Crude awakening: Oil prices down, gas prices up an extra 50 cents a gallon in North County »

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  STONERS

  March 18, 2007, 12:46 p.m.

  Many independently owned, non-branded stations in North County are losing money. According to our calculations, the typical dealer has to charge at least $3.01 a gallon to break even on a gallon of gasoline, and on Wednesday, our survey showed more than 50 stations selling gasoline at well below $3 a gallon just to hold on to their customers. Owners of brand-name stations aren't faring much better either. Their margins are probably close to 5 cents a gallon.
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  NelsonR

  March 18, 2007, 5:27 p.m.

  Stoners - Stop complaining and making the large oil companies out to having complicity in making profits. Yes, we are making huge profits every quarter but who are you to deny us this right. Remember, the Bush family has always benefited from higher oil prices, again would you deny this Democratic right? The middle class and poor can afford to pay for our lifestyle, its cost more money for us rich than the poor and middle class to survive. So leave us alone, we deserve this increase in oil prices. Hell we went to war for more oil so we are benefiting YOU. We are your corporate elite, so please leave us to our agenda since we do benefit America any again, you.

  SATIRE - hope you see it?
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  simonsez

  March 18, 2007, 6:21 p.m.

  I keep telling you guys to buy oil company stocks. Buy COP, BP and CVX. Also, I like FTO.

  If we have a windy summer in the gulf, we'll see $100 barrel oil before fall.
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  flyonthewallzz

  March 18, 2007, 8 p.m.

  It seems that the "invisible hands" that Adam Smith spoke of, belong to a person with no sole and a fictitious name. And they are getting an ever tighter grip on our scrotum.
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  MikeReardon

  March 18, 2007, 9:21 p.m.

  Nothing in gas prices appear to be actually market driven beyond the need to gain 10% profit to satisfy investor year after year. Last Nov. 7 my local gas station had $2.32 a gallon gas this week $3.21 a gallon. The industry does retains an artificial break on production by having under capacity built into its whole refining ability. But they don't even seem to acknowledge any market forces that should push prices down. Congress can't find it but it just looks to be set in place to always give the oil companies 10% profit to satisfy investor year after year. Only political pressure on the administration gets lower prices. If they don't win we get stuck with having to pay back the Nov. prices to the oil companies.
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  spikecwc

  March 19, 2007, 6:42 a.m.

  Bill O'Reilly is right. We are being price gouged at the gas pump.
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  Star_Poet

  March 19, 2007, 8:51 a.m.

  Hey F'ers!!! We control Iraq, so why is U.S. gasoline super-expensive again?

  Stupid politicians!
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  Nowalive

  March 19, 2007, 9:08 a.m.

  I still say that the Government should post a $100 million dollar prize for the first AMERICAN auto manufacturer to produce a midsize vehicle (about the size of my Lumina) to exceed 100 MPG, and run on FLEX FUEL technology. Let competition and ingenuity solve our oil dependancy.

  The best we could hope for is a 50 to 75 % reduction in highway use, and energy generation. We would still need some oil for ancillary petroleum products, but we could eventually find ways to produce better synthetic lubricants, plastics, etc.

  I would also eliminate the 30 plus "boutique blends" out there and mass produce the CLEANEST blend. Lower overhead for the refineries means lower pump prices. A standard blend means higher production, higher production means lower prices. Additionally ALL refineries should be put back online. I live near Philadelphia and there is a large number of refineries here, several have not been online in over 5 years.
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  TOtheMOON

  March 19, 2007, 11:09 a.m.

  Next week:

  "The cost of the lid that goes on the barrel that holds the oil goes up 2 cents forcing gas prices up another 20 cents a gallon!"
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  bill2936

  March 19, 2007, 12:21 p.m.

  Anyone know how much they pay in taxes on gas (local, state, federal) in CA? This is the biggest profit margin. Maybe there sould be a windfall profit tax on the government for what they make.
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  carran

  March 19, 2007, 12:39 p.m.

  This isn't anything new.....

  You see gas prices drop when everyone starts getting p-ed off and requesting an inquiry. Then Georgie goes to his fellow, filthy richers and says "hey, let's get them off our backs and lower prices for a few days". "That'll shut them up as we continue to make money that we will pass on to our future generations b/c there aren't enough days in a year to spend this kind of money."

  I say we demand that George pay back to the USA the amount he and Cheney profited while at war in Iraq. (through contracts, oil, etc) I mean by the stroke of a pen 50 billion gone, while our dollar is worth what? Favoritism is in action choosing what comapnies have contracts in Iraq. So while they're spending our money "fighting terrorism", they're filling their pockets as well.
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  endofdays

  March 19, 2007, 1:17 p.m.

  I have absolutely no problem paying 3 or 4 dollars a gallon for gas.

  My jeep gets right around 20 miles per gallon. There is no friggin way I would walk that 20 miles for four bucks. And I'd be willing to bet I'd never find someone who'd give me a piggyback all that way for $4.

  We in the US have been spoiled by cheap gas forever, and part of the result of this is that we've become a society addicted to our cars. You can sit on any highway outside any major city in the US at rush hour on any day of the week and what you will see is that out of the millions of cars choking the road, over 90% of them contain just one occupant. That is a problem. A much bigger problem than the high ratio of SUV's.

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