Three years ago Hurricane Katrina came rolling through the Gulf Coast and pretty much wrecked most of Louisiana. But before the winds had even died down, Gas prices were skyrocketing, almost doubling overnight in many places. Gas shortages abound.
Things quieted down eventually, but the price of gas never really recovered, getting over $4.00 a gallon this past summer. "It's the price of crude oil" said the gas companies, and they dutifully passed along the expense in the price of their product. Over the last 8 weeks the price of oil has come down by more than half, yet, gas prices (by my rough estimation) have come down 25-40%, maybe.
So imagine my thoughts when I see this headline screamed across CNN.com this morning:
Exxon Mobil: Biggest profit in U.S. history
Hmmmmmmm.
Seriously - am I the only one who gets pissed off about this? Because the way I see it, Exxon Mobil has been inflating prices beyond what is reasonable in order to increase their profits to *record* numbers. That's also known as "price gouging". I understand companies want to make money. I understand they have an obligation to provide value for their shareholders.
Honestly, and I'm not a fan of this, but they are begging for the Federal government to begin regulating them. A lot of our economy is based on the idea that fuel is cheap, that transporting goods for sale is cheap. As the price of fuel goes up, the health of our economy went down.
I call on everyone out there to rise up, gather sticks and stones and pitchforks and torches and guns and bombs and take ALL the gas from their local gas stations, teach those companies a lesson!!!!
Ok, not really. That would pretty much be stupid. Don't do that. But enough is enough.
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