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Originally Posted by scaeagles
Yeah, yeah, I know....taxes go to "the public". I still find it disgusting that taxes on gas are about 5 times the profits on a gallon, yet the government who levies the taxes wants to investigate the oil companies about them making too much money.
Sigh.
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All those numbers don't change the fact that price fixing is illegal.
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Oil is a commodity and the market dictates the price.
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Unless it's being run as a monopoly or cartel.
Now, personally, I don't think American oil companies are doing anything illegal, based on the price of oil per barrel. According to
these numbers when oil was at $37/barrel in 2004, pump prices were about $1.70/gallon. Now that we're at about double the price of oil, we're at about double the price of gasoline. Seems about right to me.
The only thing I notice that's a little fishy is that when oil prices go up, there's an instant rise at the the pump to match. But when oil prices go down, it takes a month to see a drop at the pump. But even that is just pennies here and there.
But, that being said, I welcome an investigation. If it turns up nothing, as I suspect, so be it. But collusion and price fixing are a very real possibility and blindly saying "the market dictates the price" without keeping an eye on it is a sure way to allow price fixing to run a free market into the ground.