Little-Acorn
05-22-2008, 12:55 PM
Every time gas prices go up, COngress investigatres the oil companies. They've done it literally dozens of times, looking for corruption, price-fixing, and God knows what else.
And every time, they've found.... nothing. No corruption, no gouging. Just normal market forces at work. Of course, they then threaten to slap high taxes on the oil companies' profits, regardless. Oddly, Congress has never investigated the oil companies when prices go down, nor offered to send them money when they don't make a profit... which has happened at times.
What might be the real reason oil prices keep going up? Demand is always going up as the population increases, of course.....
http://www.businessandmedia.org/cartoons/2008/BMI15-CongressVsOilLARGE.jpg
BTW, another reason they don't mention here, is that the Fed govt and many states put high taxes on every gallon of gas sold. A Fed excise tax of $.18 per gallon, a state excise tax of up to $.20/gallon, plus state and local sales taxes that can be as high as 9% on top of the purchase price.
Total taxes can be as high as $.70/gallon on gasoline, depending on which state and city you live in.
Do you begin to understand why gas prices are so high?
And every time, they've found.... nothing. No corruption, no gouging. Just normal market forces at work. Of course, they then threaten to slap high taxes on the oil companies' profits, regardless. Oddly, Congress has never investigated the oil companies when prices go down, nor offered to send them money when they don't make a profit... which has happened at times.
What might be the real reason oil prices keep going up? Demand is always going up as the population increases, of course.....
http://www.businessandmedia.org/cartoons/2008/BMI15-CongressVsOilLARGE.jpg
BTW, another reason they don't mention here, is that the Fed govt and many states put high taxes on every gallon of gas sold. A Fed excise tax of $.18 per gallon, a state excise tax of up to $.20/gallon, plus state and local sales taxes that can be as high as 9% on top of the purchase price.
Total taxes can be as high as $.70/gallon on gasoline, depending on which state and city you live in.
Do you begin to understand why gas prices are so high?