Oil is a global commodity and is fungible. We are not awash in oil. Global demand continues to increase as we add 50 million a year to the world population and emerging economies like India and China are becoming more affluent and can afford more and more automobiles. Increased car ownership means higher oil requirements.
China supplanted the U.S. as the world’s largest auto market after its 2009 vehicle sales jumped 46 percent, ending more than a century of American dominance that started with the Model T Ford.
The nation’s sales of passenger cars, buses and trucks rose to 13.6 million, the fastest pace in at least 10 years, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. In the U.S., sales slumped 21 percent to 10.4 million, the fewest since 1982, according to Autodata Corp.
And exactly who decides how much profit the oil companies can make? Most of the world's oil is controlled by national companies, not the private sector.
Energy ... especially good old-fashioned crude awl, is a racket. If I were in on it, I wouldn't want to change it either!
Yeah right. It is the evil oil companies. Of course who gets those profits? Shareholders like you and me, pension funds, etc. It is no racket, but an essential industry that fuels the global economy. I can remember the oil embargo and lining up to get gas. If Israel attacks Iran, look for a real spike in prices and for shortages.
That was what I was foolishly counting on the Bush Boys to address. The creative ways the oilcos use to circumvent the idiotic attempts to regulate them do no one any good in the long run.
as far as the world supply of crude goes ... I maintain that there is an absolute glut ... and that is just as much an economic problem as any perceived shortage.
Global demand continues to increase as we add 50 million a year to the world population and emerging economies like India and China are becoming more affluent and can afford more and more automobiles. Increased car ownership means higher oil requirements.
Yup. And so what? 150 years from now, there WILL be alternative fuel for vehicles. In the meantime, crude supplies will easily double as newly discovered fields come on line. Newsflash, automobiles need not be powered by gasoline. A natural progression might be Diesel, Natural Gas, Hydrogen, even electric ... powered by Nuclear Fission and FUSION plants. Right now, we are suffering from the pseudo-science of Domesday Environmentalists who think we'll run out of oil in the next 10 years.
The elites want the "little people" out of their cars and will go to any fairy tale they can dream up to further that goal.