We take our status as a capitalist country seriously, I think.

Oh puh-leeez! Do Capitalist economies bolster their steel industry by imposing illegal (under WTO rules) tarrifs against foreign steel?

Even now, people are thinking about bailing the big 2.801.

The United States are Capitalist when it suits them and socialist when it suits them.

I hope the price of oil triples so I don’t have to deal with the proles taking up valuable bumper room on the highway.

We take our status as a capitalist country seriously, I think. We don’t like high taxes. (The very thought makes me think Boston Tea Party) We don’t like paying for welfare or other people’s healthcare, because we know it’ll get wasted. We’re not as gung ho about Big Government as Western Europe seems to be. That’s why I say Britons who complain about high gas prices only have themselves to blame. It doesn’t have to be that way.

But having said that, all of the major political parties in the UK are FOR taxing cars and encouraging public transport etc, so don’t start with your ‘Well you get what you voted for’ crap…

Winston Churchill
“A 5 minute conversation with the average voter is the best argument against democracy”

A few years ago when oil was 13 a barrel it was a pretty simple matter to pile on loads of taxes per liter. Now that crude oil is 1000% more they are stuck with high taxes and high supply costs. Serves them right. They voted for these people.

And hear very similiar complaining from consumers and clients (providers) about rates and taxes.

Absolutely right, and not well-known by the public. The reason the giants (Exxon/Mobil, BP, Shell)

have such large profits is that they are not paying $135/barrel for their crude. The smaller oil

companies and refiners may be just hanging on with little profit if they’re paying full market prices

for oil.

What is never discussed is how, at the retail level, gasoline and diesel end up selling for

approximately the same price in any given region, regardless of the cost of the crude. If Exxon refines

domestic oil that cost them $10-$20/barrel, that low crude price is not passed on to consumers.

Everyone pays at the pricing structure of the most expensive refiner who bought on the spot market.

Socialism is a lot more than just what day of the year Tax Freedom Day arrives.

Absolutely right, and not well-known by the public. The reason the giants (Exxon/Mobil, BP, Shell) have such large profits is that they are not paying $135/barrel for their crude. The smaller oil companies and refiners may be just hanging on with little profit if they’re paying full market prices for oil.

What is never discussed is how, at the retail level, gasoline and diesel end up selling for approximately the same price in any given region, regardless of the cost of the crude. If Exxon refines domestic oil that cost them $10-$20/barrel, that low crude price is not passed on to consumers. Everyone pays at the pricing structure of the most expensive refiner who bought on the spot market.

Absolutely right, and not well-known by the public. The reason the giants (Exxon/Mobil, BP, Shell) have such large profits is that they are not paying $135/barrel for their crude. The smaller oil companies and refiners may be just hanging on with little profit if they’re paying full market prices for oil.

What is never discussed is how, at the retail level, gasoline and diesel end up selling for approximately the same price in any given region, regardless of the cost of the crude. If Exxon refines domestic oil that cost them $10-$20/barrel, that low crude price is not passed on to consumers. Everyone pays at the pricing structure of the most expensive refiner who bought on the spot market.

Why do you think ExxonMobil is getting out of the gas-selling business…leaving it to retailers to take the hit.

As the cost of oil goes up, the profit margin on low cost oil will (of course) increase. On the bright side, production on marginal fields (where the cost of production is higher) will also increase, as there will be sufficient motivation to drill there… Which should keep oil prices from going too high for quite some time.

And, after living in the UK for two years, it feels like everything is about a third more expensive than in the bay area, regardless of the actual exchange rate.

Canada employs 60-percent more civil servants per capita than England and the USA with three and ten times our population respectively. Fifty percent of our people support the 25-percent employed by government at premium wages and benefits.

A socialist government’s goal is to make everybody equally poor. If it moves, they tax it. If it keeps moving, they regulate it. If it stops moving, they subsidize it.

–chuck
http://chuck.goolsbee.org

Take a look at this graph:
http://www.theoildrum.com/uploads/12/north_sea_bp.png
Production is down about 40%. 40%! That hurts.

Now, oil is drilled worldwide and is fungible, but losing more than 1 million barrels per day is greater than 1% of total worldwide capacity.

For all those who say ‘but there’s lots of oil left’ it’s not as simple as that. First actual, liquid, oil is becoming harder to find. Things like tar sand and oil shale are oil equivalents which require lots of processing before they can even be refined.

Second, and more relevant to this conversation, is: what price are you willing to pay for what’s left? As I said, it is getting harder to find. Maybe you’ve heard about the “jack” oil field in the Gulf of Mexico. The oil is 28,000 feet below the sea floor. The sea floor is 7,000 feet below the sea surface. Yes – that’s over 6.5 MILES below the surface of the water. Just to get to it. Then a pipeline has to be built to get it to shore. Then it has to be refined. Then it has to be trucked to a gas station. Then you get to buy it.

And you want all that for $2 or $3 per gallon? Think of the work that goes into it. Open your eyes. Do you think that the oil companies would be drilling in these waters, going to these lengths, if they didn’t have to? If there was oil that is much easier to get to?

Again – open your eyes. Regardless of whether or not we’re running out of oil, we’ve already run out of CHEAP oil. Get used to these prices.

Different oils have different content. I believe North Sea oil has more stuff usefull for power stations, while Saudi stuff has more petroleum.

Then as far as I’m concerned, you get what you pay (through the nose) for.

If petrol prices are rising to cover the rising price of oil, how can oil companies be profiting? They’re just passing on the cost surely? Their revenues would increase, but their profits would stay the same…..

Then they must be selling more of it or speculation is up or OPEC isn’t producing as much or the GBP is weakening or the subsidies on gasoline across the world are keeping demand artificially high or something that makes more logical sense than just saying “Big Oil’z rapn me”.

Let me guess, you’re one of those that think by taxing the hell out of oil profits it won’t lead to less production and even higher oil (and therefore gas prices) despite basic economics…oh, wait. I forgot. The Dems are going to nationalize the refineries or the entire industry. Greaaaaat. Now we can see our government find some way to lose money in the oil industry. That’s what happens when people need to find a villain. Government does what it does best…overreact.

Yes, I think the “gap” between standard of living between Brits and ‘mercuns is a lot closer than it was – and to be honest, I think that it is dropping for both relative to other 1st world nations, but the US is dropping faster, making the UK look relatively better off. For now.

But I read some rather interesting tid-bits in places like

http://www.dailyreckoning.com/index.html

and some of these guys figure that the UK still has some distance to fall, with standard of living, because the per-person debt is even higher than America’s is.

I can concur with that possibility; when we lived in the UK 22 to 15 years ago, I distinctly recall many of the other families living in our neighborhood, spending 2000 pounds PER CHILD on Christmas gifts (all “on tick” – on their credit cards). We did not and our kids didn’t “suffer.”

I also distinctly recall paying 21% APR on a new car loan, in 1990, as well. That was after having lived in the UK for four years. So I had established credit (and owned a home), had a reasonably good job.

So it’s not just “income for income” but also the interest rates and taxation rates which really hurt compared to America.