Loquacious
Joined: Jan 2005
Posts: 3,954 |
Quote:
maybe you need to look into profit margins... no one talks about that but hey its not for the media's best interest.
BTW how about starbucks coffee? 53 bucks a gallon, bottled water? 35 bucks a gallon...
why don't we take those profits too while we are at it? like Obama and Hillary suggests... I tell you why not, because this isn't China or Cuba we aren't a communist country.
Wanna see lower prices? we need to start harvesting our own resources. rant mode off
Sorry, but that's not even a rational argument. There's not a single one of us who won't be able to get to work if we suddenly boycott bottled water and Starbucks coffee. That's just stupidity there, when people pay those prices for that kind of item. But try only showing up to work ever 3rd day to cut back on how much gas you use, or not filling your heating oil tank in the winter and see if that is as easy to pull off...
Eliminate speculation, cut consumption, and invest HEAVILY in alternative fuels. Sorry folks oil is going the way of the dinosaur (since it came by way of the dinosaur!heehee), time to think of the future.
Further, without even going into politics, during World War II, companies had no problem when asked to forego profits or reduce them, without any shouts of Communism! Our Economy is in a major crisis mode now (regardless of what you call it), and the fuel prices are directly impacting every sector of the economy. While it wouldn't be popular with the stockholders, why not ask the oil companies to forego say 2-3% of their profits by reducing the price per gallon. On $40 Billion in profits, 1% would put $400,000,000 back into consumers pockets (add that up with the other oil companies, and it might make a difference) Or put that into a collective fund run by the National Renewable Energies Labs to use toward developing a new alternative or a Hydrogen infrastructure, etc...) The stupid thing about this, is everyone is assuming (and I somehow think some of the oil industry execs think this too) that if we go to some alternative like Hydrogen, that suddenly all of the Oil companies will be obsolete and some other corporate sector will move in an take their place. Well, pardon me, but if I were an oil industry exec, I would break ranks with the others, and start seriously helping with the alternative fuel research, as well as laying longer term plans to be ready to retrofit my stations to handle the new fuel, perhaps with a phased in introduction so that we have both new and old fuels until we have weaned ourselves. These companies have the infrastructure in place already in the form of a service station network. But these companies typically (like Wall Street) don't think about anything long-term, only about how to stuff their wallets this week and screw next week. Some, like BP, are starting to be more forward thinking, and hopefully, for those companies, it pays off to the detraction of those companies who are standing in the way. 
Last edited by Bayern710; 06/13/2008 4:25 PM.
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