"Believe it, or don't"? Okay, I don't believe it.
Like most chain emails that use way too many exclamation marks, this one is
simply wrong. For those who want to read the history of this email (it
started shortly after 9/11), go to
http://www.breakthechain.org/exclusives/foreignoil.html.
The short form is that "It ain't that simple." And even if you did decide to
boycott one brand of station, you really don't know who they buy gas from.
Sometimes a distributor for one brand will supply gas to another brand's
station based on location and cost. The companies buy crude on the world
market and then refine it.
What has been happening lately is that the price of crude oil on the market
has been going up (in case you've been living in a cave for the last couple
of years and haven't heard). One of the drivers of wholesale crude prices is
political instability in oil-producing regions. Gosh, we don't have any of
that, do we?
Also, if Iraq had gotten out from under the UN sanctions, as appeared likely
since the UN Inspection Teams hadn't been finding any WMD's, Iraq's oil
production would have been brought back online. Remember, they're sitting on
the 3rd largest proven reserves in the world.
Granted, this would have taken a while, since their infrastructure was in
tatters. I seem to remember that the Iraqi government had already signed
contracts with some Russian, German and French companies to do the
rebuilding. Of course, when we invaded, those contracts got thrown out.
Halliburton has it now, I believe. The sale of petroleum was supposed to
finance the rebuilding of Iraq, remember? That seems to have gone the way of
the WMD's.
And now we're making noises about Iran and how we might have to take action
there. Iran is sitting on the 2nd largest proven reserves. Think what will
happen to crude oil prices if we disrupt that flow, too.
BTW, Venezuela has the 6th largest proven reserves, more than twice what the
US has. More food for thought.
Of course, anyone who is heavily invested in petroleum industry stocks is
doing backflips right about now. Go check what their stock prices and
profits have done over the last few years.
Yes, Katrina will probably just be a blip on the economy, but the rising
crude oil prices are already having an effect on the economy. Everything in
this country (and the world, for that matter) moves via petroleum: planes,
ships, trains, trucks, you name it, are all fueled by petroleum. All retail
goods will start to feel the effects of increased delivery costs. That means
food, clothing, etc. We're already seeing it in food prices. Wholesale
production will feel it, too, because of raw material delivery costs, but
that will take longer to manifest itself at the retail level.
The economy appears to be booming according to some numbers. Sure, GDP was
up 3.3% in 2004 over 2003, and corporate profits were up 12.6%. But the
poverty rate in 2004 stood at 12.7% and was trending upwards. The percent of
people without health insurance was at 15.7% in 2004, up from 14.2% in 2000.
When they say unemployment is at an all-time low, they mean an all-time low
during the Bush Administration. Unemployment was under 5% from mid-1997
until 2001. It got as low as 4% in 2000. That's according to the Bureau of
Labor Statistics.
http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?request_action=wh&graph_
name=LN_cpsbref3
But even job counts don't tell the whole story. Trying to support your
family with a Wal-Mart type job just doesn't do it. Also, the BLS makes no
attempt to identify people who have more than one job, as is getting more
common. They simply count the number of jobs.
It's not as simple as it seems, and I don't think it's as glowing as some
people think.
Gordon
|