Pemex Fuel Pricing Caught Red Handed

I am sure you know a great deal more about education in Mexico than the rest of us so certainly cannot or will not argue with you. But what you are saying is not what we are hearing from many other folks or on the news in Mexico. The current administration is trying to break the strangle hold the teachers union has on education in Mexico. They tell us the Pemex union is not even close to how corrupt the teachers union is. Teachers do no show up for class and nothing anyone seems to be able to do about it. We are in Oaxaca where the police are still seen in force outside the school administration building (or whatever it is called) to protect the administration from threats from the union. Those Mexicans with enough money send their kids to private schools. This sort of thing is true the world over - even (or maybe especially) in the US. We certainly do not know that much about what is going on here but all is not the peaches and cream you try to make it out to be. Based on what I have seen of this world today - no matter where we are - I think it is truly unrealistic to pretend that everyone has equal opportunity. That is a myth. That is not reality. There are those for whom there is opportunity and those who have little to no chance. I am not going to try to pretend that all can be saved by some miracle turn around some politician can come up with but there isn't a lot of hope if folks out there keep pretending there isn't a real problem.

So let's try to stay on topic and not wander off into the unknown. Try to explain to me why oil the government of Mexico owns and controls would vary in price when it is coming out of the same hole in the ground? Why the tax situation on the growing industry in Mexico is not being taxed to the benefit of the people . . . "The tax revenues, all together 19.6 percent of GDP in 2013, are the lowest among the 34 OECD countries." Quote from one of my posts above. Sure - I know some of the answers but as with many of the politicians in the US I cannot believe the people keep voting for those who do these things to them. (OECD - Convention on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.)

But we lived in Puerto Rico for some years where the people are seriously involved in politics and turn out to vote in very high percentages. Yet they voted for things that could easily be seen to be ruinous to their future. Today we see they are over $75 billion in the hole with no hope of baling out. We more or less saw this coming which apparently the people of PR closed their eyes to. Is this what is going on in Mexico? Are all the eyes closed? Can so many really not see what is happening? With the little we know of all of this it does seem obvious to us. Seems we must really be missing something. Can anyone explain in coherent terms?

Trying to puts these charts in this forum never seems to work - but here is what I found about fuel tax in the OECD countries - note the Mexico is the lowest - don't know where the previous information came from - US is very low also - keep in mind US fed tax is 18 cents - the rest is combination state and local tax.

Lowest tax of these 34 OECD countries........

http://taxfoundation.org/blog/how-high-are-other-nations-gas-taxes

OECD Gas Excise Tax Rates (Per Gallon), 2013

Country Tax Per Gallon

Australia $1.40
Austria $2.46
Belgium $3.10
Canada $1.25
Chile $1.93
Czech Republic $2.50
Denmark $2.95
Estonia $2.12
Finland $3.26
France $3.07
Germany $3.29
Greece $3.37
Hungary $2.08
Iceland $1.97
Ireland $2.95
Israel $4.20
Italy $3.67
Japan $2.16
Korea $2.69
Luxembourg $2.31
Mexico $0.00
Netherlands $3.79
New Zealand $2.01
Norway $3.67
Poland $2.01
Portugal $2.95
Slovakia $2.57
Slovenia $2.76
Spain $2.35
Sweden $3.10
Switzerland $2.99
Turkey $4.32
United Kingdom $3.44
United States $0.53
Average OECD $2.62