by Paul Gibson
Home >> Price Gouging
The dichotomy or irony of it all is that as soon as you hear that the price of oil, petrol or gasoline has gone up in the marketplace, you are not surprised to see the price of petrol at the petrol station go up above a euro… You are officially the victim of a FRAUD! ....called Price Gouging.
Price gouging is very simple to commit and hard to prove. Take the example of “petrol� for example. The actual time lapse that occurs between a rise in price of oil per barrel and the price “at the pump� or at the petrol station should actually be a red flag, especially when you hear one week that the price of oil has risen and then you see higher prices the next.
When you hear that inflation in this country or any country is caused by energy prices or petrol prices…the first question you should ask is what were the prices of petrol like six months ago at the least, NOT the price six days ago. The reason is simple: it is simply idiotic for any business to price their products or services based on yesterday’s price of petrol. Reason? They may be endangering there annual profits. Services are priced annually to maximize profits, and smart businesspeople will not engage in such practices. So it is safe to say that the “just priceâ€? of petrol is based on the price of petrol from six months ago, not six days ago.
In fact, the person who does raise their prices will LOSE money in the end. Price gougers raise prices even higher than market prices to take advantage of and deceive their customers. They think (erroneously), that they will make more money, when in fact they are hurting their own business.
As mentioned before, it is not easy to “proveâ€? price gouging, as it seems politicians/lawyers like to define the difference between profitting and profiteering according to their own whim. Blaming petrol companies for the economic woes of any country may make sense if their economy depends on it, but let’s face it, unless you are Saudi Arabia, Iraq, or any OPEP producing nation, you DO NOT DEPEND ON IT! Tomorrow, you can ride your bike to work and still make money…but if 85 percent of your businesses are built around the petrol industry, your country DOES depend on oil prices and higher prices benefit your country…so who are the real winners here… you be the judge…but it seems pretty clear where the problem is NOT in the case of Spain.
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Hello Paul,
I think this is a pretty sad subject because in Spain we totally depend on petrol, or at least we WANT to depend on it.
I don’t understand why we still don’t have Biodiesel (diesel made out of oil) on the gas station’s pumps. The technology is available and current cars are ready to use it straight without any change!
I think that there are many personal economic interests in taking as much profit as possible from petrol, before they start launching Biodiesel.
For some reason I assume the raise in petrol price as normal and I think to myself: Oh well, there is nothing I can do about it!
Best regards,
Cristina
Christina,
You bring up a very valid point. We DO have the technology and we simple refuse to use it…and the reason is very simple: OPEC. You don’t want to upset member countries of the Arab League right about now!
Thanks for your comments
PG
The price of oil is now at $73 and rising. They closed down a refinery in Texas yesterday. California has electric cars. Morales and Chavez claim to know something about economy and Repsol and other companies will be kicked out of the country shortly.
Morales and Chavez do know something about economy. They know if you want to spend money on education and health programmes for the poor in your country you can not let a self-interested elite control your assets.
The improvements in the lives of the poor in Venezuela can be objectively measured. The nationalisation has been so successful that Chavez is even providing cheap petrol to the poor of the USA!
Morales is doing the same. The petrol is in Bolivia so the money it makes should stay in Bolivia.
I guess I will have to agree to disagree… Education requires funding, (I agree) – However, for as much oil as a country has on their land, if they do not have the money nor the infrastructure to get it out of the ground and refine it the way most petrol companies do, there are none of those “assets” you are talking about. As far as I know, to say that Chavez or Morales is selling oil for a cheap price to the US is simply not true. If that were so true, why do you think oil prices are still skyrocketing…if anything, they are making the price of oil go further and further up by proclaiming themselves owners of refineries they never built (that’s called stealing, not nationalisation). ...There is no doubt in anyone’s mind they will try and use oil as their bargaining chip to spread their anti-US policy – much like Iran, and then we’ll be in real trouble. I’m sorry, but I don’t think education is only a matter of money, nor does anyone need oil wells in order to finance education.
Can you please register ? Anonymous postings are confusing.
However…
Chavez Gives Oil to the US
Experience speaks louder than words:
Oil Prices Fall as Chavez Quits
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