Get ready for more pain at the pump.
The average price for a gallon of self-serve regular gasoline in Orange County rose 6.5 cents in a single day, to $3.90. That's 18.1 cents more than a week ago, 30.3 cents higher than a month ago and 11.3 cents greater than one year ago, according to figures from the AAA and Oil Price Information Service.
OC gas prices, which have risen 34 times in the past 39 days, are the third highest in the state behind Los Angeles and San Luis Obispo County.
"The usual culprits are being listed as reasons for the spike -- high oil prices, Middle East tension, local refinery incidents and refineries being brought down for maintenance as they prepare to produce the summer blend of gasoline," said Jeffrey Spring of the Automobile Club of Southern California.
"But perhaps equally if not more importantly, say oil industry analysts, financial market managers see refined gasoline as a 'sure bet' for their clients' portfolios. Big investment money is flowing earlier and earlier into gasoline trading, ahead of the usual 'spring spike.'
"Southern California is a particularly vulnerable market for shortages because it has no inexpensive alternatives if local refinery production is down, and traders are aware of this."
-- City News Service
You see, the government is printing about $80B in fiat currency EACH MONTH to keep the economy moving under something called "quantitative easing". King Obama has given his blessing to this. This money is deposited in the Too Big to Fail Banks that are allowed to collect interest off of it at interest rates that are MUCH higher than you would get. When more fiat money is infused into the economy it dilutes the value of your dollar and your purchasing power goes DOWN. That's why grocery prices are going UP and the food containers you see in the supermarket are getting smaller and smaller. YOU ARE PAYING MORE FOR LESS. Your medical costs are going UP. Your gas prices are going UP. You are getting screwed, stewed and tatooed. It's great to be an American these days, ain't it? Maybe we should invade Syria to stimulate our economy further. They do have oil over there, afterall. So it would be worth it. And we could do it under the guise of a 'humanitarian invasion to save the good people', like we've done before. It's all good. And that's why the foreigners all love us so!!! hah. :^)
A likely scenario is that a few oil execs got together with some DC pol clowns on some energy committee and promised them a few mil in campaign contributions if they could manipulate market forces to raise the gas price. After the 5th mai tai they all patted each other on the backs, gave each other the power handshake as they laughed while they all drove home drunk. Power settles most everything. We no more have a 'free market' than is there a tooth fairy who puts dollar bills under pillows. As far as corruption and underhanded deals, we have become worse than Mexico.
That's probably one of the most ignorant comments I have seen thus far on these boards. The pols forbid pipelines and drilling sites to reduce production keeping prices articifically high. Recently we were paying $4.50 a gallon in California while other neighboring states were paying $1.50 a gallon LESS. And it had nothing to do with additives or switching over to seasonal fuel components or the shutdown of refineries. None of that was occurring at the time. It was all about gouging the consumer with higher articifical pricings and more in gov fuel taxes to save failing budgets. HIDDEN TAXES. Look at average price of gas when Bush was in. About $2.75 a gallon, even with the Iraq war. In the last 4 years that has jumped up to about $4.00 a gallon. There is no good reason for that besides gouging. The gov controls the future markets on oil. And there's massive manipulation. Wall Street and the gov works arm in arm. If you haven't caught on to that since 2008 you must be blind as a bat.
The fact that governemnt colludes with big business is hardly a conspiracy theory. It's as real as 2+2=4. Anyone with an average IQ who watched how the economic meltdown happened and it's aftermath, and the massive collusion between government and big business understood the market manipulation and the outright criminal financial fraud that occurred which could NEVER have possible happened without active collusion between DC and the largest financial concerns in the nation. We know that Obama accepted multi-millions from the Too BIg To Fails, to include $1M from Goldman Sachs alone. And we know all about the revolving door between Wall Street, and the highest offices in government. You seem a little uninformed. I would recommend the documentary called "Inside Job" as a primer to educate you how collusion between government and big business works when there is big money involved. Oil is no different. I gave you a specific situation right here in California when we paid $1.50-$2.00 a gallon higher for gas than our neighboring states. And that happened long after the seasonal switchover for gas additives. You just don't want to admit that there is collusion between government and big business. You want to believe that it all has to do with market forces, even health care costs! HAH! Oh well, think as you will. It's a semi-free county.