Oh No! Gas Prices Are Falling!
Every time the price of oil drops, the demand for that same product increases and the demand for alternate fuels, decreases. Why are gas prices falling?
China Daily reported that “oil dropped more than 6 percent to below $88.00 a barrel on Monday as a global market rout churned concerns that faltering fuel demand could slow further.”
In other words, we aren’t buying enough, so it’s time to lower the price. But can anyone other than the people vested in that market honestly say that we don’t use enough oil?
- » See also: World’s Cheapest Car Gets 56 MPG; First Delivery On Schedule - Today
- » Get Gas 2.0 by RSS or sign up by email.
In his new book “Hot, Flat, and Crowded”, Thomas L. Friedman writes “When I asked Rick Wagoner, the chairman and CEO of General Motors, why his company didn’t make more fuel-efficient cars, he gave me the standard answer: that GM has never succeeded in telling Americans what cars they should buy.” Thomas goes on to say , “But what the Detroit executives never tell you is that one big reason the public wanted SUVs and Hummers all those years was that Detroit and the oil industry constantly lobbied Congress against raising gasoline taxes, which would have shaped public demand for something different.”
European countries have been imposing high gasoline taxes for years, and when I was serving in Germany in the early 90’s, a gallon of gas was $6.84 a gallon, and that was 20 years ago! The result is that European countries have demanded smaller and smaller cars.
As of this writing, Gasoline in Denmark is about $9.00 a gallon, compared to $3.65 in the United States. (Up from $2.50 a year ago and down from $4.50 two months ago.) It seems like $9.00 a gallon gas in Denmark would decimate it’s economy right? Since 1981, there economy has grown 70 percent while energy consumption has been flat. In 1973, Denmark got 99 percent of it’s energy from the Middle East. Today, it gets zero.
We’ve become spoiled in the United States. We have grown up thinking that the oil that runs everything from our cars to our industrial complex, is cheap, inexhaustible and politically neutral. But we have come to an age where we realize that oil is in short supply, expensive, environmentally damaging and a political nightmare.
So with these realizations, instead of following the success of countries like Denmark, Brazil and Germany, we continue to lower the price, to fuel the demand, to use more of what we are running out of.
The Republican saying “Drill more, use less” doesn’t work. If we want more of the same Environmental devastation, financial crisis, repeated bailouts, and political situations like wars, terrorism and starvation, then all we have to do is…nothing.
I say it’s time to raise the price of Gasoline in this country. It’s time to drive this economy toward a sustainable energy program that will benefit our economy, our lives and our environment.
Photo courtesy of WiseOwl via Creative Commons License
So I’m supposed to be impressed at an article comparing US energy policy to that of Denmark.
Umm, Denmark could almost fit in my trunk….
Using Denmark as an example for the US to follow isn’t very helpful. They have almost nothing in common with us. Denmark is a small, homogenious, urbanized, and declining population packed into a small area that has vast amounts of crude oil and natural gas — and is in fact a net exporter of crude. We’re a large, diverse, growing population that’s spread across a large distance that is a net importer of crude. Maybe one lesson we can learn from Danes — apparently they have no problem with off shore drilling or exploiting any natural resources they need.
Let me get this straight: the price of gas is low because the government doesn’t tax it enough. Is that what you’re saying?
If you think you’re not paying enough taxes, why not send that extra amount in on your own? There’s even a spot on the 1040 form to do so. And if you’re not, who do you think you are telling me I’m not paying enough taxes? Do you honestly think it’ll be spent better if the taxes come from the price of a gallon of gas than from any other source?
I don’t see how gas prices are artificially low because we’re not paying enough to Washington DC. Please, explain it to us.
Let’s see, the size of Denmark compared to size of Texas. Looks like goods trucks have to go a lot farther and thus use more fuel.
City layout in the US is a lot different than what it is in England or Denmark. You’ve got streets in Europe that only pedestrians, bicycles, and Vespas can get through.
Train travel from Calais to Paris doesn’t take too long. Most of your in Europe airline travel in Europe is take off, then land.
Put high taxes on fuel in the US and you can say goodbye to UPS, Fed-EX, and Amazon.
A good many of us drive about 30 minutes to get to work and I’m sorry but the lag between getting out some tinker toy car with half the life span of a subcompact and half the safety, would put a lot of people out of work and dead.
You can always ID a Leftists on economics, they are all stick and no carrot.
Here’s a deal for you -
Next time you feel that you are paying too little for gas, simply pick what (higher) price you think it should be and write out a check to Uncle Sam for the difference.
That should make you feel better.
Meanwhile those (like myself) who have zero disposable income and are barely scrapping by can continue to allocate our monies the way that seems best to us, without further government interference.
Deal?
Ummm, Denmark != USA
How far does the average Denmark person drive to work? To school? To the store?
How many children do they have?
I live in Vienna, Austria. I have the best public transportation system in the world at my feet. I sold my car back in the States when I moved here. But having 2 kids, and relying on public transportation is very difficult. However it can be done, with inconveniences. Especially when the grocery store, bakery, etc are within a 1km walk.
But this would have been impossible where I moved from in the US. Literally. My family would have starved to death if we tried it without a car.
So in Denmark, people have the luxury to drive less. Unless you live in one of 10 cities in the USA this is impossible.
How someone could look at Denmark and then draw conclusions to what can and should work in the US is beyond me.
Denmark is a very small country that doesn’t have anything like our Mountain West region. I’m all for alternative energy, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not going to be enough here in the Mountain West to push the standard East Coast solutions like mass transit. If you think the Mountain West is provincial now, think what it would be like with $9/gallon gas. Plenty of people out here have to drive 45 minutes to see a doctor or get to the nearest grocery store. Shall we go back to the days when the stagecoach’s delivery from Sears Roebuck was the highlight of the month, so that New Yorkers can be more encouraged to ride the subway?
I do not want to give moe money to the government. NO to higher gas taxes. we will pay the cost of gasoline, not politicians. when the cost goes up, we will use less.
Have the gas taxes ever gone DOWN in Europe? How are those taxes used to assist in using less gas, other than to rob the people so they can’t buy as much? Yeah, thought so - goes right into the old general fund.
So Europe is really financing their government on the backs of a necessary transportation fluid. On demand they thought was inelastic, therefore a great source of revenue.
Why is the government the answer? It can only distort the market, and do you really want to give them more of your money? Fine, write them a check. Don’t advocate them taking more of mine for your stupid idea. After all, you are responsible fo you, I’m responsible for me.
“If we want more of the same Environmental devastation, financial crisis, repeated bailouts, and political situations like wars, terrorism and starvation, then all we have to do is … nothing.”
Last time I read my European history book (which was yesterday) I noticed the 100 Years War, the 30 Years War, and a bunch of smaller related wars all over the Continent. None of them were about oil. All of them wrought environmental devastation, terrorism and starvation.
Yes, we should use alternative fuels. Go ahead and push whatever agenda you want.
But please … stop repeating the canards that “less oil” or “more education” or “no religion” will prevent all war. Take away all the reasons for fighting and humans will just invent another one.
The price of gas does not rise in a vacuum. The price of gas is incorporated into the pricing of almost everything we eat, wear or use. The cost to our society of high gas prices doesn’t just affect gas consumption; it slows the entire economy as the price of everything else rises accordingly. Artificial price pressures by the government, down or up, end up having long-term negative consequences. TANSTAAFL.