In case someone hasn't heard price for gaoline in Hawaii was capped to $2.84 I think... don't know about diesel or the different octanes... read some newspaper about it.

The biggest concern over this is that it shouldn't cause shortages, which is the best part, people will pay less and learn (hopefully) how to consume less. Now, from microecon we know that since a lot of us have bought large SUV's and we have to get to work, the demand for gasoline is elastic (or inelastic, which ever one means we're more willing to pay higher prices) so, currently hoping that consumption comes down is just that... hoping and wishful thinking... a price cap forces most of us to consume less and we don't pay enormous amounts of money for gasoline.

Are price caps what caused shortages in the 1970's? or is that different?

I think this is genius, the saudi's or exxon doesn't run away with our money, we pay less, and we (hopefully) consume less.

Edit: still waiting for bio-diesel, or is it here, and that is the reason diesel is cheaper than gasoline now in the midwest?

This isn't genius, its idiotic, and they will learn by getting burned. If they cap the price, and gasoline prices continue to rise everywhere, companies will be less willing to sell gasoline at the capped price. Which will mean shortages.

They complain about gasoline in Hawaii being the highest in the country? Everything in Hawaii is damn expensive. Buck up.


Bio-fuels, at least in the case of ethanol are not cheaper than regular old dino fuel. Subsidies make the cost of ethanol blends at the pump cheaper, when in fact, its more costly to produce. Plus, I'd like to know how they plan to multiply corn production by several times without disrupting current uses for corn and other crops.

Here is a chart comparing all available fuel sources from the Alternative fuels division of the Dept. of Energy.

http://www.eere.energy.gov/afdc/progs/fuel_compare.cgi

Biodiesel: http://www.eere.energy.gov/afdc/altfuel/biodiesel.html

Ethanol: http://www.eere.energy.gov/afdc/altfuel/ethanol.html

Price caps are definately a bad idea. It only caps the price at which domestic companies may sell gas. If they have to buy gas from foreign sources for more than they are allowed to sell it in the US for then they lose money. If companies lose money, they stop business. That's exactly why oil refineries in the US stopped doing business in the late 70s.

re bio diesel:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/biodieselbasics/
These people make it in their garages

Gas cap? HA! That's a moronic idea, as Stumbles already said. If people can't sell it for greater than a certain amount, then when the wholesale price of gas rises above that, then the gas stations will STOP SELLING IT. Then, either they will repeal the law, or the gas stations will go out of business AND no one in Hawaii will have gas. Unless of course they raise the prices of everything IN the store to make up for the loss on the gas they are selling... but that would kind of defeat the purpose wouldn't it?

ok, the part i think we disagree on, do we need to reduce our dependence on oil/gasoline or not? we do, and therefore shortages are a good thing. it forces us to reduce our dependence on gasoline, rather than keep paying $4 or $5/gallon to either exxon or the saudi's... i've got news for the people that think the market can never fail, a lot of economists think the market has failed when it comes to healthcare, and since our dependence and usage of gasoline is so great, the best way, me thinks, to deal with it IS with shortages and not wait around until $5/gallon of gasoline becomes a reality, the extra $2 (price now ($2.37) minus the price later ($5)) is going to exxon and/or the saudi's no one else.

another point, it costs no more (almost) than it did before 9/11 to get gasoline out of the ground than it does now, so while the selling price is $65/barrel of crude it still costs the same to get it out of the ground, shipping it to places might have become a bit more expensive, because insurance for that sort of stuff has increased, regardless of that, exxon made 8.2 billion in pure profit the quarter before the last, and another 7 some billion this quarter. if any company can operate on a lower margin, exxon can...

I see the problem with trying to run refineries when you have to buy at market price but then have to sell at a lower price... who would you really hurt though? the only pure-refining company i can think of is valero, and they're not in the midwest (unless qt's gasoline is refined by valero). this is a side effect in my mind (the gasoline business is more competitive than most people thought in the last yr. or so)... since with price controls, people will pay less for gas (have money left over to spend else where) and we will start to use less gas because there will be shortages. shortages are great when you want to reduce the dependence of it (oil in this case).

maybe you guys would agree on a moving price cap... kind of defeating the purpose of a cap, but something like for every $1 jump in the wholesale price of gas, the cap could be raised 25 or 50 cents or something.

fyi, 1/2 of the price of gas is crude price, the rest is refining/shipping/etc. as far as i know.

Reducing the dependency is a good thing, but I don't see how a gas cap could do that. Gas stations make very little profiton gas as it is. If you put a gas cap on, it's going to cause shortage by completely shutting down the state of Hawaii. We need to decrease our dependency by putting money into alternative fuel research.

I feel bad for station owners. I feel nothing but rage, hatred and spite toward the motherfucking shit faced cock masters that are the companies in control of refineries. They basically have a license to print money.

same applies to the ones that pump the crude and sell it to the refineries... shortages in gasoline will only hasten the process of moving large amounts of cars to bio-diesel or other alternative fuels. if gm or ford supported e85 or lpg conversions with warranties, many more people would do it. they're starting to get behind e85. if there's no price cap on e85 or biodiesel... i would think most gasoline pumps would become e85 and bio-diesel pumps overnight.

Last time I checked no one was forcing you to buy gas. Everyone needs to quit bitching, if you can't afford it then don't buy it.

It's not that simple; it never is.

Last time I checked, in MN, 40% of the price you pay for gas goes to road taxes. I know most other states are around that point

ya, but the states arent seeing another dime out of this. they charge a flat $0.xx tax per gallon, not a percentage.

Oh, yeah. I didn't mean it that way. I just meant the government's taking a huge chunk every time you fill at the pumps.