It's official. Gas prices double under obama

[Fear No Evil]

"According to the GasBuddy gasoline price tracking web site, the price of a gallon of regular gas was around $1.79 when Mr. Obama took office"


Damn that's cheap. That's about $0.47 per litre.

How many quid is that?

 

[ShawnD1]

lol ok.

As a side note along these lines, what's funny is that as fuel economy has increased people now drive more. Prius owners drive more miles than their non-hybrid owner counterparts. As efficiency increases, people consume more of it. It's called the rebound effect IIRC.

Sounds about right. When I got rid of my pile of shit Ford Tempo and got a real car that had about 40% better gas mileage, my fuel consumption increased dramatically.

 

[sunzt]

The last peak in prices in the summer of 2008, it appears the dominant cause was Wall Street speculation - something the media nearly completely missed at the time.

Supply and demand did not explain the prices - they said they should be far lower.

Nothing has changed to prevent the Wall Street behavior, so that's the first place I'd look this time as well.

Exactly, what i've been trying to point out. For the past few years, the price of oil is largely base on speculation and will get worse.

 

[ElFenix]

lol ok.

As a side note along these lines, what's funny is that as fuel economy has increased people now drive more. Prius owners drive more miles than their non-hybrid owner counterparts. As efficiency increases, people consume more of it. It's called the rebound effect IIRC.

people who drive more are going to be more attracted to more fuel efficient cars to begin with. no, no selection bias there.

 

[Craig234]

Criticisms of Bush on record oil profits and prices were because Bush was a servant of the corporate interests.

His whole ideology was to serve them - really, it seems it was to get elected to get power for the interests who paid for his campaigns. This is why he had a massive political machinery that went to the lobbyists, and cared about one thing, getting corporations to stop giving any money to Democrats and start only giving to Republicans. This was not 'business as usual' but a whole new level of selling the government to the highest bidder.

Interests were told if they played ball - which meant not only the donations, but actually hiring Republican-selected people into their donation staff to monitor and direct behavior - they could literally write the laws they wanted passed; if they did not, the Republicans would ensure their interests did not pass whatever the benefits and whether they deserved to. It was called the 'K Street project'.

Another result was that hundreds of government oversight officials who were supposed to represent the public, came from the companies and lobbyists of the very industries they were supposed to regulate - largely killing the oversight that was intended under the law for the public benefit.

So, whatever the facts, Bush deserved huge suspicion - from his families' decades-long Texas oil affiliations and corporate servitude - over the issue.

Maybe it was only his hands-off approach to letting Wall Street get away with what they wanted; he was still a 'willing servant of corrupt interests' as their hired hand.

Obama is currently doing their bidding as well, on this windfall tax issue.

His motivations are less clear. A case can be made that his motivations are also to do the bidding of powerful interests; but it's also plausible, for example, that he simply knows that the tax cannot pass with opposition from Republicans, and there is no reason to spend his political capital proposing something that won't pass, and will only give Republicans ammunition in 2012 for calling him anti-business.

We do know what he has not done may of the abuses of the Bush administration; but there's a long list of serving those interests over the public as well.

It can be debated how much he's a 'willing' servant versus how much he simply can't get things for the public done because the interests have a lot of power.

Here's a summary from a website that proclaimed his campaign promise on an oil windfall tax was broken:

At the time, we thought it was too early to call this promise dead. Gas prices are unpredictable. But even as gas prices rose again this year, Obama said nothing about a windfall profit tax. It hasn't been included in any of Obama's three budget plans to date. And we couldn't find anywhere that either Obama or anyone in his administration has raised the idea. Now, even if it were to be proposed, experts say the political calculus -- with Republicans controlling the House -- makes it almost impossible that it wouldn't (sic) become law. We rate this one a Promise Broken.

 

[Matt1970]

Interests were told if they played ball - which meant not only the donations, but actually hiring Republican-selected people into their donation staff to monitor and direct behavior - they could literally write the laws they wanted passed; if they did not, the Republicans would ensure their interests did not pass whatever the benefits and whether they deserved to. It was called the 'K Street project'.

That's just politics as usual. It's just that as soon as the Republicans are responsible it now gets a name "K Street Project"

 

[CycloWizard]

So you see that demand/supply is not the primary driver of oil prices then (lately)

So your approach is to now summarize my posts by stating the opposite, then leave it completely ambiguous whether it's a question or statement by omitting all punctuation? Very well played.

 

[CycloWizard]

The last peak in prices in the summer of 2008, it appears the dominant cause was Wall Street speculation - something the media nearly completely missed at the time.

Supply and demand did not explain the prices - they said they should be far lower.

Nothing has changed to prevent the Wall Street behavior, so that's the first place I'd look this time as well.

How did you decide that the main driver was speculation? I see the claim thrown around by lots of people, but I've noticed one trend: none of those people know the first thing about oil production. You're simply speculating about speculation.

Criticisms of Bush on record oil profits and prices were because Bush was a servant of the corporate interests.

His whole ideology was to serve them - really, it seems it was to get elected to get power for the interests who paid for his campaigns. This is why he had a massive political machinery that went to the lobbyists, and cared about one thing, getting corporations to stop giving any money to Democrats and start only giving to Republicans. This was not 'business as usual' but a whole new level of selling the government to the highest bidder.

Interests were told if they played ball - which meant not only the donations, but actually hiring Republican-selected people into their donation staff to monitor and direct behavior - they could literally write the laws they wanted passed; if they did not, the Republicans would ensure their interests did not pass whatever the benefits and whether they deserved to. It was called the 'K Street project'.

Another result was that hundreds of government oversight officials who were supposed to represent the public, came from the companies and lobbyists of the very industries they were supposed to regulate - largely killing the oversight that was intended under the law for the public benefit.

So, whatever the facts, Bush deserved huge suspicion - from his families' decades-long Texas oil affiliations and corporate servitude - over the issue.

Maybe it was only his hands-off approach to letting Wall Street get away with what they wanted; he was still a 'willing servant of corrupt interests' as their hired hand.

Obama is currently doing their bidding as well, on this windfall tax issue.

His motivations are less clear. A case can be made that his motivations are also to do the bidding of powerful interests; but it's also plausible, for example, that he simply knows that the tax cannot pass with opposition from Republicans, and there is no reason to spend his political capital proposing something that won't pass, and will only give Republicans ammunition in 2012 for calling him anti-business.

We do know what he has not done may of the abuses of the Bush administration; but there's a long list of serving those interests over the public as well.

It can be debated how much he's a 'willing' servant versus how much he simply can't get things for the public done because the interests have a lot of power.

Here's a summary from a website that proclaimed his campaign promise on an oil windfall tax was broken:

So it's ok for oil companies to make record profits, as long as the sitting president has no ties to those oil companies? Obama has done virtually nothing different, except stumble his way around and interfere with business as usual by instituting illegal moratoriums and other such nonsense to generate the appearance that he's doing something.

 

[bfdd]

Let's not forget out good friends the Opec Nations that constantly choke production to cut supply and drive the price up.

Everyone is always quick to point out how much money the oil companies make but nobody really mentions the Opec Nations. Last time I looked it up it costs roughly $4 a barrel to get oil out of the ground and is currently selling on the open market at over $100 a barrel. Nice profit Margin.

Yup, they've been doing it for quite a few years now. We're just being played by the producers and speculators again.

 

[dmcowen674]

Drive for $5! Drive for $5! Drive for $5!

Getting very close here in Chicago

 

[theeedude]

Quadrupled under Bush, so Obama is 2x better than predecessor.

You won't see this in Washington Times.

 

[HendrixFan]

How did you decide that the main driver was speculation? I see the claim thrown around by lots of people, but I've noticed one trend: none of those people know the first thing about oil production. You're simply speculating about speculation.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-great-american-bubble-machine-20100405

In the six months before prices spiked, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the world oil supply rose from 85.24 million barrels a day to 85.72 million. Over the same period, world oil demand dropped from 86.82 million barrels a day to 86.07 million. Not only was the short-term supply of oil rising, the demand for it was falling — which, in classic economic terms, should have brought prices at the pump down.

The push transformed oil from a physical commodity, rigidly subject to supply and demand, into something to bet on, like a stock. Between 2003 and 2008, the amount of speculative money in commodities grew from $13 billion to $317 billion, an increase of 2,300 percent. By 2008, a barrel of oil was traded 27 times, on average, before it was actually delivered and consumed.

But it wasn't the consumption of real oil that was driving up prices — it was the trade in paper oil. By the summer of 2008, in fact, commodities speculators had bought and stockpiled enough oil futures to fill 1.1 billion barrels of crude, which meant that speculators owned more future oil on paper than there was real, physical oil stored in all of the country's commercial storage tanks and the Strategic Petroleum Reserve combined.

 

[JEDIYoda]

This thread is amusing watching liberals whine about cherry picking. Create a thread about the stock market and watch them talk about how much it has risen under Obama lmao.

Yet this whole thread is bogus......so I also find it amusing!!

 

[sunzt]

So your approach is to now summarize my posts by stating the opposite, then leave it completely ambiguous whether it's a question or statement by omitting all punctuation? Very well played.

Of course oil price isn't a 1-1 correlation with supply and demand, and it does go up and down with some variance as does the market in general. However, what we've been used to in terms of variance does not explain the sudden run up to $150 in 2008.

Do you believe $150 oil was a justified price reflective of the expected supply and demand at the time in 2008? That the speculators did not push up the price from $80 to $150 just to dump it for profit a short while later? That huge variance in that short amount of time is not normal. How long did it take for us to go up $40 from $40 to $80? About 2-3 years. How long did it take for us to go up $70 from $80 to $150? Only 1 year!

We should be seeing a general increase in Oil over a long period of time which are usually dictated from supply and demand. However, 100% run ups in short period of time without any destabilizing/catastrophic event in oil supply can only be explained by market manipulation by speculators. Or do you really believe that the market is efficient and without manipulation?

 

[Doppel]

people who drive more are going to be more attracted to more fuel efficient cars to begin with. no, no selection bias there.

Yeah seriously. We need an across-the-nation mandatory course on statistics.

dmcowen: Getting very close here in Chicago

Please stop lying.

 

[CycloWizard]

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-great-american-bubble-machine-20100405

Yes, let me read that article, which is obviously well-researched and unbiased.

From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression -- and they're about to do it again.

The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere. The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.

No agenda here. Nor does any part of that rubbish (at least that you quoted - I assume you read the mess so I'm going to skip the rest) use any facts to support the idea that speculation was the real driving force. I already discussed how a time lag exists between supply and demand. I don't know what economists would call it, but an engineer would call this relationship viscoelastic. If I decide to drill a well today, I am guessing that the future price of oil will be greater than the total per-barrel price of producing it, including the exploration to find it, build the platform, drilling, pumping, labor, and transportation. Since the oil companies keep making money, they must be extremely good at making this decision, at least in a macro sense. This indicates to me that there is a bit more to it than speculation, which is irrational and unpredictable by nature.

 

[Craig234]

That's just politics as usual. It's just that as soon as the Republicans are responsible it now gets a name "K Street Project"

No, as I said before, it was not politics as usual, it was radically more than has ever been done before. Get informed and then post.

 

[werepossum]

How did you decide that the main driver was speculation? I see the claim thrown around by lots of people, but I've noticed one trend: none of those people know the first thing about oil production. You're simply speculating about speculation.

So it's ok for oil companies to make record profits, as long as the sitting president has no ties to those oil companies? Obama has done virtually nothing different, except stumble his way around and interfere with business as usual by instituting illegal moratoriums and other such nonsense to generate the appearance that he's doing something.

Obama actually has close ties with at least one, BP, which was a major contributor.

Quadrupled under Bush, so Obama is 2x better than predecessor.

You won't see this in Washington Times.

You might want to brush up on Bush's exact term of office as well as the definition of "quadrupled" before you post, so as not to be thought a complete idiot. By your own chart, gasoline went from $1.50 up to $4.00 and back down to maybe $1.70 during Bush's eight years, whereas it has gone from $1.70 to around $4.00 during Obama's two years. Live by irrelevant data, die by irrelevant data.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-great-american-bubble-machine-20100405

Good info, thanks. Didn't Bush raise the margin requirements for oil trading to parity with other commodities? Did that run out? I can see the societal value in speculation, but not in trading paper commodities to run up the price.

 

[CycloWizard]

Of course oil price isn't a 1-1 correlation with supply and demand, and it does go up and down with some variance as does the market in general. However, what we've been used to in terms of variance does not explain the sudden run up to $150 in 2008.

Do you believe $150 oil was a justified price reflective of the expected supply and demand at the time in 2008? That the speculators did not push up the price from $80 to $150 just to dump it for profit a short while later? That huge variance in that short amount of time is not normal. How long did it take for us to go up $40 from $40 to $80? About 2-3 years. How long did it take for us to go up $70 from $80 to $150? Only 1 year!

We should be seeing a general increase in Oil over a long period of time which are usually dictated from supply and demand. However, 100% run ups in short period of time without any destabilizing/catastrophic event in oil supply can only be explained by market manipulation by speculators. Or do you really believe that the market is efficient and without manipulation?

The question you pose is particularly easy to answer. Did people pay the "speculative" price for oil? If so, that's obviously a market-supported price, if only in the short run. As the market adjusted to the increased price by consuming less, the price decreased accordingly. The change can all be explained without invoking speculation - it's just a crutch used to avoid a more complex explanation involving inflated currency, increased production costs, and a host of other issues which the normal person knows absolutely nothing about.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Bush and this Texas oil cronies just had to have something to do with this! If not, I think my little pea brain is going to explode!

 

[HendrixFan]

Yes, let me read that article, which is obviously well-researched and unbiased.

I only quoted the important facts to dispute your claim. While you may disagree with the writers viewpoints that does nothing to change facts.

While there are many factors that influence the price of oil, including those you mention, those factors are not what caused the sudden spike in prices in 08 (which disappeared when Congress threatened to regulate it) or the sudden spike we are seeing now.

Speculation certainly is a large factor in the huge price swings we have seen.

 

[HendrixFan]

Good info, thanks. Didn't Bush raise the margin requirements for oil trading to parity with other commodities? Did that run out? I can see the societal value in speculation, but not in trading paper commodities to run up the price.

I would have to dig it up, but IIRC when speculation was pushing oil prices through the roof (near election time no less) Congress just posed the mere threat of regulating oil trading and the rats fled the ship. Nothing was passed into law though so the door was left open for manipulation again.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/06/24/news/economy/oil_legislation/?postversion=2008062413

 

[Craig234]

I would have to dig it up, but IIRC when speculation was pushing oil prices through the roof (near election time no less) Congress just posed the mere threat of regulating oil trading and the rats fled the ship. Nothing was passed into law though so the door was left open for manipulation again.

That is the history. It's well told in "Griftopia" by Matt Taibbi.

One of the effects of all this decades of pushing wealth to the top is creating a sort of Tsunami of capital racing around the world chasing how to make more money.

It washes away things like markets as it comes and goes.

Just as a tsunami can take water away before it arrives, 'normal' businesses can be cash-starved even while trillions of dollars are roaring around in speculative assaults.

It doesn't want to make peanuts being loaned to the peasants who were impoverished to shift the wealth to the top, it wants to acquire everything.

For example, this is how as the people are worse off, their needs from the state go UP at the same time state revenues are declining, leading to things like the governors and mayors who sell off public assets at cheap prices to these private wealth buyers for a little short term cash to avoid a crisis, costing the public far more money in the longer term.

This is how Chicago sold off the revenues from the city's parking meters for the next 75 years, to an unknown group of investors - quite possibly middle eastern nations' sovereign wealth funds - for a fraction of what they're worth, in order to get a quick bit of cash for the year's budget, let later politicians and citizens deal with the lost revenue.

This is a negative cycle, just as a person who sells their car for cash to eat and then can't commute, as the public is impoverished and the wealthy make more, the only answer is to cut the public's benefits MORE, impoverishing them MORE, leading to more selling off of public assets cheaply, leaving the public poorer, leaving the rich with more money to pay for propaganda to tell the people to support those policies and to buy elections for people who serve them instead of the public.

And what do we do? Give the House of Representatives to Republicans in 2010, ensuring the corrupt interests will not have an worry about the public opposition.

Save234

 

[Darwin333]

It could be 10$ for private vehicles and I would be fine. People can pay for their own pen0r enlargement and quit wasting energy in big vehicles.

I'm with ya bud, I could afford it and I wouldn't have to deal with nearly as much traffic since all those poor fuckers couldn't afford it.

 

[Matt1970]

No, as I said before, it was not politics as usual, it was radically more than has ever been done before. Get informed and then post.

It's the same damn thing the Dems did for nearly 40 years and it's cry foul when the Republicans did it.