How to lower gas prices

[whereinthehellami]

What is everybody's thoughts on the below copied email that I got from work?


THIS IS NOT THE 'DON'T BUY' GAS FOR ONE DAY, BUT IT WILL SHOW YOU HOW WE CAN GET GAS BACK DOWN TO $1.30 PER GALLON.

This was sent by a retired Coca Cola executive. It came from one of his engineer buddies who retired from Halliburton. If you are tired of the gas prices going up AND they will continue to rise this summer, take time to read this please.

Phillip Hollsworth offered this good idea.
This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the 'don't buy gas on a certain day' campaign that was going around last April or May!
It's worth your consider ation. Join the resistance!!!!

I hear we are going to hit close to $ 4.00 a gallon by next summer and it might go higher!! Want gasoline prices to come down?

We need to take some intelligent, united action. The oil companies just laughed at that because they knew we wouldn't continue to 'hurt' ourselves by refusing to buy gas.

It was more of an inconvenience to us than it was a problem for them.
BUT,whoever thought of this idea, has come up with a plan that can Really work. Please read on and join with us!

By now you're probably thinking gasoline priced at about $2.00 is super cheap. Me too! It is currently $2.98 for regular unleaded in my town.

Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a gallon of gas is CHEAP at $1.50 - $1.75, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control the marketplace..not sellers.

With the price of gasoline going up more each day, we consumers need to take action.

The only way we are going to see the price of gas come down is if we hit someone in the pocketbook by not purchasing their gas! And, we can do that WITHOUT hurting ourselves.

How? Since we all rely on our cars, we can't just stop buying gas.

But we CAN have an impact on gas prices if we all act together to force a price war.

Here's the idea: For the rest of this year, DON'T purchase ANY gasoline from the two biggest companies (which now are one),EXXON and MOBIL.

If they are not selling any gas, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit.

But to have an impact, we need to reach literally millions of Exxon and Mobil gas buyers. It's really simple to do! Now, don't wimp out on me at this point...keep reading and I'll explain how simple it is to reach millions of people!!

I am sending this note to 30 people. If each of us send it to at least ten more (30 x 10 = 300) ... and those 300 send it to at least ten more (300 x10 = 3,000)...and so on, by the time the message reaches the sixth gro up of people, we will have reached over THREE MILLION consumers.
If those three million get excited and pass this on to ten friends each, then 30 million people will have been contacted!

If it goes one level further, you guessed it..... THREE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE!!!

Again, all you have to do is send this to 10 people. That's all!

(If you don't understand how we can reach 300 million and all you have to do is send this to 10 people.... Well, let's face it, you just aren't a mathematician. But I am . so trust me on this one.

How long would all that take? If each of us sends th is e-mail out to ten more people within one day of receipt, all 300 MILLION people could conceivably be contacted within the next! 8 days !!!

I'll bet you didn't think you and I had that much potential, did you!
Acting together we can make a difference.

If this makes sense to you, please pass this message on. I suggest that we not buy from EXXON/MOBIL UNTIL THEY LOWER THEIR PRICES TO THE $2.00 RANGE AND KEEP THEM DOWN. THIS CAN REALLY WORK

[Pacer]

At a minimum, the genius mathemetician doesn't account for repeat receivers in his 300 Million people boast... Also, it would be helpful to include all the sub-brands owned by Exxon and Mobil.

[hc5duke]

Exxon, Mobil, and Esso, but wiki also says they own "hundreds of smaller subsidiaries"

I already only shop at Arco/Safeway/Costco, as they're the cheapest around, but I wouldn't even begin to put a dent in other people's gas usage, much less Exxon. My daily commute is 1/2 mile one-way, and in the last 6 months, I've filled up a total of 6 times.

[DukeUsul]

Well, I think it'd be easier to convince everyone to buy fuel-efficient cars than it would be to convince them to boycott certain gas stations.

I'm no economist, but I'd think that reducing demand at certain gas companies while not reducing overall demand, will then raise demand at the remaining gas stations. You'd start to see price disparities between the two groups and pretty soon people will say "forget this boycott" and start buying gas at the lower prices.... leading back to equilibrium.

The only way to lower overall price is to reduce overall demand.

[Cavlaw]

Well, if you're not persuaded it's nothing more than a dumb ploy by the stupidity of the idea or by the writer's use of the same ridiculous tone as every other hoax email, you could just refer to the snopes.com page (http://www.snopes.com/politics/gasoline/gasout.asp) on this exact message.

[whereinthehellami]

Well, if you're not persuaded it's nothing more than a dumb ploy by the stupidity of the idea or by the writer's use of the same ridiculous tone as every other hoax email, you could just refer to the snopes.com page (http://www.snopes.com/politics/gasoline/gasout.asp) on this exact message.

Good find. Interesting.

[cspan37421]

A relative sent me an email to this effect this morning and I had to once again beg off from being included in chain emails - unless they involve family news. It saddens me that such things are forwarded without much critical thought, and as chain emails go, the reasoning behind this one is one of the weakest I've seen in some time. Like DukeUsul, I recognized right away that if you bought only from a subset of providers, the competition those providers faced would go down, and thus, their prices would go up.

Even if you drove less to lower demand for gas, OPEC can just cut supply (again) and the prices won't change. Much of the price increase of late can be attributed to the falling value of the dollar - for which you can thank the Fed and the POTUS who, at least for several years, never vetoed a GOP spending bill. The deficit ballooned, war was taken off-budget, and cheap money was everywhere, and so our dollar has tanked in value. Nice legacy!

The best bet, as always, is to act rationally. When you have to buy gas, buy it from lower-cost providers. Drive less, to save overall fuel use. When you have to get a new car, consider a more fuel efficient one. Etc.

I've found that a good rule of thumb for emails is that if they say anything about forwarding it to your friends and family, you probably don't want to waste time reading the rest of it.

[hurleyfor3]

I guess driving less isn't an option.

[cato]

At a minimum, the genius mathemetician doesn't account for repeat receivers in his 300 Million people boast.

Yeah, but that leads to the best line: "(If you don't understand how we can reach 300 million and all you have to do is send this to 10 people.... Well, let's face it, you just aren't a mathematician. But I am . so trust me on this one."

[hc5duke]

I guess driving less isn't an option.

Well, that would be more like "put away part of your paycheck every month in a savings account for retirement", you know, boring. This, it's like "GET RICH QUIKK BUY DJKE.FU STOCK NOW". ;)

[unexpected]

The hilarious part of this is that most people don't even realize where there gas comes from- with very few exceptions, gas from different companies comes from the same refinery. There are many, many refineries across the world, and they'll accept oil from just about anyone, so long as they're equipped to turn it into gasoline.

Once it's been turned into gasoline (meaning it's already been SOLD once), the refinery then sells it again to middlemen who then resell it one more time to gas stations.

Boycotting specific gas stations only hurts the small business owner who owns that particular station. They are locked into long-term contracts with the middlemen (called jumpers). they have to buy gas at whatever price the jumper gives them, and then they tack on an extra 2-3 cents a gallon. This is why you see stations across the street from each other with huge price differences? The more expensive one is forced to keep his price that high, otherwise he'd be selling gas at a loss. He'd like to lower his prices, because he needs to drive convenience store traffic (that's how gas stations make their money).

That Costco gas that you buy? more than likely produced at an Exxon Mobil refinery.

[YmoBeThere]

I was hoping to see some good advice, like walk don't drive, drive a more fuel efficient vehicle, etc. (Can you sense the sarcasm? Not meant as a shot at any subsequent posts.) Humph, same ole, same ole, boycott and they will lower prices spam that has been going out for the last 3-4 years.

I did hear an interesting bit yesterday, and this isn't news. Brits are paying the equivalent of $9 a gallon. We still have it easy...