.....per litre in Surrey.

Which actually brings up an interesteing point.

About 6 months ago oil went through $30 - $35 a barrel and gas was about a $1.00 litre. There were a number of people here iwho confidently suggested that it was a conspiracy of the oil companies.

Now with oil $20.00 a barrel higher and gas at .80 - .94 cents, would those same people please explain to me why gas is not about $1.50 per liter?

This is a somewhat rhetorical question as I know the answer but there are some that seem to think the oil companies work together to rip us all off and I'm curious to understand how the current pricing is explained away by those oil company critics.

 

Hey 97, ever heard of currency value in comparison to the world or the U.S. dollar? Our dollar is currently at the 0.80 mark in comparison to the U.S. Now tell me, what was the dollar trading at when you last has this discussion? 0.65, 0.70? Can you do the math?

I have no idea what your point to this post is, but you seem to be saying that the gas companies are our friends and they want us to have good value.........? Or at least,....that they aren’t jerking us around....?,....That they aren’t trying to raise gas prices unfairly but are merely adjusting their prices according to their costs,...(cough). Hello???

Since when does a any retailer care about the hardships they inflict on their customers? The bottom line is and always will be, the bottom line. And the better their bottom line is, the more they fill their pockets, be it the c.e.o., the owner, or the corporate share owners. Heheheh, wake up boy! SO ,.... what was your point? Thought so.

 

West coast gas prices rarely reflect what the oil prices are. I found the best way to gauge actual gas prices is to look down south or in Ontairo.

It's all about the bling and that is all based on supply vs. demand. And right now everyone's taken thair gas guzzling v8 off the road for the winter.

If people buy gas on monday, the gas price on tuseday will be higher. People wont by gas on Wensday, so the price of gas is lowered but not to the same price on monday. People then buy gas on thursday thinking that gas has gone down and is now cheaper. Now it's friday gas prices have gone up because of demand/supply and people need to fill up for the weekend. Saturday the prices go back down untill about noon when everybody goes and fill their tank with gas. Sunday is a nothing day and gas prices drop back to a price slightly higher than thursday(unless there is a reson to drop prices lower) and begin the prosses again on monday.

 

LOL Maybe next time you could put that on a spreadsheet.

 

HAHAHA






...I did in high school

 

Elgyn is right about the cars. People aren't driving their hot rods or 4.10 geared Camaros. They're driving their 4 and 6 cylinder winter cars. No more road trips or drives for the heck of it. No more A/C. Home heating oil is nill since most people switched to nat. gas during the big push a few years back. Even just the hint of offshore oil in BC will make the price at the pumps drop.

Biggest factor I would think would be that we're not as dependant on mid east oil like the US is.

I'm saying the price of a barrel of oil is going to go down. It's already gone up. And with it at it's price now, all sorts of people are going to drill for oil where it wouldn't have been profitable before.

 

Ok well oil prices dropped during the last 3 days by almost $4 to $52 a barrel now. It was almost $56 a barrel 4 days ago.

I am the person who always tried to drill to everyone what is now being revealed, that crude oil prices barely affect our pump price. At the time everyone called BS! on this. Well, with everyday my theory of a conspiracy is coming out. If you think about what you all are saying, you think that price per barrel almost doubling since last pump price was at $1/L and yet still our prices are at $0.769 at the pump with the crude oil price almost doubled, don't you think there is more to it then just plain old thinking of "ohh this is winter time". These same people who try to use facts to resolve prices a few month ago with prices of $1/h at the pump were saying that, and this is true "crude oil price will only rise now, and the price at the pump will be $2/L in no time". Well they got the part about crude oil prices almost doubling, and so did we all, everyone knew it was going to happen, but what no one is taking responsibility for is their words on the $2/L. Sure it would be nice to be right for a change, but pump prices went down despite all the fact. Everyone knew what winter was a few months ago, but yet they still claimed the estimated prices, now that facts aren't all there, many will try to make sense of the situation by blindly scoping over the issue and pretend that that is the answer.


Point is simple, we'll never know what pump prices will be as I stated before, there is more to it then just facts as to why the prices change, so don't try. The companies decide what they want the prices to be and sadly, we were and continue to be heavily overcharged, economy and this so called "oil starvation of the world" has nothing to do with it, 10 years ago we knew where the crude oil supply was headed, simply using the statement of "oil supply is going dry" to constitute reason for oil prices going up is ridiculous. Oil company CEO's didn't wake up one day and say "wow we're going dry, lets bring prices up", they planned this out evenly and slowly.

So yes you're being ripped off, at least now you know and are thankful that at least we're not paying $2/L like everyone predicted with crude oil prices at where they are at now.

BTW.. To add to this, reason why the price per barrel dropped in the last 3 days is because the government accidentally discovered ”over supply" oil. I Wonder how does this mysteriously happen? Yeah, you guessed it, they tried to hide it from the public but it eventually came out. Kind of like when our parliament just recently discovered that when we though that this country was at a defecate. We were actually at a surplus of 9 Billion dollars.

Again, something I said during elections quote "You think that with all these levy's, tax hikes, cuts, etc... Done within the last year or two we are somehow at a defecate? You realize how much money the government collected, where is it all?" Well, it finally came out LOL cuz someone again "oops" and discovered it like they never knew it was there. I’m sorry but its not $1 you find in your pocket one day, this is 9 Billion dollars LOL.

Sorry I'm venting what I know here, and you asked Shawn. Again I may not be right on some things, but you get the picture.

 

hey matt... its deficit not defecate lol

 

I'll admit, the whole oil/gasoline industry is strange and hard to pin down exactly how pricing works. The long fall with warm temps probably did help. Cars get the best mileage between about 15-20°C, which is exactly where we've been up until now.

Interesting you bring up the 9 billion dollar surplus and gas taxes.....Little interesting but not well known fact. Last year the Federal government spent 2.5% of the gas taxes it collected on roads. To give you the dollar figures. They spent 135 million of the 5.3 billion they collected. And of that 2.5%, 99% of it was spent east of Ontario.

Fed gas tax is 10 cents/litre. Used to be 8.5 cents until 1995 when they upped it to 10 cents to pay off the deficit. The defit has been gone since 97, but the extra gas tax is still there. Don't forget they charge GST on top of the fed gas tax and prov gas tax and the price of the gas itself. So when the price at the pump goes up, the feds bring in more money. It also means Alberta (who's prov gas tax is 9 cents) pays less money to the federal government than BC does (our tax is 14.5 cents)

My solution is to get the federal government out of the gas tax game completely, so we just pay the price + prov gas tax. Leave building roads and highways up to the provinces. They already build them as is (unless you live in Quebec or the Maritimes)

 

Exactly.

 

I have a hard time believing that. Got a link? Highways, bridges, repairs ect cost big bucks. Your telling us that the Fed gov only spent 135 mill in the entire county last year on roads? That is chump change man. A new bridge alone will cost 300-400 mill.

And just so you guys know, yes we had a 9 Billion surplus last year but Canada is still in major debt as a whole.

 

Matt / Tyhoon. It would appear you subscribe to the "oil company conspiracy" story and all I'm asking is, when oil was $35 per barrel it cost about $1.00 litre about 6 months ago.

Oil is now above $50 and yet a litre of gas is cheaper. Although the $CDN has gone up, surely the oil companies would still take that 'profit' for themselves. Surely they would say "Well if you were prepared to pay $1.00 when it was $35.00 then what is the problem with $1.50 when its $50?". Yes the CDN $ has gone up which means the 50% rise in $USD is perhaps only a 25% - 30% in CDN $$, but again, why would the oil companies not all just sit around and say "too bad so sad. $1.50 take it or leave it"?

There were those that said last time that gas jumped up that it was an oil company conspiracy. If you believe that, then surely the rise in world oil prices would surely mean just an increased justification to REALLY screw you. Like $2.00 per litre.

I know that some here have made the argument that all the gas guzzlers are parked in the garage - which of course would be a minute (spell) % of consumptiom but whatever. Even if demand has gone DOWN because of lower summer consumption, surely that reduced demand would result in lower world oil prices. I mean they are $50 - $55 no matter what you say.

Again, last summer there were those that argued the "...big bad oil companies.." where screwing us due to the rise in crude, so how does tht argument stand now that oil has gone up so much, including in $CDN terms?

 

PS: just for the record, I'm not an apologist for the oil companies, its just that rather then looking at them as a conspiracy to rape and pileage, I'm of the view that uniform oil prices at the gas pump represent and extremely EFFICIENT market as opposesed to a corrupt one.

My point is, if you believe the oil companies to be corrupt, explain your logic in the context of the current market pricing.

By-the-by, someone here has already touched on the reason for the apparant price inconsistancy of the last 6 months.

 

i would like to know how gas can cost so much in a country that is one of the largest oil producers. is it cause we sell it to the US to refine it just to buy it back.

i blame our gas prices on the US, there is so much of a demand that they cant supply it all so they buy it from other countries then they gouge people on the price because of demand. being beside a country like that has us being gouged at the pump becuase if our prices where cheaper then people would come north of the boarder to fill up. then the US would find someway to sue us or charge tariffs on our gas like they do everythign else we supply them. then we would get gouged at the pump cover the tariffs.

dont think the gas companies are hard up for money needing to gouge us at the pump cause of the price of oil

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/041026/britain_bp_3.html

 

First of all, we have our own oil refineries so we are a net exporter to the US. Next, we export oil because we are able to produce significantly more then we consume. As we export that brings foriegn $$ INTO our country allowing for further investment and to finance growth domestically. Next, oil is a global commodity priced in $USD on the world stage. Thankfully we live in a free market economy, and any investor who risks his capital to find and produce oil has the right to sell it to whomever he wants for the highest price he can get. If that fundamental principal EVER changes then the remaining pinkos can turn out the lights when the rest of us have left. Actually they won't have too, because communist economic theory has proven that the power will end up shutting down on its own. No need to flick a switch.

Finally, the rise in oil prices has many, many reasons at this particular time. However, I would also ask the peaceniks. It seems to me that the Iraq war was was about the US being able to control Iraq oil. How does that theory jive with oil being at $55? If the war was about oil, and they 'won' the war, why is oil so high?

And finally, the primary reason for the rise in oil, and as I say they are a number of them, most of which are relatively temporary, is because China has become a giant, black hole of resource consumption. IT is THEY who are primarily responsable for the rise in oil prices and subsequently all other power sources. Nothing at all to do with the US. And don't expect that to change any time soon.

One more thing. The reason for the high gas prices last spring had everything to do with low oil inventories and a number of refining problems and bottle necks on the global stage last spring. So the fact that oil was $35 per barrel did not directly have anything to do with the surge in gas at the pump. The problem was that oil could be bought at $35 but there was a shortage of the finished product at the consumer level. You could buy ALL you wanted in Saudi Arabia at $35 but it takes about 3 months to get it to the consumer. As I say, there were a number of issues at the time including strikes in Venezuala and a fire at a major oil refinery (I forget where). There was also a shortage of tankers. A whole bunch of little things that basically caused shortages in the North American market for about 2 - 3 months. But again, it was not an oil company conspiracy, just supply and demand got out of balance.

Note: Yes, I AM feeling a little fiesty this evening.