Oil Company Altruism

Regardless of whether the statistics show it or not, our economy is in a recession. Major banks have failed, the government has unwisely bailed out large financial institutions to the tune of 700 billion dollars and may soon bail out the Big 3 automakers, housing prices have drastically fallen, foreclosures have skyrocketed and unemployment numbers are starting to creep up. We can all feel it, we all know it, we are in a recession.

So isn't nice of our leading energy companies to come along and offer us such charitable prices at the pump? Just a few months ago gas was hovering between $4.40 and $4.60 in Salem, Oregon where I live. Salem is a boring town unfortunately, so each weekend I wanted to leave for Portland or Eugene. But with those kind of gas prices, I weighed the pros and cons each time. Sitting alone in my apartment on a Saturday night isn't that bad compared to purging my wallet at the gas station.

Nationally, things were little better as the average price hit a record $3.24 a gallon in May of this year. But then Christmas came early. Apparently the oil executives felt guilty about their record setting profits and felt like they should give some of it back to us less fortunate. This massive outpouring of altruism has lead gas prices to plummet. In Salem it's $1.99 a gallon, the cheapest I've seen since I was in high school. Nationally gas prices have fallen to $1.89 a gallon. For those of us struggling to pay rent on time, the oil companies may be all that's keeping us afloat. And it doesn't end there. Oil, which was around $150 a barrel has plummeted well below $100. Apparently OPEC has gotten into the Holiday spirit too.

Now unless you are on a record setting pace for denseness, you realize I'm joking around. The oil companies are still as greedy as ever. It's simply they can't charge as much because of good old supply and demand. Honestly think about it, why did the oil executives all of a sudden start to raise prices around the turn of the century? Did they just up and become greedy? Of course not, they've been greedy the whole time, they were just restricted by the market. And now, our inflationary boom has collapsed (financial crisis, housing bubble) and the deflationary adjustment has come. This is bad, but can be good too. Sure investment and wages will go down, and unemployment will go up, but prices should go down as well (that is unless the government tries to keep prices from adjusting, like they did in the Great Depression, which will lead to yet another depression). Eventually (again under the delusional assumption that the government stays out) the economy will stabalize and everything will return to normal.

Now remember before the financial crisis and bailouts and change talk and all that. Remember back to this summer when all the talk was about the housing crisis and oil prices. The oil company's were gouging us! Hang the CEO's from the gallows! The hysteria was completely out of control. It should be no surprise that those leftists at the DailyKos jumped into the muck, but so did Bill O'Reilly and many faux right wingers. Congresswoman Maxine Waters even, to her eternal shame, threatened to nationalize the entire oil industry!

Well what now Maxine? What now Bill? What now left wing nuts at the DailyKos? Will you thank the oil companiess for their collective genoristy? Will you take a quick break from your current outrage over the supposed lack of regulation in our financial markets to apologize for all the bad things you said about them? You know what, save the the apologies and save the gratitude. Here's another idea, why don't you all just realize you don't know the first thing about economics and shut the hell up!