incubus Posted September 29, 2003 Share Posted September 29, 2003 Oil companies are like most businesses. Sometimes you make a lot of money and some times you lose a lot of money. When Oil companies report high or record profits it is big news. When oil companies make little or no profits (much of the time) that is not news. I tend to take a long view of profits and not snap shots, as snap shots of earnings can be very misleading. Many of my friends work for small local companies that are in the process of cutting cost everyway they can. They are being squeezed just as you say. Reading the paper, I am aware of several thousand lay offs in the PNW region just the last month by these same companies and it is obvious that they are struggling. The argument about oil companies ripping people off would be more valid if history were not littered with tens of thousands of "now defunct" oil companies. It is not axiomatic that just because you are an oil company and sell oil that you can always make massive profits or charge what ever you want. The bottom-line; like with Arizona this past summer, refinery problems in the Midwest the previous summer... yada, yada, yada... energy production, refining, transportation is so thin that we have very little competition anymore and every little hiccup will drive the price up. Reasons for this lack of competition these days usually will lead you back to governmental mismanagement and NOT big business that is trying to screw the little guy. What we need is a lot of big businesses trying to screw each other and THAT resulting competition will be good for the little guy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kitten Posted September 29, 2003 Share Posted September 29, 2003 Do you think a good example might include Microsoft (big business)? It seems the government will only let you get away with so much as a "big business". I for one believe in big business! If someone can do the job right - then let them do it! I also believe I am a pretty simple person - I like to fill my gas tank up - drive away - and think about where the hell it came from. (Spoken like a true consumer ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allthumbs Posted September 29, 2003 Share Posted September 29, 2003 microsoft, boeing, hewlett packard, fluke, et al. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nolanr Posted September 30, 2003 Share Posted September 30, 2003 Hmm, gas prices are astronomical right before Labor Day, the biggest driving weekend of the year. Then coincidentally prices start to drop in the following weeks. Hmm. Nope, not a case of big business artificially manipulating prices and screwing consumers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScottP Posted September 30, 2003 Share Posted September 30, 2003 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nolanr Posted September 30, 2003 Share Posted September 30, 2003 Freshman year economics was a loooong time ago. I would guess demand for gas is close to a constant, so people are going to pay at the pump regardless of the price, there will just be lots of grumbling about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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