Why aren't we rioting in the streets....

[Elijah]

...when we hear that ExxonMobil's second quarter profits are $10.36 BILLION dollars?!?!?!?! It breaks down to the oil company making a profit of $79,000 a minute for the last three month period. So explain to me why as a population we continue to have the same driving habits with gas over $3.00 a gallon for regular unleaded on average nationwide?

Something needs to be done and it's obvious our government won't do anything about it.

[Skyler]

There's a difference betwen profit and profit margin.

[G]

http://money.cnn.com/2006/07/27/news/companies/exx on/index.htm?cnn=yes

Profits at Exxon Mobil surged 36 percent to a near record $10.4 billion in the second quarter as surging oil prices helped the world's largest publicly traded company soundly beat Wall Street forecasts.

The company's profit - which amounts to a cool $1,318 a second - is the second biggest ever reported by a U.S. company, behind only the $10.7 billion Exxon itself earned in the fourth quarter of 2005.

The earnings equaled $1.72 a share, topping the $1.64 a share analysts had forecast on average, according to First Call. Total revenue in the quarter was just a bit more than $99 billion.

That's not profit margin. That's PROFIT.

Yes, I'm highly irritated that Exxon/Mobile can make so much money off of charging me $3+ a gallon. But, as the "investigation" showed, there's not going to be a damn thing I, or anyone else, can do about it other than bitch.

Sure, their "profits" are "going" to study future "cost reducing fuels" but it's going to come out of my pocket and there's nothing I can do about it.

By the way, anyone who's foolish enough to believe that GAS/OIL companies are going to make it so that the Consumer doesn't have to pay a lot of money.. I've got a bridge I can sell you.

Oil companies are in it to make money, and since they are already making so much money, they can bribe all those corrupt politicians(BUSH especially) to turn the other way as they charge us hard working consumers any damn thing they want.

And if they think that they're not making a lot, note the PROFIT. THat's money that they DO NOT use for refining oil, paying their workers, etc. Meanwhile, the corrupt politicians are saying to themselves "Looks like they'll be giving me a bigger bribe this next quarter, eh?"

[Karen Wilder]

BT (British Petrolium) earned about 2/3rds of that. Something like $570 per second.

Well, do you really believe that anyone will do anything about it?

If the US stops buying Oil at the current prices... then China, India and other contries will buy it. The demand will continue to outstrip the supply, and that's what really drives the prices world-wide.

I read an opinion/editorial today... basically it said that oil companies earn ~$0.05 per gallon of gas, compared to ~$0.27 in taxes.

A "Windfall Tax" on oil companies is being discussed... how about reducing existing fuel taxes? The ones that actually affect our pocket-books.

[Deluthan]

I would love to be able to bike to the store, or ride a train to work where I can read and actually do something productive, instead of having to waste energy focusing on the road and worrying about getting a ticket or, you know, accidentally killing someone. Alas, our (USA's) infrastructure is designed around one mode of transportation, and when that one mode breaks, we have a crisis. Until we start designing our infrastructures to support a variety of modes of transportation, we are pretty much slaves to the oil industry (or whatever bio-fuel may come along to replace it).

A junkie doesn't blame the drug dealer for being bankrupt because the dealer jacked the prices on them ridiculously high, knowing they would pay. We've paved ourselves into a corner, and now we have to own up to our choices. We're pretty much at the whim of the oil industry until we do something to change it. I think the only reason they haven't went ahead and jacked priced up to $5 or $6 a gallon is that they want to avoid creating too much trauma to the ecomony, because the fallout would hurt them in the long run. Because they very well could, and we would pay. This is just a conspiracy theory, but, it does make me curious when the price of gas drops dramatically after Hurricane Katrina when it was reported that oil companies had recorded some of their highest profits, or when it dropped again immediately after the State of the Union when Bush stated we were "addicted to oil". Coincidence, or hushing the naysayers?

Roads, by the way, take up a ridiculous amount of land. Acres upon acres of just asphault. I've heard that upkeep of roads is by far the most expensive of any other transit system, which wouldn't surprise me. And those worried about global warming, consider how much knocking down heat-buffering plantlife and replacing it with heat-conductive black pavement may be affecting things.

I could rant on--if it's not obvious, I am frustrated with the lack of options I have in getting from place to place, and the danger in just taking a walk or riding a bike where I live--but I'll just say that, if we want to continue "enjoying" independent (or is it isolated?), unmoderated transportation, then we have to be willing to accept the high cost it places on ourselves and others.

[Vanion Shadowcast]

I actually feel extremely strongly about this subject and will not go into a rant over it - however, I'll say this. I live in a city, and where I live(and have lived in the past), I've always pooled together with like minds to car-pool on occaisons where public transportation wasn't enough to get me to where I was going. I refuse to own a car until I see the result of some of this new technology and feel comfortable with the direction of the travel economics of America.

If you have the option of taking public transportation or car-pooling when possible at all, it's what I do, and it is a fine response to the situation. The problem is that most of America seeks convenience, and this is certainly not the most convenient travel system. If you can sacrifice that(if possible, or at least whenever possible), then you've said something with more than just words.

[G]

All I have to say about it is my job absolutely depends on driving. It's nothing carpooling, or public trans can take care of. Generally, when I'm not actually *at* work, I don't drive, or we do pool together.

Course, it would be better if there were more carpool lanes here. That sucks a bit.

Anyway, in regards to public trans, it'll be a matter of time before they start raising their fares because of gas costs.(Philly having one of the highest rates has to be bad out there. I'm in Cali now so don't know) Also, my experience with PT is that if at all possible, I'd avoid it(Again, that's based on Philly experience. Which sucked. I hated depending on SEPTAs slow ass schedule, and feeling like I'm sitting in or near someone elses urine. Yes, it's that bad)

Carpooling is, indeed, a viable option. And I am eager to see these so called new technologies to decrease our dependance on Oil. Of course, based on the people saying they're looking into decreasing, I'm not expecting anything soon. The president is an Oil monger(How deep is his hands in oil companies?) and the Oil companies themselves likewise.

I'm not holding my breath.

In summary, I carpool when I can because it's better that way, I absolutely need to drive my car for work, and I have no faith that oil dependancy will be reduced anytime within the next 25 years.

I blame the Government for not regulating properly and oil companies for lack of options.

[Vanion Shadowcast]

On a side-note... Philly's public transportation system is pretty awful. Of all the cities I've lived in, I hated the bus-system there the most. I also generally hated Philly the most. Ah well.

[KelatheSkelicia]

Or perhaps a more economical solution would be to find a vehicle that gets plenty of miles per gallon, and doesn't cost that much to fill up.

Like, a scooter. I can take it everywhere except for the interstate, but for local travel, it is awesome. It gets 100 miles to a tank of gas, and the tank size is 1.3 gallons.

So, it's another viable option to carpooling or public transportation. Unfortunately, it costs money, and places like Honda would have to go into some major mass production of these little things. Also, riding scooters has always been popular in places like Japan and Italy, or so I've been told.

Please remember I'm not talking about a scooter that looks anything remotely like a motorcycle, because I've seen those.

Also, I think carpooling is a great idea. If everyone would stick to this, maybe traffic wouldn't be nearly as bad as it is today. And maybe traffic accidents would occur less frequently, simply because most people are more careful with other people in the car.

However, I do think that they should not allow teenagers who have just earned their licenses to carpool, unless they have parental supervision in the car. That is an accident waiting to happen.

Another thing about the oil prices, I wonder who has stock in these companies? Perhaps some of the Bush cartel, under assumed names or companies? I don't know. I'm not a conspiracy theorist.

This is my little rant, sorry if it got a little off topic there.

[Gnimish Gnimoi]

Carpooling or public transportation is great if you live in the middle of a big city, or have everything close-by to you.

When you live in a not-so-dense area, and your job is a 40-minute drive from your house it's not so feasible to ride a bike or to find a bus that'll drive to the middle of nowhere.

[G]

To the Scooter idea, believe me, that was an option I totally was looking into. Especially a Vespa. Hell, even a motorcycle saves more money and gets a way better gas milage than any car does.

The problem with me getting one happened to be insurance. I'd like to get one for my job because driving for work is what costs me the most, but the work won't allow me to get one due to it being a stupid requirement that their insurance covers me as well as my own.

I researched it, and a good scooter will go between 35-40 mph, which is about what I do on my job anyway, and will get about 200-250 miles per tank. Seeing as they're at most a 3 gallon tank, well, you can see how much savings I'd get.

I so wish I could switch from the car to a scooter for work. Aside from the cost of gas, I really dislike putting all this extra milage on my personal car.
--

Also, Philly, yes, a horrible city with one of the most expensive, and worst, public transportation system in the country.

[Elijah]

It would be nice if popular opinion worldwide would be something of the following:

Any country that still relies on fossil fuels, i.e. oil, after 2015 to transport and provide energy for the majority of it's population should be consider a third world civilization.

Denver actually has a multiple times award winning public transportation system that has even been recently approved by public vote to expand and upgrade even more. Efficient bus system combined with more lightrails being added every year.

[Alais d Nitesong]

Public transportation in larger cities is a viable alternative to taking your own car, but, for those of us who live in rural areas, it's just not an option.

Nor is a scooter. It's 12 miles from home to work, and all interstate.

Car pooling doesn't work either because my job demands that I pick up and go on a moment's notice to suppliers, so while my spouse and I both work at the same place, we can't ride together.

We need research into technologies that will reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.

One of the things that I am frustrated with is that Mercedes will not market the diesel version of our cars in the USA. The new diesels get significantly more miles per gallon and are cleaner than gasoline engines, and yet MBNA will not release them for the US.

We build cars for 103 countries around the world, but no diesels for the US, and I have to ask why.

[G]

We build cars for 103 countries around the world, but no diesels for the US, and I have to ask why.

We're the richest nation in the world. Automakers, Oil companies and the government know this, so, are happy to charge their own countrymen as much as they want, and only supply us with the machines they want in order to tax and charge us as much as they want.

Ahh, capitalism. They don't care about us, they only care about what they can get from us.

[G]

Also.. here's something I want to share...

Japan and the U.S. are very different places, and the cars that people choose to drive are different, too. In the U.S. the top-selling cars tend to be sedans like Civic (#1) or Camry (#3) or larger vehicles like Toyota's RAV4 (#9) or the Chevrolet Tahoe (#10). The top selling cars in Japan are usually small and stylish, often of the type known as "one box" (basically, boxy hatchbox cars), like the Suzuki WagonR (#1), the Daihatsu Move (#2) or the Honda Fit (#4), all very stylish cars that are marketed to hip young people who want to buy an inexpensive car but still have something fun to drive or pimp out. These cars tend to be "K" class vehicles, meaning that they have engines of 1000 cc or smaller, making them very fuel efficient -- the standard-gasoline WagonR gets 47 mpg/21 kpl, not bad at all.

This is from a mailing list I'm on that tells me culture differences and such between Japan and America from an American who lives in Japan now. I find it funny that another country has vehicles that get almost 50mpg where in America, most cars get 25 at best. Why? Not safety, but money.

Also...

The Smart Car, due 2008.