It's not how much a gallon of gasoline costs, it's how many miles per gallon you get out of that gallon. If you get 20 mpg @ $4.00 a gallon that means it will cost you $4.00 to go 20 miles. If you have a vehicle that gets 40 mpg then you can drive 40 miles for the same price. So the answer to the 'oil crises' isn't 'more oil, it's more mpg. People are starting to get he message…that's why you're starting to see the bleached bones of old SUV's rotting by the side of the road…or soon will be! You also see more hybrids and even a few of those 'Smart Cars'. That tells you something. I just bought an 85 mpg 150 cc scooter. I now buy gas by the quart….not the gallon. Exxon…eat 'yer heart out.
Obviously I care. The more money gas costs me, the less I have available for other spending.
However, I am happy to let the free market dictate gas prices. I don't begrudge oil companies for making a big profit. Capitalism and supply/demand is a beautiful thing when it's left alone to work! After all, if I don't want the gas, I don't have to buy it. I could find a job closer to home and bicycle if push came to shove.
www.LP.org
July 30th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Both price and efficiency matter.
A car with great mpg is nice, but the food I buy on the shelf isn't going to get cheaper — farming equipment, fertilizers, etc all require oil and I doubt they'll be out buying the newest technologies to reduce prices tomorrow.
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
I care!
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
better wear a helmet
the people driving the big vehicles are either rich and talkin on the cell phone when they're driving…or they're mentally slow and rode the short bus…either way….they wont get out of the way for a 150cc scooter. watch your ass buddy.
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Obviously I care. The more money gas costs me, the less I have available for other spending.
However, I am happy to let the free market dictate gas prices. I don't begrudge oil companies for making a big profit. Capitalism and supply/demand is a beautiful thing when it's left alone to work! After all, if I don't want the gas, I don't have to buy it. I could find a job closer to home and bicycle if push came to shove.
http://www.LP.org
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
People aren't "getting the message" they're choosing between paying bills and eating now. People didn't tell the automakers to start making cars bigger again–you're placing the blame and the burden where it doesn't belong. And higher prices do matter. And a better MPG isn't going to save people money if the prices is raised that much higher to match. Making oil that much more valuable is what the oil companies want because they can make their record profits–and only produce half of what they used to.
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
I care about how far I can go on a tank of gas, how does your scooter rate on that one. I also care about safety in the event of a crash and how much I can carry in one trip when I have to move a bunch of stuff
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:15 pm
Yes I do care. I higher the price for gas, the higher everything else goes. Just about everything we use/purchase is a petroleum based product.
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:18 pm
Let me see you haul around 300 pounds of tools on that scooter. Or haul 6 kids to the ball field. I bet you couldn't get groceries for a family of four on the back of it. Hey, good for you, save fuel, I'm all in favor of it. I try to use as little as possible, avoiding extra trips, taking the smaller car when I can, and I have slowed down. But some of us don't have the ability to save very much. I commute 50 miles every day, and sometimes have to make some extra trips for appointments and such. I carry test equipment with me. I drove through a rain storm today. A scooter or even a little econobox isn't going to get the job done. You better believe I care what the pump price is.
EVERYTHING got where it is on a truck that runs on diesel. You better believe I care what the pump price is.
So as for people "getting the message", get over yourself.
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Yes, I don't get the same as before and it is making a huge difference in my budget to pay double than I did before.
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:28 pm
we ahve had a crisis for over 30 yrs, its just bunk. People need trucks and suvs, someone just wants to take the heat off the highest record profits of oil companies suddenly rather then do something all those yrs in office doing nothing, but taking kickbacks while we get our backskicked by the ones failinlg to represent us
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July 30th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Well, clearly, if I'm spending $40 to fill the tank, I'm going to notice when it suddenly starts costing me $60 or $80. But you make a very good point. I'm looking forward to parking a Volt in the driveway in about a year and a half.
In the meantime, my 1966 Karmann Ghia holds about 12 gallons, and a tank will take me about 350 to 370 miles. Now, I don't go very fast in the old girl, and we can't haul lumber home from the yard or pull a 5th wheel with her, but I get lots of compliments on her style. She beats the minivan for miles per gallon, and she's way more fun to drive.
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July 30th, 2008 at 9:09 pm
Personally, no… because I don't have a car, but high gas prices indicate other, larger issues beyond people's own little views on the situation.
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July 31st, 2008 at 5:35 am
Yes I do.http://www.jonchristianryter.com/2008/080621.html
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August 1st, 2008 at 3:19 pm
You bring up a good point, but groceries don't arrive at the store by motor scooter. Grocery prices in the L.A. Area have increased by more than 15% in the last 9 months. Low income families have been hurt badly and it amazes me that so many people fail to see how rising fuel costs have impacted our way of life.
Low income families in rural areas have been unable to cope with the increased cost of fuel. There has been a rush to apply for food stamps and government financial aid because working low paying jobs will no longer provide food and shelter for a family.
As people have been forced to tighten their belts and spend less money, there have been severe consequences to retail businesses. There has also been a drastic reduction in the number of jobs available. So, in a short period of time most of us have been effected by the rising cost of fuel.
There are no simple answers to the problem. However, we must continue to conserve fuel, limit our reliance on foreign oil, and create more jobs for Americans. As much as I appreciate seeing people carrying their groceries on bicycles and motor scooters, I also regret that few of those vehicles are manufactured in America.
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August 1st, 2008 at 4:59 pm
'Sure. But most important of all is a deeper question, "Does one really care how soon everyone decides to turn aside — and must! — and direct attentions to the more naturally economic points of views and practicalities, which opposing attentions do assure to be the swan song of many a corporation, not only in those of the oil industry but in all the market communities as well.
One might read accounts that this sham of gasoline prices we observe today did occur in the 1970's in the precise way and with the selfsame consequences — to wit: off the scale gas prices, gas-hogging vehicles needing scrapped now found wastes; there came lay-offs, bankruptcies; and there was aligned businesses that folded as an immediate consequence; most ironic of all followed record profits for the oil corporations, after which car manufacturers began shifting their quarterly estimates and emphasis on trends, thus shutting down the design, assemblage, and marketing of large, hulking cylinder engines. But not for long did this hold.
One cannot overlook the link of one thing to another today. Unlike the 1970's, the year 2008 is likened to none other. Even GMC has ceased with dispensing dividends to shareholders as they once enjoyed for the past 80 some years. Not since 1922, just before the Great Depression, has such austerity evidenced in such a large, major corporation. GMC has always been held as American as "mother, home, and apple pie." It's all over now!
What we see today is the nail in the coffin in the ways America does business, certainly as the supreme leader of the world's market economies and central banking systems.
That good-ol'-boy fat, dumb, and happy day and arrogance is increasingly coming to its ending.
America's days of blind, selfish, gluttonous greed is rapidly coming to a close, and not few West Europeans and oil-rich Middle Easterners are aware of this, many of whom are gloating that America is about to undergo its come-uppance due to years of neglect, arrogance, and waste.
This is an ado with lots more than mere escalating gasoline and oil barrel prices. So yeah, we had better care — fast and in the right way.
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