> So, what are the other choices, and which one do you advocate?
>I'm not a policy expert of any sort, but it makes sense to me to prevent >price gouging during an emergency. Seems to me we have a long tradition of >that sort of policy. I think that is reasonable, as long as we can agree that the price rise that most of us see is not price gouging. As an aside, retail gas is often sold as a loss leader....the prices at places like Diamond Shamrock or Stop & Go or 7-11 are less than the cost of selling the gas. They make their profits inside the store. >Price controls haven't worked well -- I recall the days >of anti-inflationary wage and prices freezes fairly well. I certainly >remember gas rationing. OK, we agree here, but I see you contradict that below. >As for accountability, I believe that businesses must be accountable to >their stockholders and the public, in different ways. Different industries >at different times deserve different degrees of nationalization. I think it >is terrible that our health care system isn't nationalized enough to assure >that everyone in the richest country in the world has basic medical care >available. This is a topic for another thread, but there are weaknesses in government run medical care, also. A friend of mine, who is a British physician who did an internship in the US gave a very personal description of the advantages and disadvantages of each system. I think universal health insurance is probably better than the government owning all health care facilities....but I won't go into detail on this here. >The petroleum industry doesn't have the immediate impact of >health care, but it is critical, so I think it we are right to demand a high >level of public accountability from it. Details, I don't know. But to let it >wave in the winds of laissez fair economics seems crazy to me, given the >level of short-term disruption that could be caused by wildly fluctuating >prices. Gasoline price stability is important.. I'll leave it to others to >muse on how stable and how to achieve it, but I don't buy the argument that >it can't or shouldn't be done. Gasoline production in the US has been curtailed. The length of this curtailment is unknown. If supply is less than demand, for say a month or two, how do you reduce demand to put it in line with supply? Prices will work very well at this, as millions of people change their buying habits. You agreed that rationing doesn't work. I suppose the president could make an appeal to patriotism, "drive less", but I think that he would be overwhelmed by the first panic....and we'd be back to gas lines. Indeed, IIRC, Carter made such an appeal without much effect. >It dawns on me that this is a bit closer to home, literally and >figuratively, for you. Nothing personal, but if your income goes up while >people can't get to work and businesses fail because of gasoline price >volatility and gouging, My income is not going to go up as a result of a blip in gasoline prices. Now, I did get laid off back around when prices were at historical lows, when exploration for oil was grinding to a halt. Remember when oil was selling for, inflation adjsuted, Great Depression prices? That's the time that SUV sales went through the roof. Were you opposed to low prices then, out of curiosity? I guess I know why energy is always a scapegoat for any ecconomic problems, but the rest of the nation wouldn't necessarily reach the promised land if the oil industry would enter a 3 decade bust, instead of just a 2 decade bust. During this time, the oil patch shrunk by about 50%, as a percentage of GDP. Before being laid off (in a 50% lay off), I survived a 50% layoff, and a move where 80% of the people lost their jobs. In 1986, the economy in Houston got to be so bad, due to the oil bust, that a virtually new 2000 square foot house in a nice neighborhood went for about $30,000. Given all this, why not just say that fuel prices were abnormally low for the last 20 years, and that we'll all be better off as more realistic prices cut consumption? Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
