RV Fuel Issues & Prices - Post 'Em Here!

[Dick_A]

All other fuel threads will be automatically deleted. 🙂

[Fezziwig]

Supply and demand?

Most people have a grossly oversimplified notion of "supply and demand".

For example, supply and demand are suspended when a monopoly (or it's brother oligopoly) controls things, as OPEC did in 1973.

Economists use monotonic curves for 'demand' and 'supply' (the notions we usually have when we laymen talk about supply and demand), and where they intersect is the Equilibrium Point. But history is full of exceptions to the monotonic curve idea. For example, during the Irish potato famine when potato prices increased demand actually increased. And that was a Free Market. It's because of 'externalities' as economists call other independent variables. Any Electronics Engineer who's tuned a stagger-tuned IF strip can sympathize.

It's a terrible thing when actual fact interferes with a guys ideology.

[Paw_Paw_Festus]

LindsayRichards wrote:
I know it’s hard to believe here in the US, but the world wide recession is easing a little and oil based energy prices are creeping back up.

Tell me! We just returned from the Texas Gulf Coast. Rain, rain, rain, and WHITE KNUCKLE TRAFFIC all the way from the coast to Fort Worth. We bearly missed being involved in TWO pileups! We finally called it quits for the night at a really nice RV ranch in Burleson TX.

Along the way though - I'm thinking, what the heck is wrong with you people? Don't you know the economy is a mess?! Don't you know the price of fuel is too high for you to be running around having fun?

Why are so many people out on the roads enjoying this great country? :S Recession? What recession???

[LindsayRichards]

I know it’s hard to believe here in the US, but the world wide recession is easing a little and oil based energy prices are creeping back up. Pricing is once again over $80/bbl. Demand is starting to outstrip supply and prices are going back up. Under the free market system that has worked since the ancient times, people would be prospecting and producing more oil. Unfortunately this isn’t happening now. Much of the OPEC production capacity is tapering off and they need developed country’s technology to increase their production. This isn’t happening for political reasons. New areas like Brazil are going to be coming online, but too slow. Our government’s ban on oil, shale oil, coal, and natural gas probably won’t be changing. When gas hit $4/gallon, it was lifted and then quietly reinstated by congress when the recession drove down prices again. If (really when) the dollar no longer becomes the world’s reserve currency, then we are going to be hit very hard on non domestic energy prices. Business around the globe is now betting against America because of our over spending and over borrowing.

[Paw_Paw_Festus]

So one can assume that OPEC could double their supply and make twice as much $$
Well, why not triple it? Or Quadruple it?
If supply and demand didn't matter? Then every oil pumper in the world would be drilling and pumping like mad.

Sorry guys, it doesn't work that way.
Again, I don't mean to be rude.

[AO_hitech]

John&Joey wrote:
The rules were changed where you could buy and sell oil and not take possession of it...Has nothing to do with supply and demand.

Put the old rules back in place and you'll see oil at 40-60 a barrel.

[Fezziwig]

lindsay says:

"If our American companies were allowed to obtain fossil fuels with reasonable protections our economy would once again be the envy of the world."

"Our American companies"?

Do you think some oil companies are 'owned' or managed or directed by the US government or by US citizens?

They are not. They are all international companies, owned by international investors.

They do not belong to us. They are not 'ours'.

[John_Joey]

The rules were changed where you could buy and sell oil and not take possession of it. That simple change turned it into an investment vehicle for many fund managers. Has nothing to do with supply and demand.

Put the old rules back in place and you'll see oil at 40-60 a barrel. Of course some 401K's will take a mighty big hit.

[LindsayRichards]

If you keep on looking at the trees, you have no hope of ever seeing the forest. The people who run the forest rely on people only seeing the trees and not tryig to fix the forrest.

[Galvorien52]

So that's the reason why unleaded has gone from $2.16 to $2.45 in 6 weeks?

[LindsayRichards]

People can come up with all of the conspiracy theories they want to. but the simple facts on energy pricing havn’t changed much in a century. Oil prices depend on worldwide oil supply and worldwide oil demand. The various forms of energy are also interrelated as they compete for usages. The large supplies of natural gas recently discovered in the South East should be bringing down the cost of gas, oil, and coal as they can be used interchangeably in electricity production (with plant modifications of course.) the worldwide oil production is now at about 85 million bbls a day. Prerecesson usage was about the same and the price skyrocketed. When the recession is over and the worldwide usages once again reaches worldwide production, then prices will skyrocket again The US uses about 25% of the usage and supplies about 5% of the production due to government regulations by our many tree hugger politicians. Our once great oil companies are now just a footnote on the production side of the equation. Exxon used to be number one and is now number fourteen in the world. If our American companies were allowed to obtain fossil fuels with reasonable protections our economy would once again be the envy of the world. The huge supplies of shale oil in the West are larger than all of the oil produced by mankind to date and are under congressional mandate not to be touched. Gas and offshore oil are under similar bas, We do not have an energy shortage, but a political overage/

[DaSu]

junmy3 wrote:
The past few years when oil/gas prices went up all over the news media it was blamed on the President and Vice President and their relationship to BIG OIL. They are now gone and prices are starting to go up. Why is the current administration not getting blamed? If it was the previous president's fault, is it not the current president's fault as well? Just my observation.

Maybe the winter heating season has to do with th increase in price thus far . it usually happens this time of year .A reponse to your question could be 8 years verus 10 months.

[junmy3]

The past few years when oil/gas prices went up all over the news media it was blamed on the President and Vice President and their relationship to BIG OIL. They are now gone and prices are starting to go up. Why is the current administration not getting blamed? If it was the previous president's fault, is it not the current president's fault as well? Just my observation.

[Paw_Paw_Festus]

LindsayRichards wrote:
Oil is a commodity. Doesn’t matter where it is shipped. What matters is the total consumed vs. the total produced world wide. These basic laws of supply and demand have been in play for centuries and any hatred of big business does not change them. Most thinking people can understand that if more oil is pumped, then the price comes down. When we leave our own natural resources untouched for political reasons, then America ends up pay more for it from foreign nations and we lose jobs. Pretty simple really. The simple reason we are not drilling now is that the environmentalist movement presently has control of our government. Governments come and go.

THAT my friends -- is the truth. Good post..

[Paw_Paw_Festus]

Fezziwig wrote:
Oil is a FUNGIBLE commodity, in fact.

The marginal utility of pumping a barrel of oil from OCS or ANWR is that we get 1/3 barrel. We have to export 2/3 of a barrel to get 1/3 of a barrel. Does that seem like a good deal for the USA to you?

If only 1/3 of the pumped oil applies leverage to the US oil market to lower prices is that a good deal?

Only the oil company gets richer, and they are 60% owned by foreigners.

HUH?:h

[John_Joey]

We have enough oil in reserve to float a ship, yet the cost of a barrel of oil is going up. All due to speculators.

We need to regulate commodities better. If we have a resource that has a strangle hold on our economy, and a small group of people controlling it, why not police it.