Be careful what you wish for
I remember seeing a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline sold for 79.9 cents in Georgia in 1999. This week, local gas prices jumped to very nearly three times that amount. Of course, I'd like gas prices to be lower. Who wouldn't?
But then, I got to thinking. The main reason gas prices were so low was because of lower demand, and that was because of an economic crisis in Southeast Asia. Now, given the choice between higher gas prices, and tens of millions of people suffering through a severe economic downturn, I think I'll take higher gas prices.
Are you so selfish that you'd want to repeat the late 90's economic crisis in order to get cheaper gas?
posted by Greg @ 10:13 PM
2 Comments:
There's no argument that demand was lower than it is now.
There's no denial that price per barrel was lower than it is now.
The is an argument to your conclusions about a 'late 90's' economic crisis being involved however.
Prices were at a dangerously low level in 1999 because of competition, there were more oil companies, more refining capacity and more struggle by producers to get to the wallet of the consumers.
That all changed in 1999 when the re-monopoliztaion of oil was undertaken with two major mergers and the actual disassembly of refining facilities in the county.
From that point forward prices started moving up and have not stopped since.
good post, poor conclusion.
It's your conclusions that are suspect. The number of oil companies and the number of refineries don't change the fact that oil is in much greater demand now than it was then.
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