Basic Economics Department: It's the supply and demand, stupid!
Are you smarter than a U.S. Senator?
I don't claim to be a Mensa candidate or anything, but I must know more about basic economics than a large block of the members of the U.S. Senate. You see, I know about the law of supply and demand.
Yesterday, the Democrat majority tried (and failed) to pass a cloture motion on a bill to impose a "windfall profits tax" on oil companies.
Here's the problem I have with that bill: A windfall profits tax would do absolutely nothing to help consumers--on the contrary, it would most likely end up hurting consumers in a whole bunch of ways.
As much as they bloviate about how high fuel prices are hurting consumers, the Senate and House of Representatives haven't done diddly to impact the basic issue: increasing the supply of oil, or decreasing the demand is the only way to reduce the price. It's Econ 101.
The U.S. could be doing a whole lot to deal with this--drilling for our own proven reserves, increasing refinery capacity, and expanding our generation of alternative energy sources, such as nuclear power plants (which are far safer and better for the environment than coal- or oil-fired plants).
On the oil production front, here's link to the Drill Here, Drill Now petition. I signed. Will you?
Roy M. Jacobsen
in Modern Life, News
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