Dirty Rotten Gouging Criminal Bastard Scoundrels

[dr_phil_physics]

Twas Just A Bit Over A Week Before...

... the Fourth of July when I witnessed the gouging of the gas pumps before people filled their gas tanks for the holiday and weekend. By the time we got to July 4th itself, and after there was plenty of hew and cry, prices had dropped down to $2.96.9/gal of regular in Allendale. But on Thursday the Fifth, "after the holiday", prices surged back up to $3.15.9/gal.

Words Cannot Express

This back and forth, giving and taking... nay, worse yet the illusion of being nice is just sickening. None of this occurs with any correlation between usual market pressures. "They" have just gotten better at disguising their nasty greed by not being quite as obvious as jumping up the prices on Fridays and dropping them on Tuesdays... every weekend of the summer. Even that price game was at least predictable -- now you never know when is the optimum time to fill a tank.

Whine, whine, whine you say? Nope, it's going to be taunt the evil oil companies until they decide to restore balance to the marketplace and stop robbing us. Or somebody arrests the robber barons and makes them.

Dr. Phil

Comments

[johnleague.livejournal.com]

In 2002, an oil-company analyst at Morgan Stanley wrote a report about the coming "Golden Age of Refining." He predicted enormous profits for refiners because, by his estimation, refining demand would outstrip supply 2 to 1. Needless to say, this has been hailed as one of the most prescient calls on Wall Street in recent years. From the perspective of most common folk, though, it's also one of the most jaded.

[dr-phil-physics.livejournal.com]

Exactamundo. Not only is it a contrived shortage, the mad price swings give the illusion of market forces at work. We're just supposed to think, "Why this is all very complicated and I'm just going to have to leave this to the professionals."

Pffffbt!

Dr. Phil