Posted on 11/20/2009 10:03:17 AM PST by autumnraine
The Exchequer, via excise taxes, makes approximately 45 times what oil companies do, per gallon of refined product. That is not a typo, 45 times. And the oil companies do all the work; the government merely collect. Lazy, thieving sods.
Want to whine about high crude and petrol prices? Talk to your MP (not that that will do any good, of course, until Labour are thrown out on their bums, and maybe not even then). Further, goobermint directly conspires to raise prices even higher by dint of the full library of regulatory costs they impose.
Next, I suppose that you will wish to decree to the various ships' owners how they should more ''efficiently'' use their own property, eh?
Some exponent of capitalism you are. Might as well tattoo ''From each according to his abilities...'' right on your forearm.
"Unacceptable", eh? Got you pegged, laddiebuck.
I'm just saying the situation is hardly optimal...
The Exchequer, via excise taxes, makes approximately 45 times what oil companies do, per gallon of refined product. That is not a typo, 45 times. And the oil companies do all the work; the government merely collect. Lazy, thieving sods.
Who cares what the government are doing with regard to this argument? Its hardly the biggest news that they are lying theiving sods - I sort of guessed that already. The point I am trying to make is that the oil companies do all the work, but the people who are collecting on this scam are some smooth talking types in suits in a London office whose contribution to the gallon is making a keystroke on a laptop.
Want to whine about high crude and petrol prices? Talk to your MP (not that that will do any good, of course, until Labour are thrown out on their bums, and maybe not even then). Further, goobermint directly conspires to raise prices even higher by dint of the full library of regulatory costs they impose.
Darn right I do! Its costing ME money. Got a problem with someone protecting their own interests?
Next, I suppose that you will wish to decree to the various ships' owners how they should more ''efficiently'' use their own property, eh?
I dont recall suggesting that. Let me read back. No, I dont think I did. Hmm...must be a conclusion youre jumping to there.
Some exponent of capitalism you are. Might as well tattoo ''From each according to his abilities...'' right on your forearm.
I believe in capitalism, but I'm not blind to its weaknesses either. The opposition are going to use this. It's not good publicity. It looks like greedy capitalists and greedy big oil swindling the consumer. Nonsense of course, but when the price of oil went up in the seventies how many people blamed the government for taxing it too highly? Most people blamed the Arabs.
"Unacceptable", eh? Got you pegged, laddiebuck.
Usually it is liberals or socialists who put people in nice neat little boxes as rapidly as that. Are you sure you're not some kind of plant?
Oh no, capitalism!
Well, yes apparently they ARE doing just that.
Iran did this a year or two ago but someone said they can only hold it for 90 days before it goes bad.
Iran did this a year or two ago but someone said they can only hold it for 90 days before it goes bad.
They are witholding supply until current refined stocks are depleted to the point where upward pressure on prices come into play and then they will release more of the supply.
They underestimated the ability of the American people to cut back when the price of gasoline moved way above its actual value to us. It wasn’t that many years ago that the Big 3 were posting record sales on their biggest profit makers, the SUV and pickup and the Saudi’s were saying 35 dollars was a fair price for a barrel of oil. Greed and speculation in the oil market has now destroyed the market for the very products refiners depend on most for higher fuel sales. Thats why now the only thing they have to work for them is more control of supply whereas a few years ago they would make a good profit on volume and supply. Throw in the AGW crowd and their fossil fuels agenda and it looks like the oil markets cut their own throats.
Read my posts over 9 years here on FR; you'll soon be disabused of that notion.
And when goobermint starts sponsoring, supporting and worst of all subsidising assorted frauds, directly, as now, the game is bloody over. And much more quickly over when various alleged free marketers start apologising for goobermint misbehaviour.
NO economic situation anywhere on this planet is anywhere near optimal, so that little objection is facile and, frankly, specious.
Just BTW, ''unacceptable'' (your first term) and ''hardly optimal'' (your second) are not equivalent concepts.
Very interesting. That helps bring things together.
I think it ties into the points I am trying to make. Speculators are, by definition, only interested in short term gains. They don’t care if, as you say, the oil market “cuts its own throat” as long as they get their profit NOW. Now you could say, ok its their capital, this is a capitalist system, good luck to them. But I don’t think they represent genuine capital. Their activities artificially increase or decrease the value of goods. They disrupt trade, they extract money out of the system (MY money, as it happens), without adding any value to the product. They are basically parasites on the system. At the best they are indulging in institutionalised gambling.
It just really winds me up. I’ve spent most of my life working in industry and I’ve seen this kind of short-termism all the time. They make the books look good now, for the benefit of the city - while neglecting plant and R&D for the future. Things look rosy on the surface, but the reality is a dispirited, demoralised workforce struggling with old-fashioned, decaying equipment - who can conveniently get all the blame when the whole thing blows up.
I agree with that. I also hold congress responsible for this countries decaying infrastructure. AS the richest nation on the planet, we should have an infrastructure system that reflects our wealth. Roads and bridges should be clean and safe. Our transportation system of air and rail especially rail should be top of the line. We should have a water distribution system that should be able to mitigate the effects of drought in any part of the country.
Congress’s over generosity to social programs I would say is much to blame for this.
And if you look at the mam-made wonders of the world, I’ll bet dollars to donuts that they weren’t built by union workers.
Its bizarre isnt it. The one thing national government really should be able to control and dictate (because it is a national issue) is the provision of infrastructure. But they just cannot resist dabbling in local issues that should remain just that.
I agree. If the infrastructure is good, everything else has a chance. If it is bad, there’s no hope at all.
However, your bet is lost. Amazingly, the great pyramid of Giza was built with union labor!
This is phantom storage. There is no way to track it as one would the land based storage.
IOW this is akin to the sales man who says this is his “last widget” when he has a warehouse full of identical copies. IOOW no truth in marketing.
The way to kill the ghost tankers is to take family homes “off grid” as a massive public policy.
I didn't suppose for one instant that you were - but I did want you to know how it felt to be misrepresented. NO economic situation anywhere on this planet is anywhere near optimal, so that little objection is facile and, frankly, specious.
That really is a specious argument! What you are saying is that because all other systems are imperfect (something that I agree with fully - the capitalist system is easily the most successful) it is therefore wrong to complain about something that is wrong in the capitalist way of doing things? If that were so, we would never be able to criticise anything, and therefore we would have no chance of addressing or correcting anything either. Tell me, if everyone on your street was two hundred pounds overweight, would you be feeling ok about only being one hundred pounds beyond your optimum? By no means! You may be not as bad as everyone else, but one hundred pounds overweight is still unhealthy for most people. Just BTW, ''unacceptable'' (your first term) and ''hardly optimal'' (your second) are not equivalent concepts.
No they're not. That's because the first is a reference to a commonly known quote by Edward Heath (the unpleasant and unacceptable face of capitalism) which is often trooped out by leftits when this kind of incident occurs, whereas the second is my personal assessment.
I thought it was slave labor.
That is the common misconception, reinforced by various hollywood epics in the 50’s and 60’s. It isn’t true. Pyramid building was a very skilled and highly organised activity - the workforce actually had their own towns close to the building sites. And yes, there are contemporary records of them going on strike.
My thoughts on it aren’t derived from the movies. But I could be wrong about the pyramids. I know about the stone masons but as far as being a union, I think it may have been popular revolt.
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