People like Protagoras think we have an unalienable, constitutional right to get hosed by oil companies and speculators and anyone who disagrees gets called a bad name. As opposed to people who think they have a constitutional right to unlimited supplies of cheap gas, regardless of the actual economic facts.
Do tell, what is a "fair" price for gas? Bear in mind that a barrel of oil contains 42 gallons, so the current price of $70/barrel equates to $1.67/gallon, *before* transportation, refining, taxes, and overhead.
There are other products that come from that barrel besides gas. So that figure isn't accurate.
Do tell, what is a "fair" price for gas? Bear in mind that a barrel of oil contains 42 gallons, so the current price of $70/barrel equates to $1.67/gallon, *before* transportation, refining, taxes, and overhead.
Adam Smith has already defined what a 'fair' price is. See below:
"The natural price, or the price of free competition ... is the lowest which can be taken, not upon every occasion indeed, but for any considerable time together...[It] is the lowest which the sellers can commonly afford to take, and at the same time continue their business."
The Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter VII