Governments’ Power to Alter the Free Market
A simple look at gasoline prices per gallon around the world from Conde Nast Portfolio Magazine dramatically shows just how much havoc governments can cause when they interfere with the free market economy and how much tax policies, subsidies and additive and refining requirements can effect the prices citizens pay for fuel.
Until the general public understands what's in store for them once the government adopts this green agenda, energy prices will continue to rise.
I would add that in your case, a one way ticket to a red state would be great, but that would be impolite.
Oh right, "do as I say not as I do" is your axiom.
I don't claim that conservatives want to force me to live on a cul de sac with 2 hummers in the garage do I? Get over yourself man. If you want a country place, get to work and go buy yourself one. Its a free country, but it costs.
Truth be told, the Pearl would suit me just fine, but I have a very attractive female partner who insists on (organic) country living, so here I am, about to haul a pickup truck full of weeds to the composter today. Cest la vis.
(2) We are engaged in a war in the Middle East whose primary, but not only, purpose is to keep the oil flowing into the international market. (Most Middle East oil goes to Asia). Those who consume oil (gasoline) should be paying for that war through a gas tax. I did a very rough estimate and came up with an additional tax of $4 per gallon in the US to pay for the war.
(3) Through our consumption of gasoline we, the US, are funding a variety of tyrants and dictators around the world. We are funding our opponents in the Middle East and elsewhere. It is our, as in we the people's, reluctance to bear the burden of higher priced gasoline that threatens our international competitiveness and costs the lives of our soldiers in conflicts overseas.
Shall we test those numbers?
From US EIA - U.S. Motor Gasoline Consumption =390 million gallons day
390 X 365 = 142,350 million gallons per year
142,350 X 5 = 711,750 million gallons during Iraq
711,750 X $4 tax = $2,847 Billion Tax
Total budget authority for Iraq war in all 5 years = $590 billion
ERROR, ERROR, ERROR DOES NOT COMPUTE.
Rough estimate?
Yes, very rough and typical of the Liberal philosophy to promote energy development by taxing it and spending the money for political toys.
> [I]n the US. Gasoline is subsidized by our government in many ways, mostly though tax breaks given oil companies
Well lets consider the "subsidies" with real numbers. Exxon most recent quarter according to CNN.
Record quarterly income earned of $11.68 Billion
Record quarterly Tax payment, all taxes less pump tax $32.36 Billion
By my calculation that works out to a tax of 73.5 percent of an earned revenue of $44.04 billion.
In fact. as the legacy media has been careful to minimize, the Iraqi people, Sunni, Shiia, and Kurd alike have rejected Al Quida and Mahdi militia blood lust in favor of the rule of law. They have rejected the extremism of Iran. Iraq, the first ever Arabic nation based on the rule of law!
After experiencing extremism up close and personal then the rejection of extremism and the desire for the rule of law comes from the heart. Who would have predicted Iraqi Muslims volunteering join the Collation, to go to Pakistan to find and destroy Bin Laden?
All the more remarkable given 60 years of failure under Truman, Eisenhower, JFK, LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Carter to produce anything even remotely similar with the Palestinians.
Nothing less than a tectonic shift has taken place beneath the legacy media headlines in the wider media war on victory. A shift from the Polosi, Reed, Obama 2007 announcements that we had lost and must surrender and withdraw.
My comment has everything to do with Dave's proposal to raise a $2,847 Billion Tax to pay for a $590 billion war leaving $2,257 Billion for politicians to redistribute for political toys.
I don’t know that Dave is liberal, but the tax proposal sure is. But then, that’s not new as we are still paying the tax for the Spanish American war.
Likewise on the issue of taxing the oil companies. My point is not that they are not taxed fairly or enough. Those are other issues. But that within their tax structures there are subsidies, such as the depletion allowance, for the production of gasoline. It is not a free market.
Thanks for adding some sophistication.
In the larger context of spending verses revenue there is a valid point to be made. In general the Federal Government should pay the bills from real revenue. In terms of spending, Iraq represents only a small portion of total Federal spending.
While the present tax code has brought near record Federal revenue growth Congressional spending has grown even faster.
This is not only a Congressional failure. To the extent that President Busy couldn’t or didn’t restrain Congressional spending, he also shares blame.
I think we would agree on the inappropriateness of subsidies. I do contest the term subsidy as used here. The focus is the use of tax policy to manipulate or coerce a free market to actions desired by government.
Subsidy isnt the only term involved in this practice.
The City of Portland wishes to force high density housing. High density is not profitable and banks wont finance these projects. As an "incentive" the city offers Tax increment financing.
Subsidy or incentive, these two terms are essentially interchangeable depending upon the writers goal to Demonize or Sanctify.
In less nuanced language we used to have a simple term for these kinds of financial manipulations. We used to call it a bribe.
President Busy = President Bush
When we finally develop the miracle solar cell and windmill and reduce our foreign oil imports to zero.
What then?
Well, no US dollars going to the middle east, Yep, all that funding to those evil countries that the left always bemoans comes to a screeching halt. No oil money coming in at all thanks to our handy trusty solar cells and windmills.
Uh oh, that means those countries will become impoverished. Most people have enough sand, few want a camel as a pet and you cant eat oil.
"those people in the mid east hate us because they are poor, uneducated, income disparity, Wal Mart" is what we will hear from the left.
The solution that will be proposed?
"We must send them foreign aid, its an investment!"
A nano second - That unit of time with between which the left creates a screwed up situation and then proposes a solution for it involving your wallet.
Its interesting to note the area presently including Israel, the West Bank, south western Lebanon, and Gaza was not originally a dessert. More than 2,000 years ago the area was forested, that is until the Romans began to tax trees.
The reason that the Saudis, The desert kingdoms, should have no long term fear of a declining market for oil is simple.
The out industrialization of the EU. The EU carbon policy is pushing the relocation of European industrial capacity to the middle east.
Currently the bulk of the worlds tall construction cranes are in Dubai
Taxing standing trees is bad environmental policy. California either established or raised taxes on trees in the 60s, and it resulted in massive clearcutting that destroyed some very fine salmon streams, like the Mattole River on the north coast.
I don't know about EU de-industrialization, but the US seems to be accomplishing the same thing without a carbon policy. I don't think what they are building in Dubai is industrial production facilities, which do not require tall cranes. I expect those cranes reflect what is left of our money being spent on Dubai oil more than they do Euro de-industrialization no?
Large scale deforestation impacts local weather patterns. There is no better example than Mt. Kilimanjaro where deforestation has reduced precipitation and reduced glaciation.
The deforestation of the middle east under the Romans caused a similar precipitation reduction. It was not until the Israelis began to plant trees that the precipitation pattern reversed and began to increase.
I led a watershed analysis in Oregon a few years ago in which I had made an assumption about forests and precipitation similar to yours, and I was set straight by a prominent OSU hydrologist. Along our coast, we probably get a bit extra precip from fog drip collecting on mature forests, but not much, and even this is basically used up by the trees themselves. It doesn't make its way into our streams or groundwater. I was knuckle-wrapped.