Comments on: How to lower gas prices: Calm down, and learn some economics. http://positiveexternality.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/ Economic observations of everyday life... Sun, 02 Jan 2011 06:32:49 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: John http://positiveexternality.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/comment-page-1/#comment-187 John Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:42:52 +0000 http://www.respectcapitalism.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/#comment-187 Your gas ain't expensive. Look at Norway, Belgium and other European countries. You know what would be worse? If your water would be 5 times as expensive as your gas. This is reality in certain parts of the world. Please stop moaning about your gas prices. The western world is leading a good life. We gotta pay attention to what the world is telling us ( mother earth + the political tension across the globe ). Not like what mc cain's vp tries to tell us: "stop the water and then what?". * sigh * Your gas ain’t expensive. Look at Norway, Belgium and other European countries. You know what would be worse? If your water would be 5 times as expensive as your gas. This is reality in certain parts of the world.

Please stop moaning about your gas prices. The western world is leading a good life.

We gotta pay attention to what the world is telling us ( mother earth + the political tension across the globe ).

Not like what mc cain’s vp tries to tell us: “stop the water and then what?”. * sigh *

]]> By: benhughes http://positiveexternality.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/comment-page-1/#comment-51 benhughes Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:28:47 +0000 http://www.respectcapitalism.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/#comment-51 There is only a "problem" here in a relative sense, not an absolute sense. It is simple harsh reality that oil is a scarce resource and that the supply and demand dynamics of oil produce a market price (rather efficiently I might add - this is a commodity after all) than what most people are *used to*. If you want to compare absolutes across liquids, compare a gallon of gasoline to a gallon of other fluids. Even a gallon-equivalent of bottled WATER can be more than gasoline prices today! The worst thing that government can do and that consumers can demand is for government "solutions" to a "problem". The government should be lessing regulation and allow the free market to operate as well as is possible. Even then gas prices may be "high", but at least we will have done everything we can to eliminate inefficiencies. In particular, allowing offshore drilling and in other protected places could dramatically increase domestic supply of oil, driving down the price in the long run. Ultimately we'll need to move to other energy sources and the great thing about the current gas prices is that innovative companies have a strong financial incentive to do so and a lot of work is being done as we speak to get us away from oil-based transportation energy. But any of these alternatives are not likely to produce energy that is back at $2/gallon gasoline equivalents. Americans should get used to paying these prices for transportation energy as a fact of life - just like prices for groceries or anything else. There is only a “problem” here in a relative sense, not an absolute sense. It is simple harsh reality that oil is a scarce resource and that the supply and demand dynamics of oil produce a market price (rather efficiently I might add – this is a commodity after all) than what most people are *used to*. If you want to compare absolutes across liquids, compare a gallon of gasoline to a gallon of other fluids. Even a gallon-equivalent of bottled WATER can be more than gasoline prices today!

The worst thing that government can do and that consumers can demand is for government “solutions” to a “problem”. The government should be lessing regulation and allow the free market to operate as well as is possible. Even then gas prices may be “high”, but at least we will have done everything we can to eliminate inefficiencies. In particular, allowing offshore drilling and in other protected places could dramatically increase domestic supply of oil, driving down the price in the long run.

Ultimately we’ll need to move to other energy sources and the great thing about the current gas prices is that innovative companies have a strong financial incentive to do so and a lot of work is being done as we speak to get us away from oil-based transportation energy. But any of these alternatives are not likely to produce energy that is back at $2/gallon gasoline equivalents. Americans should get used to paying these prices for transportation energy as a fact of life – just like prices for groceries or anything else.

]]> By: Paul Coker http://positiveexternality.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/comment-page-1/#comment-49 Paul Coker Fri, 11 Jul 2008 19:22:09 +0000 http://www.respectcapitalism.com/2008/06/26/how-to-lower-gas-prices-stop-bitching-about-them-and-get-your-facts-straight/#comment-49 So at what point are gas prices to high??? At what point do people actually stop going because they can't afford it?? If you know what the problem is not, then what is the problem and how does it get fixed??? PAUL COKER SGT, USA So at what point are gas prices to high??? At what point do people actually stop going because they can’t afford it?? If you know what the problem is not, then what is the problem and how does it get fixed???

PAUL COKER
SGT, USA

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