WINNABLE Gas War

[Jeff Gagnon]

GAS WAR??

a GAS WAR idea that WILL work=97=97=97=97>

This was originally sent by a retired Coca Cola executive. It came from one of his engineer buddies who retired from Halliburton. =A0It's worthy of=A0your consideration:

Join the resistance!=A0 I hear we are going to hit close to $4.00 a gallon by=A0summer and it might possibly go higher! =A0Want gasoline prices to come down?=A0 We need to take some intelligent, united action.=A0 Phillip Hollsworth offered this good idea. This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the "don't buy gas on a certain day" campaign that was going around earlier!=A0

The oil companies just laughed at that because they knew we wouldn't continue to "hurt" ourselves by refusing to buy gas. =A0It was more of an inconvenience to us than it was a problem for them.

But whoever thought of THIS idea, has come up with a plan that can really work.=A0 Please read on and join with us!

By now you're probably thinking gasoline priced at about $1.50 is super cheap. =A0Me too! It is currently $2.79 for regular unleaded in my town.=A0 Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a gallon of gas is CHEAP at $1.50 - $1.75, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control the marketplace..... not sellers.=A0

With the price of gasoline going up more each day, we consumers need to take action. The only way we are going to see the price of gas come down is if we hit someone in the pocketbook by not purchasing their gas! And, we can do that WITHOUT hurting ourselves.=A0

How?=A0

Since we all rely on our cars, we can't just stop buying gas. =A0But we CAN have an impact on gas prices if we all act together to force a price war.

Here's the idea:

For the rest of 2007, DON'T purchase ANY gasoline from the two biggest companies (which now are one), EXXON and MOBIL. If they are not selling any gas, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit.

But to have an impact, we need to reach literally millions of Exxon and Mobil gas buyers.=A0 It's really simple to do! Now, don't wimp out at this point.... keep reading and I'll explain how simple it is to reach millions of people.

I am sending this note to 30 people. If each of us sends it to at least ten more (30 x 10 =3D 300) ... and those 300 send it to at least ten more (300 x 10 =3D 3,000)... and so on... by the time the message reaches the sixth group of people, we will have reached over THREE MILLION consumers.=A0 If those three million get excited and pass this on to ten friends each, then 30 million people will have been contacted!=A0 If it goes one level further, you guessed it..... THREE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE!!!

Again, all you have to do is send this to 10 people. That's all. (If you don't understand how we can reach 300 million and all you have to do is send this to 10 people.... Well, let's face it, you just aren't a mathematician. (But I am, so trust me on this one.) How long would all that take?=A0

If each of us sends this e-mail out to ten more people within one day of receipt, all 300 MILLION people could conceivably be contacted within the next 8 days!!! I'll bet you didn't think you and I had that much potential, did you? Acting together we can make a difference.=A0 If this makes sense to you, please pass this message on.=A0

I suggest that we not buy from EXXON/MOBIL UNTIL THEY LOWER THEIR PRICES TO THE $1.30 RANGE AND KEEP THEM DOWN.

[Puckdropper]

[e-mail] (Jeff Gagnon) wrote in news: [e-mail]:

*snip*

*snip*

A mathemetician, perhaps, but not an economist. Gas is not a competive market commodity, supply is purposely fixed and carefully regulated so demand will drive the prices higher. Sounds like a monopoly to me.

I'm not an economist either, but I took a couple classes in college.

What can you do to "win" this gas price escallation? Drive a more fuel efficient car and take a bike or walk if you're close enough to the place you're going. If you should be pressuring anybody, it should be the insurance companies in order to make purpose-based vehicle ownership cheaper. That way, when you need to haul several sheets of plywood, you can do it. When you just need a couple screws, a few pieces of sandpaper, and a gallon of milk, you can drive a more fuel efficient car to get those items.

To the OP: Please note the proper tagging of the subject line with [OT]. All posts (including general interest) that aren't about wood working originally should be marked with this notation.

Puckdropper

[Phil-in-MI]

{Snip}

I agree with Puckdropper.

Supply and demand says it all. If the cost of gas has no effect on demand, why shouldn't it continue to go up? Only when the overall demand changes will the price of gas stabilize.

Prior to January 2001, my local gas prices were influenced by competition between local gas stations. Not no more! There is only one or two sources of wholesale gas, and ALL gas stations in my area get their supply from this small quantity of (non-completive?) sources. It is the total demand that will change the equation, not just a boycott of some independent owned franchise station. Why pick on the little guy with no influence?

Puckdropper correctly pointed out, use less gas.

Aside: How can I continue to indulge in woodworking as a hobby when I am now spending $50.00 per week on gas just to go to work. That is double what I spent on gas just 3 or 4 years ago. $25.00 a week adds up to a lot of tools, wood, and wood hobby magazines. And I ain't got it as bad as many others who need 2 tanks of gas to get to work each week because of how far in the suburbs they live from work. {If my local Woodcraft store is 4 gallons of gas away (round trip), that makes the cost of that .......}

Phil

[B A R R Y]

This is why some folks also consider rising energy prices to be anti-inflationary.

You have to go to work, and you have to eat. When these basics go up, you spend less on other, discretionary items, slowing the overall economy.

[Pop`]

It's suggesting a chain letter; those are illegal, even on the internet.

[Tom Veatch]

A bunch of utter nonsense based on total ignorance of fungible commodity markets.

[GLiddy]

To the original poster:

Your post is pure bullshit. I'm sure you're just a troll. But here is a link

in regards to the post. I use the site on a weekly basis, since I get emails from coworkers who seemed to get suckered into just about anything.

[Morris Dovey]

| On Sun, 20 May 2007 11:12:05 GMT, "Phil-in-MI" wrote: | || Aside: How can I continue to indulge in woodworking as a hobby || when I am now spending $50.00 per week on gas just to go to work. | | This is why some folks also consider rising energy prices to be | anti-inflationary.

I don't think so. As the cost of production goes up, the price of goods and services will remain at some multiplier of that cost. It's been a long time since I studied this stuff, but isn't this "cost push" inflation?

| You have to go to work, and you have to eat. When these basics go | up, you spend less on other, discretionary items, slowing the | overall economy.

Yuppers - but many will reconsider their means of transportation, and many will find ways to spend less on food.

Application of Murphy's Law and the Law of Unintended Consequences to the scenario indicates that more people will be driving "beaters" than will be shifting to public transportation, and that there will be an increase in malnutrition and general health problems.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Rod & Betty Jo]

Regrettably not......The "two oil companies" would simply wholesale the gas to everybody else whom wasn't being boycotted. Even worse such a boycott might even initially raise prices since "everybody else" would have increased demand and the two intended oil companies could charge a premium for their now surplus gas. Rod

[Leon]

You hit the nail squarely on the head. The version of Supply and Demand that we are seeing, has progressed to the stage of "What the market will bare. This is not however a monopoly as other companies are involved. Letting all the oil companies merge in to 1/2 the number that there were around 10 years ago, basically eleminating 1/2 the competition is a steer towards a monopoly like trend. I firmly believe that oil prices are fixed by fear much like fear drives the stock market. If the local and national news woudl SHUT UP about anouncing gas prices goin up the oil companies would not have to raise the prices to meet our expectations. The oil companies love the news agency being the barer of bad news, it gets us ready for the next price hike.

An interseting side note, The Shell VP was on the news the other day and he indicated the supply and demand excuse cutting short of calling it what it actually is, "what the market will bare. He said there is no shortage of oil, simply a shortate of a way to produce gasoline. With no shortage of oil and oil prices being lower than what they have been, why is gasoline at an all time high? It's, what the market will bare. He also went on to say that no oil refinery has been built since 1977, too much governmant red tape and cost. Awhhhh, what part of business does not have red tape??? If they built more refineries there would be less restriction on refining.

Another interesting note, a long time friend and neighbor is an engeneer that just finished working in California. He was the site cost engeneer overseeing the expenses of revamping a refinery for Valero. He learned that in California that Valero's cost to produce 1 gallon of gasoline is $1.02 and 1 gallon of diesel is $0.89.

Oil companies claim demand is up and some have even blamed the earlier day light saving time this year as a reason. If demand is up and creating a problem I wonder who is sitting in line to get gas? I remember those shortages in the 70's, those were more real than what we have today.

Get rid of the need for gasoline altogether. Yes it will affect the economy, but oil is used for a lot more than producing fuel for cars and trucks. The typical gasoline engine only makes use of 25% of the fuel it burns the other 75% is lost to heat. The new hybrid yet to be marketed cars can operate from electricity for about 2.2 cents per mile. While converting fuel to electriciey is wastful, it is not nearly as inefficient as letting the engine in your car convert the fuel into useable energy. Typically, all things being equal the cost of electricity needed to drive a car the same distance as 1 gallon of gasoline, would be 75 cents as compared to gasoline at $3 per gallon. This information is from the specs on the GM Volt concept car and the from the Zap motor company that has been producing electric vehicles in California for the last 10 years. Zap has produced and sold over 90,000 vehicles world wide.

[Leon]

IIRC the price of gasoline last year was just under the equivalent price of gasoline in 1982. Now it is 50% higher.

[Leon]

Exactly. They are all sleeping with each other.

[Swingman]

What's the price/gallon, adjusted for inflation from say, 1982 (twenty five years)?

Seems that would be a pretty good way to judge the current cost in the scheme of things.

[Morris Dovey]

| Get rid of the need for gasoline altogether. Yes it will affect the | economy, but oil is used for a lot more than producing fuel for | cars and trucks.

*YES!* Thank you for saying the words that so much needed to be said. It _will_ happen in the long term, and the only open question is how painful the transition will be - and the longer we procrastinate the more difficult the change.

Even if we were to achieve global "no-fuel" energy production (unlikely in the short and intermediate term) we would still likely need significant amounts of petroleum for non-fuel uses.

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[HeyBub]

No business has red tape like energy-related ones. A gas-fired electrical generating plant was built in my area a few years ago. It took ELEVEN YEARS to get past all the regulatory hurdles and court cases before construction was begun. It then took another three years to actually build the thing.

Gasoline is not at an all-time high, either in actual cost or in percentage of disposable income. That high took place in 1981.

I remind you that there are five different blends of gasoline required in the Chicago area. This kind of silliness wrecks havoc in the distribution scheme.

[Leon]

Actually gasoline is at an all time high. Compared to a cost of living example of how things were in 1981 is simply a comparison of the percentage of your income that went towards purchasing gasoline then vs. now. Even with that in consideration, last year when gasoline prices were considerable less than they are today we were within about 10% of having matched that ratio compairison of 1981 prices. We are certainly paying much more today than we were last year.

[Han]

"Leon" wrote in news:Cc14i.9407$ [e-mail]:

Well my salary is certainly higher today than it was in 1981 (that's a good thing!). Unfortunately, we decided on a minivan a few years back, rather than a small sedan. I'm trying to compensate by bicycling and using the trains. Since I am now a senior citizen according to NJ Transit (62!), cost of train travel has gone down by ~50%. Walking from the station to work is also good for me.

[B A R R Y]

I LOVE riding my bike for actual transportation. Actually, I love riding it anywhere, but to replace driving is extra fun!

My favorite is riding to the liquor store for microbrew and getting asked "When do you get your license back?" Seriously!

[Rod & Betty Jo]

gas peaked around $1.30 in 1981 today (as of 2006) after inflation it would be $3.07 today..............Fed and State taxes have raised considerably over that time per gallon but I don't know where they fall proportionally. I'd still suspect the Gov. take has exceeded actual or relative road costs...i.e mass transit is largely funded via gas taxes. On the other hand if memory serves me correctly a barrel of oil hit $30-$40 or so per barrel before collapsing below $10 in the mid 80's.....$35 in 1981 would equal after inflation $82.57 today. Since today's price is around $66 we can blame regulation, refineries and local taxes. Rod

[Leon]

IIRC I remember gas prices reaching about 80-85 cents per gallon in Texas during the shortage in the early 80's. According to the California Energy Comission, the yearly Average price in California was $1.34 per gallon. For the inflation prices to be in line, the prices "in 2006" would have to be $2.63 per gallon on average. Does any one know where I can buy gas for $2.63 per gallon?