According to this preliminary Energy Information Administration report on California gasoline prices. I really want to paste in an excerpt here, but they’ve set Acrobat so I can’t copy text (grrr), so here’s the punch line: after you take out last year’s crude oil price spike, these factors conspired to raise gasoline prices:
-refineries producing close to physical capacity
-isolation and distance from other sources, such as Gulf Coast refineries
-California-specific gasoline, mandated to address air quality issues, which fragments and balkanizes wholesale gasoline markets
-the switch from MTBE to ethanol as the oxygenate
In other words, policy decisions and not price gouging are the fundamental root of higher and more volatile gasoline prices in California.
We are seeing the highest gas price in the nation here in Eureka, CA. Today the AVERAGE price is $2.38 for regular, that is 22 cents more the the next highest average in California. This is killing our economy, as well as effecting the ability of middle income parents to put quality food on the table. We are all having to changes in our lifes because of gas prices, but the effect on our senior who are already having to give up their meds for food and/or rent is shameful. The oil company had 41% increase in PROFITS through January and Febuary, and this has been the norm with every gas price spike in the last three years. This stat comes from the California UPC, and is not indicative of the fuzzy math normally use by corporations. We are all Americans, but most of the pie is now going to the oil slicks of the world. Many would argue that oil companies are making their profits on the backs of those who can least afford the extra $110 a month the average communtor is paying today. People are driving less when it comes to cutureal activities. All of the major oil companies are no longer American owned and we can see the effects of this. Your comments sound like more corporate smoke, and that just doesn’t work anymore.