroud crunched the numbers to find out that, with gas prices climbing, moving near an Amtrak station is the best thing for his wallet.

Stroud was looking in Elk Grove., Calif. — about 85 miles away from his job in the San Francisco Bay Area — because homes there are more affordable. But with gas at $4.50 and a car that gets about 22 miles per gallon, Stroud would be pumping $560 a month into his tank.

So instead he made an offer on a home near the train station in Davis, which will shave $160 off his commuting costs.

"I wouldn't even be able to consider doing it without that Amtrak possibility," said Stroud, 45, who also telecommutes one day a week to his job in software quality assurance.

Stroud's choice represents a fundamental shift in the way more Americans are approaching home buying in this era of ballooning gas prices. Real estate agents, transportation officials and industry surveys indicate that home buyers are placing more importance on cutting their gas bills and commute times than they have since the oil shocks of the 1970s.

End of excerpts.

God Bless Us All

[Wags]

Originally Posted by DallasGuy

Only part of the oil price rise is due to normal supply and demand. A good portion of it is due to market manipulation...and Bush or the congress isn't doing anything about it:

ICE, ICE, Baby | Ed Wallace | Star-Telegram.com

ICE, ICE, Baby, conclusion | Ed Wallace | Star-Telegram.com

Recent article that supports your post.

Marketwatch.com - Gas could fall to $2 if Congress acts, analysts say

Limiting speculation would push prices to fundamental level, lawmakers told

Gas could fall to $2 if Congress acts, analysts say - MarketWatch

Excerpts from the article

The price of retail gasoline could fall by half, to around $2 a gallon, within 30 days of passage of a law to limit speculation in energy-futures markets, four energy analysts told Congress on Monday.

Testifying to the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Michael Masters of Masters Capital Management said that the price of oil would quickly drop closer to its marginal cost of around $65 to $75 a barrel, about half the current $135.

Fadel Gheit of Oppenheimer & Co., Edward Krapels of Energy Security Analysis and Roger Diwan of PFC Energy Consultants agreed with Masters' assessment at a hearing on proposed legislation to limit speculation in futures markets.

Krapels said that it wouldn't even take 30 days to drive prices lower, as fund managers quickly liquidated their positions in futures markets.

"Record oil prices are inflated by speculation and not justified by market fundamentals," according to Gheit. "Based on supply and demand fundamentals, crude-oil prices should not be above $60 per barrel."

End of excerpts.

I wonder if Congress and Mr. Bush will act on these recommendations.

God Bless Us All

[ERD50]

From that article:

The committee will likely consider legislation that would rein in index speculation by imposing higher-margin requirements; setting position limits for speculators; requiring more disclosure of positions; and preventing pension funds and investment banks from owning commodities.

Both major presidential candidates have supported closing loopholes that encourage speculation in the energy markets. Read more on Election Blog.

However, other witnesses said that pure speculators have had little impact on energy prices,

So what really scares me is - is this another 'bubble' that is going to burst, and there will be bailouts paid for by you and me, because, you know, we can't just let the economy fall apart? So soon after the housing bubble?

$2 gas is the last thing I want to see. People are just now actually starting to conserve, and all that will be blown away if there is a drop in prices. Add another ten years on to my chance of buying an all-electric car.

-ERD50

[lazygood4nothinbum]

how about just publishing lists on every gas pump in the country the names of major firms & funds speculating to benefit from the high price of oil? lists should include telephone numbers, email and physical addresses of the principals & major stock holders of those firms & funds.

i might just open up a little shop selling torches and clubs to the villagers. why stop there. i'll open a chain. lynch depot.

[kcowan]

You know whenever congress goes on a witch hunt that they have no idea what the real problem is. With politics, sound and fury is more important than quiet progress.

[Ronstar]

I analyzed my gas consumption to see how working one less day per week and riding my bike to work one day a week affects my monthly gas expenditures. I've gone from about 180 gallons used in Feb 2008 to 126 gallons in June 2008.

But what i really noticed is that Chicagoland gas prices rose about a dollar a gallon from jan-june in 2007, stayed flat from july 2007 - jan 2008, and then rose a dollar per gallon from feb-june 2008. Hopefully this trend continues and gas prices stay flat until next year at least, or hopefully go down.



heres a link to historic gas prices

Midwest Regular Conventional Retail Gasoline Prices (Cents per Gallon)

[Walt34]

Originally Posted by ERD50

$2 gas is the last thing I want to see. People are just now actually starting to conserve, and all that will be blown away if there is a drop in prices. Add another ten years on to my chance of buying an all-electric car.

-ERD50

Two dollar gas would be great! Then I could afford to run the 8.1 liter tire-smokin' MF pickup truck that I really want.

[TromboneAl]

Someone tell me again why US automakers didn't see this coming 5-10 years ago.

[Leonidas]

Originally Posted by TromboneAl

Someone tell me again why US automakers didn't see this coming 5-10 years ago.

Short-sighted perhaps?

Good friend from school got his dream job designing cars in Detroit. Started with the 1992 Chevy Caprice. A horrible car, huge and under-powered, and he said stupid management decisions kept adding weight to the car. The running joke among engineers was that they had a quota of adding a pound a day to the weight.

They put a prototype on the track and the performance was abominable because of all the weight. "Nobody will want to buy this" went from the engineers up to management.

It was the late 80's and gas was getting cheap because the bottom had fallen out of crude prices. Management's decision: "Let's just put a bigger engine in it."

[eridanus]

China:

"The country imported 75.97 million tons of crude oil, up 12.7 percent from a year earlier [2007 to 2008]"

China's oil imports up by double digits in first 5 months _Energy/Mining--China Economic Net

"China's oil imports doubled over the past five years and surged nearly 40% in the first half of 2004 alone."

China's Quest for Oil - TIME

China says oil imports soar; signs refinery deal with Chad - MarketWatch


India is much the same.

[ERD50]

Originally Posted by TromboneAl

Someone tell me again why US automakers didn't see this coming 5-10 years ago.

Agree with Leonidas, short-sighted, but also:

GM: GENERAL MTRS CORP Actuals & Estimates

they were making money 4-5 years ago. High mpg cars weren't big sellers or big profit makers at the time, so I think one could argue they were doing the 'right' thing, business-wise. It's tough for a company that big to be nimble, but that is what they needed. They failed.

-ERD50

[Wags]

Yahoo.com - Oil prices pass $143 a barrel; US gas hits high

Oil prices pass $143 a barrel; US gas hits high: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

Excerpts from the article

Oil prices surged past $143 a barrel for the first time ever Monday, and the price for a gallon of gas hit an all-time high in the United States.

Supply concerns and a fragile global economy continue to drive the price of oil to new highs, as well as continued tensions in the Middle East

End of excerpts.

Not a pretty sight - there is no end in sight.

If the U.S or Israel attack Iran we just might be seeing $7 to $10 a gallon by the end of Mr. Bush's term.

God Bless Us All

[CitricAcid]

GM and most of the other American companies had a duty to their shareholders, and since they had a near stranglehold on trucks, SUVs and other gas guzzlers, I agree with ERD50 saying that they were being responsible, to a certain degree, at the time. They still could have worked/invested more, however, into the next generation of vehicles. It is tough to defend them for being very far-sighted when in only a couple of years, without a major technological development, their major market is largely decreased just because of an input price. It just seems to me that the Japanese and a few European automobile manufacturers were already farther ahead in the R&D department and it would be tough to deliver profits AND development to GM. Would take a really daring CEO

[TromboneAl]

High mpg cars weren't big sellers or big profit makers at the time, so I think one could argue they were doing the 'right' thing, business-wise. It's tough for a company that big to be nimble, but that is what they needed. They failed.

Agreed. But they had to occasionally look 10 years down the road, since it takes so long to retool, etc. Unless they totally discounted Peak Oil, somebody had to warn that oil prices could skyrocket. Maybe they figured that with slow, steady increases, people would still buy low MPG cars.