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Ten years ago the price per barrel of oil was around 45 dollars. The avarage price per gallan, for gasoline, was around 1.25 (regular). Now the price of oil is 75 dollars per barrel and gas is over 3 dollars. Do the math! The price per barrel has gone up 60%. Gasoline should therfore be about 2 dollars a gallon. NOT over 3.



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All the firgures I have given are from memory. They may be off a bit, but not alot!



"Not alot"? You couldn't be further from the truth.

10 years ago today, the average price of a gallon of gas in the US was $1.31. The crude oil price on 04/29/1996 that day was $22.07 -- half of what you claim it was. In the time that crude prices have more than tripled, gas prices have only just doubled (most of this difference is due to taxes in the $1.31 that don't increase with the price of crude, so, in reality,the price of the crude portion of the gasoline cost has tripled as the cost of the crude itself has tripled).

Crude oil prices didn't hit $45 until July of 2004 -- not even 2 years ago. And it didn't get above $45 and stay there until barely a year ago. Either way, it wasn't even close to "10 years ago".

Here's a chart I made a little while ago with Pump vs. Barrel prices:



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Most people look to the Middle east and think thats where are oil comes from. IT DOES NOT! In fact the list of foreign oil goes something like this, Canada, Great Britain, Mexico, Venezuela and then the ENTIRE middle east region!



Great Britain? Uh. No. Not even in the top 10. Your others are correct though.

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The last report I saw (even in the NY Times it's hidden) only 20% of total foreign oil is from the middle east.



Hidden?

You make it out like it's some sort of conspiracy to hide the fact that most of our oil doesn't come from the Mid-East. It's pretty common knowledge. And the exact sources and amounts are freely available from the Department of Energy itself.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/rankings/crudebycountry.htm

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The last report I saw (even in the NY Times it's hidden) only 20% of total foreign oil is from the middle east. This is were we get misled. The news will report that countries like Kuait (just one example) supply 7% of our oil. This seems like alot for one country, until you realize the 7% they are talking about is from total forein oil (wich again is only 30% of are oil use).



Well, it certainly got you misled.

Of the total oil we consume in the US, Kuwait supplies about 1.7% -- that's a lot more than "one quarter of one percent".

Your primary math error lies in your incorrect statement of "total foreign oil is only 30% of our oil use", which is incorrect. 65% of our oil is imported not 30%; and Kuwait makes up 2.5% of that 65%.

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. This is were we get misled. The news will report that countries like Kuait (just one example) supply 7% of our oil. This seems like alot for one country, until you realize the 7% they are talking about is from total forein oil (wich again is only 30% of are oil use). That's less than one quarter of one percent of our oil use. So someone tell me how they have any influance on our oil prices?



Iran supplies virtually none of our oil, yet they can influence our prices. In fact, right now, they're probably the single biggest influence on highly speculative oil prices.

Oil prices are set world-wide. Just because Iran, or anyone else, doesn't supply us doesn't mean anything. They supply other countries with oil. And when those countries don't get their oil from Iran for some reason, they have to buy it from someone that we do buy oil from. This means that we have to essentially 'outbid' them for it to ensure that we can get it. That means that we pay more for the same exact gas, from the same exact countries, because some other country that we don't even buy from, did something.

Or here's another one -- Gold. Also has prices set world-wide. Iran doesn't provide the world with any significant quantities of gold, yet their actions alone in recent weeks have pushed the price of Gold up 20%.

When you deal in commodities with prices set on an international level, you're going to have prices that you pay affected by actions that don't affect you at all. And may or may not even have a measurable effect on supply. But they still affect prices. It's just the way commodities markets work.

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