You have lots of choices.
Here's one...
80 MPG. $3 for a fill-up.
Posted on 04/26/2006 6:35:00 PM PDT by Blood of Tyrants
Okay, I have seen a LOT of threads claiming that oil companies aren't really making that much on each gallon of gasoline.
Oh, really? (blink, blink) Then explain the record profits by the oil companies.
Why sure. First, US oil companies don't import all of their oil. In fact several companies actually import very little. Where do they get it? Why, from wells on private and federal land that they drilled on years and years ago. What is the extraction cost to get it out of these wells? You can be darned sure that it is nowhere near $75 a barrel. In fact, I read that it is somewhere around $7 to $15 a barrel. Add to this cost a small royalty that they pay the federal government or private land owner and refining and transportation cost and you come up with maybe $25 a barrel.
Now, mix in the oil they bought 3 or 4 months ago at $52 a barrel that is just now coming to the refinery and you have an average of between $25 and $40 a barrel.
So what we have is huge profits at the expense of the consumer. How long will it last? The prices will start to drop once they feel they are starting to harm the economy. Congress and the media and the consumers stop bothering them and they look for the next opportunity to do it all over again.
No, I wasn't aware of that. I've never seen it in his byline. I thought he was just a journalist and an opinion writer.
Still, economists can differ, and I can differ with them, or with any degreed experts, when I think they are wrong.
The theory is, the gas station guy will make the same 10 cent profit off the more expensive gas that he did off the previous tank, in spite of the higher wholsale cost...
So he wants me to loan him 30 cents more a gallon or am I just giving it to him so I can help him finance his business??? When do I get my 30 cents back???
What's the deal, when a new station opens up, are potential customers required to drop in and pay for the first load of gas so the owner then can go buy it from the wholsaler???
If you don't like it, don't buy his gas.
Instead, buy from the guy who is willing to go without profit and be in debt just so he has gas available for you whenever you need it. But after a while, the bank won't lend him any money to buy that next load, and there won't be any gas waiting for you. Hmmmm? Maybe that's why it's hard to find those stations.
when a new station opens up, are potential customers required to drop in and pay for the first load of gas so the owner then can go buy it from the wholsaler???
So among other basic business and economic realities, you have never heard of start-up capital either.
Well, all I remembered when I posted that was remembering his by-line as being the Milton Friedman Chair at Stanford. I think Friedman did some of that stuff.
But I also looked it up for you. Not sure at which point you'd say he "became" an economist. Maybe he was born one?
EDUCATION:
Ph.D. in Economics, University of Chicago, 1968
A.M. in Economics, Columbia University, 1959
A.B. in Economics, magna cum laude, Harvard College, 1958
Who needs a person with a high degree of skill in or knowledge of a certain subject when we have you! Right?
An oil glut? Says who? If its speculation then what are you worried about? The price will soon come crashing down to meet reality.
You forget to mention the cabal of banking interests that made sure the Hunts did not succeed.
We as a society have really digressed. Remember how we praised and honored great oilmen in shows like Dallas? But the 90s changed all that. Now oilmen are evil ghouls looking to destroy the world economy. How dare they charge an inflation adjusted price for oil. Am I the only one who has noticed that there other economic inputs rising as fast as oil. Anyone notice the price and shortage of cement? Of copper? Of Zince?
Funny that no one was crying for Washington to send some money to help oil companies stop bleeding losses. Oil companies endured a decade of losses then started finally making good then great profits and all of a sudden we are on them like rats, decrying their greed.
Doesn't matter...they could SELL their "cheap" oil for $75 on the open market. Are you saying someone should sell their house for $100,000 when all their neighbors are selling theirs for $400,000 just because they bought their house for $100,000 years ago???
You've got the wrong analogy.A better analogy would be that someone who has the material to make a house.
Builder A:
- Material cost: $80,000
- Labor cost: $120,000
- Sell price: $300,000
- Profit: $100,000
Builder B:
- Material cost: $40,000
- Labor cost: $120,000
- Sell price: $300,000
- Profit: $140,000
If Builder B sells his material to Builder A, he only makes $40,000. If he builds a house, he makes $140,000.
Besides. Builder B is in the business of building, not just being a material middle-man.
A good business man would never simply sell the raw material.
What percentage profit were they making when crude was $40 a barrel and gasoline was going for approx $1.68 per gallon?
My God. He’s been listening to Huffington. Perhaps that oil is coming from my country, in the Albertan oil sands. Or from the Gulf of Mexico.
Don't have any choice...There's only one supplier...And oddly, a city of 150,000 with numerous different brand name gas stations all have the same identical prices quoted within 10 minutes of a price hike...
So among other basic business and economic realities, you have never heard of start-up capital either.
Sure...But not from the customers...
You have lots of choices.
Here's one...
80 MPG. $3 for a fill-up.
Actually.....the word is MOBIL. A "mobile" is what hangs from the ceiling and spins in the wind.
"Actually.....the word is MOBIL. A "mobile" is what hangs from the ceiling and spins in the wind."
I stand corrected. 8^>
What happened here is that I was responding to Blood of Tyrants, and you were giving a retail markup example. I was responding to a comment about the price to oil companies being only a buck a gallon, or maybe even per barrel of crude (it wasn't clear which), so I was in no way intending to respond to your earlier post.
That's my fault for not reading every post carefully before responding to Blood of Tyrants, but I was engaged in a discussion only with that poster on the thread at the time.
Unproduced reserves in the ground which still will require lifting costs and can't be produced immediately are selling for considerably more than $20 per barrel today. It was the buck a gallon I was objecting to.
I guess the point went over your head. At $3 a gallon for gas, About $.25 is profit, $.60 taxes, and the rest is for ALL that goes into procuring, refining, distributing, etc etc. If we had drilled in Anwar years ago, built Nuke Power Plants years ago, built refineries years ago, etc., we would not be having the problems now.
You can get water for .39 a gallon at the cheapie store, but that is not the point. The small convient 12 oz. bottles can generate up to $2.90 a bottle profit when sold at a theater or concert, or ballgame. That is about 3000% profit. If that margin is OK with you, why do you fuss at 8% by the oil companies. You argue with the same inane logic the MSM does. Say hello to Al.
"Plentiful $3/gal gasoline is better than rationed $2/gal gas. "
Well said.
"I have no choice about gasoline as there is no public transportation in my area."
This is a free country. Move.
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