"A lady wrote the best letter in the Editorials in ages!!! It explains things better than all the baloney you hear on TV.
Her point:
Recently large demonstrations have taken place across the country protesting the fact that Congress is finally addressing the issue of illegal immigration.Certain people are angry that the US might protect its own borders, might make it harder to sneak into this country and, once here, to stay indefinitely.
Let me see if I correctly understand the thinking behind these protests.
Let's say I break into your house.Let's say that when you discover me in your house, you insist that I leave.But I say, "I've made all the beds and washed the dishes and did the laundry and swept the floors. I've done all the things you don't like to do. I'm hard-working and honest
(except for when I broke into your house).
According to the protesters:
You are Required to let me stay in your house. You are Required to add me to your family's insurance plan.You are Required to Educate my kids.You are Required to Provide other benefits to me & to my family.(my husband will do all of your yard work because he is also hard-working and honest, except for that breaking in part).
If you try to call the police or force me out, I will call my friends who will picket your house carrying signs that proclaim my RIGHT to be there.
It's only fair, after all, because you have a nicer house than I do, and I'm just trying to better myself. I'm a hard-working and honest, person, except for well, you know, I did break into your house And what a deal it is for me!!!I live in your house, contributing only a  fraction of the cost of my keep, and there is nothing you can do about it without being accused of cold, uncaring, selfish, prejudiced, and bigoted behavior.

Oh yeah, I DEMAND that you learn MY LANGUAGE!!! so you can communicate with me.Why can't people see how ridiculous  this is?! Only in America."

 Pretty cool

 

 

Optimistule!

Free Markets Need Free People

If there is one point of consensus in the fraught politics of immigration, it is that illegal immigration is bad. Yesterday, President Bush voiced his support for tough enforcement at the U.S.-Mexico border and called on Congress to resolve the status of the 12 million illegal immigrants now in the country. Last week, Rep. Tom Tancredo (R., Colo.) entered the presidential race, promising to make resentment of illegal immigrants a major campaign issue. And yet, from a purely economic perspective, illegal immigration is arguably preferable to legal immigration. Because Congress and the president refuse to see this, further reform this year could make a bad situation worse.

Illegal immigration is persistent because it has a strong economic rationale. Low-skilled workers are increasingly scarce in the U.S. while they are still abundant in Mexico, Central America and elsewhere. As the Bush administration has said repeatedly, impeding illegal immigration, without creating other avenues for legal entry, would conflict with market forces that push labor from low-wage countries to the high-wage U.S. labor market.

The acceptance of these market pressures is behind proposals for a large-scale expansion of temporary legal immigration. But simply handing out more temporary visas won't be enough to staunch illegal immigration, because the illegal route is for the moment vastly more efficient than the cumbersome legal system. Illegal immigration responds to economic signals in ways that legal immigration does not. Illegal migrants tend to arrive in larger numbers when the U.S. economy is booming and move to regions where job growth is strong. Legal immigration, in contrast, is subject to bureaucratic delays, which tend to disassociate legal inflows from U.S. labor-market conditions. The lengthy visa application process requires employers to plan their hiring far in advance. Once here, guest workers cannot easily move between jobs, limiting their benefit to the U.S. economy.

An expanded guest-worker program, with highly regulated inflows of temporary, low-skilled foreign labor, would be unlikely to attract much interest from U.S. employers; a cumbersome legal channel would rather give them an incentive to continue hiring illegals. Were new legislation to combine stronger border and interior enforcement with an unattractive guest-worker program, it would be pitting policy reform against itself. Stronger enforcement would deter illegal immigration; a cumbersome guest worker program would encourage it. Only one of these components would be likely to survive in the long run.

Rather than merely expanding the number of temporary visas, Congress should redesign temporary immigration from the ground up. Successful reform would have to mimic current beneficial aspects of illegal immigration. Employers would have to be able to hire the types of workers they desire, when they desire. One way to achieve this would be for the Department of Homeland Security to sanction the creation of global temp agencies, in which U.S. employers posted ads for jobs and foreign workers applied to fill them.

Matching foreign workers to U.S. employers efficiently would require flexibility in the number of guest workers admitted -- and one way to make the number of visas sensitive to market signals would be to auction the right to hire a guest worker to U.S. employers. The auction price for visas that clears the market would reflect the supply of and demand for foreign guest workers. An increase in the auction price signals the need to expand the number of visas; a decline in the price indicates that the number of visas could be reduced.

Perhaps the most important provision of any new visa program would be to allow guest workers to move between jobs in the United States. Without mobility between employers, guest workers would lack the attractiveness of illegal laborers. They would also be exposed to abuse by unscrupulous bosses. One way to facilitate mobility for guest workers would be to allow existing visa holders to apply for new job postings, along with prospective guest workers abroad. Guest workers could move between industries and regions of the country as economic conditions change.

Making immigration more responsive to the market would not be easy to implement, either administratively or politically. However, absent a boldly redesigned guest-worker program, temporary legal immigrants would be unlikely to displace illegal labor. In the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, Congress voted to increase enforcement against the hiring of illegals without creating a mechanism for the continued inflow of legal, low-skilled labor. Under steady pressure from business, the government ultimately gutted or redirected IRCA's major enforcement provisions. The end result was that illegal labor has continued to find a way into the country.

As Congress again wrestles with immigration reform, one would hope that it will pay heed to the failures of the past by creating a framework that allows for the dynamic participation of legal immigrant workers in the U.S. economy. Otherwise, the U.S. is likely to find itself with even larger illegal populations in the very near future.

Mr. Hanson is director of the Center on Pacific Economies at the University of California, San Diego. This op-ed is adapted from a new study published by the Council on Foreign Relations (www.cfr.org/illegal_immigration).

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"If [man] is not to stifle his human feelings, he must practise kindness towards animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."
Immanuel Kant

arissa:

Free Markets Need Free People

I agree to a certain extent. I'm a big supporter of competition as means to balance and drive improvements into the crappy, less than stellar performance of general American workforce, which btw, there's plenty to go around (just like hairy legged romanian girls and beautiful prostitutes )

The problem I have with blindly applying Ricardo's take on economic theories and wages is that we still live in a highly fragmented, socio-political world with huge imbalances which isn't quite conducive to an uniform, blanket application of highly refined economic principles. Is like you'd force an Afgani child to eat our food and expect him not only to love it but to be healthy after abusing it for many years. It doesn't make much sense like it doesn't make sense to expect european-americans to learn how to live like south chinese overnight and am not sure it would be a good thing either.

To a certain extent I relate the underlying message of this article to Darwin's Evolution theory, Mein Kampf or Marx's Communist Manifesto..Nice intellectual exercises but very little good coming out of them.

Regardless, staying here illegally IS against the law and should be punished in full force

I work with Crystal and read part of this forum. What follows is my opinion:

Let's set some things straight.

I have had it with this myth that American citizens are unwilling to do so-called demeaning jobs. We are willing to do so and have been doing so for hundreds of years. What we are not willing to do is work for slave-wages. If people come in here, legally or not, and are willing to work for slave-wages, because they have been conditioned to do so for hundreds of years in their own countries, that does not mean that we should be forced to compete with them. It is bad enough that all of our jobs that can be are being outsourced to slave-labor countries. In addition, more wage-slaves are being imported into America to further destroy the lives of Americans. This (Globalization) is all part of a plan to reduce the entire world to the economic and social level of Calcutta. A tiny minority of super-rich want to preside over a vast majority of super-poor. This is not going to fly and will eventually lead to riots, civil war, and revolution, as has happened throughout history.

Another myth that absolutely drives me up the wall is that if working people are paid a decent (livable) wage, then the cost of the goods they produce will rise to the point that they will become unaffordable. This is pure and absolute B.S. For thousands of years, this has not been the case. It has only been a supposed problem since the Harvard MBA/CEO's got together and decided that the obscenely huge pay disparities between themselves and their employees were not great enough, and that the workers at the lower levels should not even make enough to live, let alone live a middle-class life. The wage increases of the CEO's, largely fed by skimming/reducing the wages of their employees, are responsible for the unaffordable cost of nearly everything that is essential to daily life.

If one spreads the additional hourly cost of paying a worker a decent/livable wage, as opposed to a slave-level wage, out over the total number of items that that worker handles per hour, then the additional cost that will have to be added to the price of each individual item will be minor. Besides, if everybody makes a better salary, they will be able to afford these tiny increases, and everything will be good. This is the way it always worked. It is only when Globalization and unlimited illegal immigration was put into motion that a huge wrench was thrown into the economic machinery of America and other formerly living-wage countries.

The world will not be a better place if everyone is brought down to a lower standard of living. It will be a better place when everyone is brought up to at least a middle-class standard of living. There is enough wealth generated by viable businesses to allow all of the workers in that business to at least make a living. How much do the CEO's need, after a certain point? Does Bill Gates (who said he wanted to import more slave-wage employees because Americans, who made him worth his Billions of dollars by buying his products, wanted a livable wage to work for him) really need any more money? This is not some Monopoly game that is being played out here, Bill. These are people's lives, and they are being ruined more every day.

This current economic situation is immoral and is not sustainable. Don't even get me started on the phony oil shortage myth that is attacking working people from the other side of their wallets. America is headed for another revolution. It is a shame that we cannot correct this peacefully, but the system is so corrupt that it may not be possible to reverse the downward slide in time. Those at the top have forgotten the lessons of history, as they always seem to be prone to do.

 

Crystal:

slave-wages.

What is the $$ equivalent you have in mind for "slave wages" ?? We may be talking about the same thing.

 

I do want to say few things in regards to what that lady said in her article and that is if the US government feels that they can just govern every other country the way they see fit - or to put in her words : if she comes over to my house and forces me to run it in a certain way and then my house falls apart she's damn right I will move into her house and demand to have the same rights as her! She is responsible for me becoming homeless. Just as a quick reminder of what happened after the WWII and how Romania ended up as a communist country...so yes we do owe them the fact that they shaked hands with the Russians and we had to live the kind of life we did for the last half of century. And as for present days if Bush wouldn't have been flexing his muscles to show the world what a macho leader he is, taking over Iraq (without solid reason since till this day there were no mass-destruction weapons found) and causing the fuel prices to go sky high and eventually all prices, than probably life would've been a little bit better in Europe. And somehow we endedp up in Europe with fuel prices at least double compared to US prices! For those who don't know in Romania gas price is 1 euro/ litre which in $/gallon would be $5.2/gallon... would you like to compare wage levels now? Rhetorical question. So yeah.when your policy influences the lives of so many nations don't be upset when they will come to you and ask for help. By the way, what would've happened few hundread years ago if the American Indians would've had the power to force out the British saying hey guys sorry you don't have the right to be here, this is our country and you are illegal go home! Do you think that the British applied for visas at the American Indian embassy overseas before taking over and killing more than half of the population:)? Most likely not, so let's try to see the big picture here and not think that it's okay to go to a certain teritory which doesn't belong to you and take over because you are strong enough to do it and run it the way you want, but it's not okay to go to a country as an individual with no power and try to make a better living. After all we are all human beings with the same rights as God created us and we all have this planet to share, probably not for long the way things are going lately...  

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Live and let live

Prism exemplul pur ipotetic mentionat arata mentatitatea ingusta a unor americani. Point-ul lu' madam nu are legatura cu realitatea. Si sa negi argumentatia lui Mr. Gordon H. Hanson e deja comedie curata. Articolul e documentat si argumenteaza spre deosebire de madam Fa^tz,  care (nu stim) dar eu banuiesc ca s-o fi trezit cu fatza la cearsaf.

 In actuala conjunctura economica presupunand ca toti muncitorii ilegali (SUBLINIEZ muncitorii ca sa fie evidenta diferentierea intre oamenii care lucreaza ilegal si .... resturi) s-ar intoarce de unde au venit, economia americana ar intra in recesiune. Sunt peste 10 milioane !! Asta ti-o poate demonstra orice student care a trecut cu bine cursurile de economie politica, anume ca orice miscare brusca in economia unei tari, fie chiar a americii, genereaza efecte perverse, iar lucrul acesta il stiu bine cu totii, incepand cu studentul mentionat mai sus, toti businessman-ii, congressman-ii, inclusiv administratia. "Boom-ul" prabusirii monedei americane ar fi asurzitor, iar ptr cetateanul american de rand ar fi insuportabil. Lira engleza s-a apreciat in buna parte datorita muncitorilor clandestini care au scazut presiunea salariala asupra patronatelor din domeniul constructiilor, si piata imobiliara a luat avant cu efecte in lant in intreaga economie. Economia europeana (euro), a iesit mai repede din faza de contractie si datorita atentiei guvernelor in a reglementa statutul muncitorilor clandestini, spre deosebire de administratiile americane care au preferat politica ...... strutului.

 Pe langa efectele economice favorabile la fel de adevarat e ca au aparut efecte sociale dezagreabile. Cazurile prezentate in mass media sunt reale dar nu intotdeauna. Si aici ar tb spus ca ziarele nu sunt o sursa credibila de informare, intrucat speculeaza senzationalul, ca ziarul sa se vanda. De televiziuni nu mai pomenesc. Atat in america dar si aiurea pe glob. Exemple edificatoare sunt in arhiva The Sun, care a uitat sa scrie despre dezamagirea produsa de inexistenta valului de emigranti ilegali (plini de TBC, SIDA, si sifilis)  ce urmau sa soseasca din Romania si Bulgaria incepand cu 1 ianuarie 2007.  Ultima gogoritza a fost prezentata si la BBC, despre romani care si-ar fi instalat corturi intr-un parc. In cele din urma s-a dovedit ca era o exagerare.

 Rolul guvernelor, sau ma rog pt conformitate, al administratiei daca e sa vorbim despre america, e de a reglementa problemele societatii in asa fel incat sa aduca bunastare si progres economic. Actuala legislatie privind imigratia sau regimul vizelor cu drept de munca e depasita si anacronica, ba mai mult genereaza situatii umilitoare pt conditia umana, binecunoscuta fiind lipsa de scrupule a societatii americane cand e vorba de $$. Despre astea nu se spune nimic, decat pe ici pe colo pe forumuri. Eu personal i-as prezenta respectabilei doamne, situatii reale de umilinta la care se ajunge respectand ad literam actualele prevederi legale.

 Postarea in limba engleza mi se pare dovada de elitism ieftin, cata vreme suntem pe RomPortal . Nu de altceva dar cunosc si franceza si as putea deveni celebru postand in 3 limbi pe un forum romanesc     

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In rest la multe vise placute, si fie ca simplitatea fericirii tale sa nu se complice niciodata.

orange:

And as for present days if Bush wouldn't have been flexing his muscles to show the world what a macho leader he is, taking over Iraq (without solid reason since till this day there were no mass-destruction weapons found) and causing the fuel prices to go sky high and eventually all prices, than probably life would've been a little bit better in Europe. And somehow we endedp up in Europe with fuel prices at least double compared to US prices! For those who don't know in Romania gas price is 1 euro/ litre which in $/gallon would be $5.2/gallon... would you like to compare wage levels now?

  Nu prea stau bine cu timpul liber in utimul timp si de aceea nu prea am raspuns pe topicul asta, dar cand vad niste idei dintr-astea debitate doar asa de dragul sa fie scrise, cam greu sa ma abtin. Ideea asta ca Bush e cauza pretului la benzina sa fie asa ridicat imi aduce aminte de un survey citit printr-unul din ziare: o larga majoritate a americanilor sunt convinsi ca Bush e cel care stabileste pretul la benzina si doar din cauza lui e benzina asa de scumpa...

Sorry, dar e greu sa nu razi pana sa-ti vina rau...ce are mai Bush cu benzina???? cu pretul la benzina??? da, o fi avand el ceva amprenta pe el, dar  uite ca nu-i el ala care pune pretul la benzina de aproape $3/gal in USA si aprox.$6/gal in Europe. Oricat nu mi-ar place mie de Bush, sa dau vina pe el ca deh... trebuie sa fie un tap ispasitor pe undeva, nu merge. Supply and demand sunt cauzele cele mai mari care determina pretul la benzina, i.e. China si India care inghit la petrol indeajuns pt tot globul ca nah ele trebuie sa creasca de 4-5 ori mai mult ca Europe, instabilitate in Middle East (mai scoate o vorbulita de nuclear weapons Iranul si uite cum tremura pretul), mai vine un uragan si distruge vreo "cateva" rafinarii...ca sa nu mai zicem de taxele bagate de guvern la greu pe marile companii petroliere (mult mai mari in Europe decat in USA)...si care in return sunt puse pe seama consumatorilor... so unde-i Bush-ul? ah, ca a creat macelul din Iraq, true...dar pretul la gas ar fi fost undeva tot pe acolo, with or without the war.

 

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"If [man] is not to stifle his human feelings, he must practise kindness towards animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."
Immanuel Kant

Prism:

Nice intellectual exercises but very little good coming out of them.

  Are you describing yourself in this sentence?

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"If [man] is not to stifle his human feelings, he must practise kindness towards animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."
Immanuel Kant

Crystal:

This (Globalization) is all part of a plan to reduce the entire world to the economic and social level of Calcutta. A tiny minority of super-rich want to preside over a vast majority of super-poor. This is not going to fly and will eventually lead to riots, civil war, and revolution, as has happened throughout history.

I would suggest you some readings such as The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, NY Times, Chicago Tribune, Boston Globe etc, or a course or two in economics before making those statements. I really don't want to be rude, but your entire message shows how little knowledge you have about the economy of this country, which truly is yours more than mine at this point. This globalization is the one who allows you to have cheap food, cheap clothing and basically your entire lifestyle cheaper than anywhere else. And if the globalization would go away, YES at that point we would go back in the Nearthental. We trade with other people because we produce things cheaper than them and they produce some things cheaper than us, therefore in the end we are better off than producing those things by ourselves. Trading has existed since the humans left the caves and started "socializing". A good book to read would be "The world is flat" by Thomas Friedman. 

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"If [man] is not to stifle his human feelings, he must practise kindness towards animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."
Immanuel Kant

 News Intelligence Analysis

[Editor's Note: In his State of the Union Address in January 2007, President Bush revealed a new and startling plan to double the Strategic Petroleum Reserve: Read the ramifications of this unwise move from the New York Times editorial here.]

How Bush Pushed Gasoline Prices Sky High 

By Katherine Yurica

On March 5, 2003, Senator Carl Levin, the Ranking Minority Member of the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, released a report prepared by the minority staff that reveals why gasoline prices soared under the Bush administration. It has to do with the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserves (SPR) and some odd decisions by the Department of Energy (DOE) after consulting with White House officials.According to the Senate Report, the Bush administration added forty million barrels of oil to the nation’s reserves in 2002. That wouldn’t be a problem in and of it self. But the purchases represented an extreme change in energy policy; they were made in a strong market, with a tight supply of oil, which increased demand, which in turn pushed up the gasoline prices to their highest levels in twelve years.

 

The Senate report said in a one-month period in mid 2002 the Bush administration purchases caused crude oil prices to soar, raising the cost of heating oil by 13%, jet fuel by 10% and diesel fuel by 8%. The bottom line was the Bush policy change cost citizens between $500 million and $1 billion.

 

When crude oil jumps from $20 a barrel to $30, the Senate report says, the costs to U.S. taxpayers are an additional $1 million per day. “Over three months, the additional cost of filling the SPR approached $100 million,” which will ultimately be borne by U.S. taxpayers.

 

Why did Bush do it? For one thing, he was advised to do it. It has to do with the secret National Energy Policy advisory group headed by Vice President *** Cheney. Cheney has steadfastly refused to release the names of those who advised the administration on energy matters. However, according to an article published in the Sunday Herald in Scotland (October 6, 2002), by Neil Mackay, it was former Secretary of State, James Baker who personally carried an advisory report to Cheney in April of 2001. Assembled at the James A. Baker Institute for Public Policy of Rice University, the task force consisted of oil and energy executives. The report, Strategic Energy Policy Challenges for the 21st Century is referred to simply as the “Baker Report” or “report” below.

 

The report advised the new president, “At a minimum the government should aim to fill all of the nearly 700 million barrels of [reserve] capacity it currently has available.” Later, the National Energy Policy report recommended that the President wait until exchanged SPR barrels were returned and then he should determine whether offshore Gulf of Mexico royalty oil deposits to the SPR should be resumed. So after September 11, 2001, George W. Bush vowed to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserves (SPR) to capacity.

 

The Baker report was not irresponsible, it also warned the president, “One problem with trying to refill the reserve at this time when markets are strong is that any purchases made by the U.S. government would add to the current tight supply.” In other words, prices would go up!

 

At one point, the Baker report recommended that purchases of reserve additions be accomplished through direct “budgetary allocations.”

 

Trying to teach a new president the facts on SPR oil rights and wrongs must have been a heady proposition. There were many object lessons in which to point. The Baker report singled President Bill Clinton’s use of his “discretionary authority to lease oil to the market on a time-swap or exchange basis” as an example of a no-no. First, according to the Baker experts, Clinton’s exchanges reduced the size of the SPR at a time when more oil might have been needed. Next, the report chided, a president must not earn “far less in interest” than he could have, by using better methods. Perhaps Clinton’s biggest faux pas according to the Baker experts is that he used the drain-down of the reserves “to address winter heating-oil inventory concerns,” which indeed reduced heating oil from $37 to $31 per barrel. That was a big no-no. The Baker report advises a president must not use the SPR as “a market buffer stock to damp prices and price volatility.” (Translation: A president must not help the poor to heat their homes at a reasonable price at the expense of oil company profit taking.)

 

Hence in the National Energy Policy report, the NEPD Group “recommends that the President reaffirm that the SPR is designed for addressing an imminent or actual disruption in oil supplies, and not for managing prices.” (At page 8-17.)

 

That recommendation signaled a significant policy change: it denied the president the right to withdraw oil at times when prices are unusually high due to manipulation of the market.

 

What were the superior choices left for the President? The report advises taking advantage of “the market’s forward price structure…if the market structure were backwardated, with future prices lower than current prices, the government would be able to replenish the reserve with more oil than it had leased on an auction basis. If the market structure were in contango, with future prices higher than prompt prices, the government could lease its cheaper spare storage capacity to industry, thereby also providing revenue to build government-owned reserves at a later time.”

 

But the method the Bush administration chose was to fill the SPR without regard to crude oil prices at all but simply at a constant rate of speed. The result was extremely high prices for gasoline and increased charges to be born by the taxpayers. The Bush administration denies this. But the method they chose did not add any additional reserve oil to the nation’s strategic supply. So why do it? Oil companies were happy, after all oilmen contributed $26.7 million to Bush’s campaign in 2000 and another $18 million for the 2002 election.

 

Another possible reason is this: The only way to get oil companies willing to make investments in drilling new sources of oil is to keep oil prices high. The nice thing about this methodology is that criticism can be so easily deflected as a White House spokesman did in a recent interview, by claiming the “purchases were for national security reasons.”

 

Whatever the motivation, this much is clear: American citizens had to pay and are still paying a hefty price for gasoline and home heating oil. In the end, regardless of the lip service Mr. Bush may offer to the American people on how he is benefiting all citizens, the facts show he benefits those corporations who made large contributions to his campaigns.

 

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Live and let live

arissa:

orange:

And as for present days if Bush wouldn't have been flexing his muscles to show the world what a macho leader he is, taking over Iraq (without solid reason since till this day there were no mass-destruction weapons found) and causing the fuel prices to go sky high and eventually all prices, than probably life would've been a little bit better in Europe. And somehow we endedp up in Europe with fuel prices at least double compared to US prices! For those who don't know in Romania gas price is 1 euro/ litre which in $/gallon would be $5.2/gallon... would you like to compare wage levels now?

  Nu prea stau bine cu timpul liber in utimul timp si de aceea nu prea am raspuns pe topicul asta, dar cand vad niste idei dintr-astea debitate doar asa de dragul sa fie scrise, cam greu sa ma abtin. Ideea asta ca Bush e cauza pretului la benzina sa fie asa ridicat imi aduce aminte de un survey citit printr-unul din ziare: o larga majoritate a americanilor sunt convinsi ca Bush e cel care stabileste pretul la benzina si doar din cauza lui e benzina asa de scumpa...

Sorry, dar e greu sa nu razi pana sa-ti vina rau...ce are mai Bush cu benzina???? cu pretul la benzina??? da, o fi avand el ceva amprenta pe el, dar  uite ca nu-i el ala care pune pretul la benzina de aproape $3/gal in USA si aprox.$6/gal in Europe. Oricat nu mi-ar place mie de Bush, sa dau vina pe el ca deh... trebuie sa fie un tap ispasitor pe undeva, nu merge. Supply and demand sunt cauzele cele mai mari care determina pretul la benzina, i.e. China si India care inghit la petrol indeajuns pt tot globul ca nah ele trebuie sa creasca de 4-5 ori mai mult ca Europe, instabilitate in Middle East (mai scoate o vorbulita de nuclear weapons Iranul si uite cum tremura pretul), mai vine un uragan si distruge vreo "cateva" rafinarii...ca sa nu mai zicem de taxele bagate de guvern la greu pe marile companii petroliere (mult mai mari in Europe decat in USA)...si care in return sunt puse pe seama consumatorilor... so unde-i Bush-ul? ah, ca a creat macelul din Iraq, true...dar pretul la gas ar fi fost undeva tot pe acolo, with or without the war.

 

Hi Arissa,

You have your answer above.

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Live and let live

xmas:

 Postarea in limba engleza mi se pare dovada de elitism ieftin, cata vreme suntem pe RomPortal . Nu de altceva dar cunosc si franceza si as putea deveni celebru postand in 3 limbi pe un forum romanesc     

Xmas, one reason why on this specific topic people are posting in English is the fact that we are disscusing an issue which involves both nations Romanian and American, so we - the Romanians are free to express our point of view but also the Americans should be given a chance to reply and as you probably noticed Crystal's reply from above is given by one of her co-workers most likely an American person who is interested in this topic and wanted to express his/her point of view, if we would write in Romanian that would make it a bit difficult. And most likely there might be relatives (husbands, wives, etc) of RP members of American nationality which would probably like to see what we think about this problem and honestly I would also like to know what they think, hopefully I'm not the only one...

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Live and let live

Cu o singura informatie/completare: In California pretul la benzina a trecut de cateva luni de $3/galon!!!

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Omul nu poate descoperi noi oceane, cata vreme nu are curajul de a pierde din vedere tarmul. ( Andre Gide )

orange:

 News Intelligence Analysis

[Editor's Note: In his State of the Union Address in January 2007, President Bush revealed a new and startling plan to double the Strategic Petroleum Reserve: Read the ramifications of this unwise move from the New York Times editorial here.]

How Bush Pushed Gasoline Prices Sky High

 

Uite un alt articol din zecile care le poti gasi prin ziare ...am putea sta aici zile intregi si sa ne dam reply cu articole despre pretul benzinei, sorry dar timpul meu e un "pic" limitat acum pt asta. Fiecare vede ce poate si cum vrea, ca la urma urmei tot 3$ pe galon platesc/ti.

 

 

Big Oil's Best Defense Is Simple Economics

May 10, 2006; WSJ, Page A2

Give Rex Tillerson some credit. The new chief executive officer of Exxon Mobil Corp. ventured out of his executive cocoon last week to be interviewed by Matt Lauer on NBC's "Today" show -- an act of courage for an oil company CEO.

The last time a top Exxon executive risked commercial network TV was in 1989, when then-President Lee Raymond appeared on ABC's "This Week With David Brinkley" to defend Exxon's slow response in cleaning up the Valdez oil spill. Mr. Raymond was skewered by inquisitor Sam Donaldson -- "Are you telling us, sir, that...this is not your fault, that you did everything right?" -- and he never went back.

Mr. Lauer is no Sam Donaldson. Still, in his good-natured, morning-TV way, he went for the kill. In a final question, he asked: "Would Exxon Mobil be willing to lower profits over the summer to help out in this time of need and crisis?"

I think he was serious. After all, what better way to recover from his partner Katie Couric's defection to CBS than to see headlines reading: "Oil Chief Tells Lauer He'll Cut Profits, Prices." It didn't happen. Instead, Mr. Tillerson answered: "Well, that's not the business. We're in the business to make money."

You might think a network newsman earning $13 million a year would have a firmer grasp of capitalism. Would it really be a good idea for Exxon to take money from its shareholders -- many of them pensioners -- to subsidize fuel prices for sport-utility vehicle owners? One of the beauties of the marketplace is that it eliminates the need for those sorts of distributional decisions, which no person -- not even Matt Lauer -- can make well.

I don't want to pick on Mr. Lauer, though. Just about everyone in this year's great energy debate earns an "F" for economic literacy. That starts with the MBA-in-Chief, President Bush, who last week called on the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission to investigate "price manipulation" by the oil companies. His comments came after he received a letter from the two top U.S. congressional leaders from the "party of business" -- Sen. Bill Frist and Rep. Dennis Hastert -- calling for investigations into "price gouging."

Price manipulation? Price gouging? Those are fine fighting words to Americans paying more than $3 a gallon for gas. But when it comes to explaining today's gasoline prices, they have little meaning -- and Messrs. Bush, Frist and Hastert should know better.

"Price gouging" is a common law concept that might apply if, say, a gasoline station in New Orleans charged $10 a gallon to drivers fleeing from Hurricane Katrina. "Price manipulation" is a less-precise term that seems to suggest oil companies have power to set gasoline prices. Neither reflects the situation facing most Americans today, who can choose from multiple, competing suppliers of gasoline. The oil and gasoline markets aren't perfect. But if the U.S. government wants to go after companies with pricing power, oil companies fall pretty far down the list.

Most experts agree that today's gasoline prices -- unlike those of three decades ago -- are the result largely of supply and demand. Supply is tight and threatened by security concerns and political instability in oil-producing nations. Meanwhile, demand from places like China and India is booming.

Moreover, high prices, as painful as they may be, aren't just a problem, but also a solution.

Since Jimmy Carter donned his cardigan sweater three decades ago, U.S. policy makers have tried all sorts of gimmicks to reduce dependence on foreign oil, to no avail. Oil imports have risen from a third of U.S. oil consumption to 60%. The reason: Oil was cheap. It's symptomatic that the Arizona resident who complained on the "Today" show about spending $50 to fill his tank was driving an SUV.

As gasoline prices rise -- and everyone becomes convinced they will stay high -- people will figure out how to consume less, oil firms will invest more, and alternative energy will become more common. That is just Economics 101 -- a course that most participants in this debate seem to have missed.

As for those who worry the merger of Exxon and Mobil might have created an industry that is too concentrated -- well, stop worrying. Exxon Mobil still has only about 8% of the retail gasoline market in the U.S. And its size is a plus overseas, giving it the clout it needs to push for access to government-controlled oil reserves and the financial heft it needs to undertake multibillion investment projects. That's all good for U.S. energy security.

Since no one else seems willing to make that case, it is a good thing Mr. Tillerson is. For morning TV viewers, he may have started a trend. On Monday, ConocoPhillips CEO James Mulva was interviewed on ABC's "Good Morning America."

 

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"If [man] is not to stifle his human feelings, he must practise kindness towards animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."
Immanuel Kant

"Uite un alt articol din zecile care le poti gasi prin ziare ...am putea sta aici zile intregi si sa ne dam reply cu articole despre pretul benzinei, sorry dar timpul meu e un "pic" limitat acum pt asta. Fiecare vede ce poate si cum vrea, ca la urma urmei tot 3$ pe galon platesc/ti. "

Arissa,

Articolul pe care l-am citat eu are la baza urmatoarea documentatie:

1.  U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve: Recent Policy Has Increased Costs to Consumers But Not Overall U.S. Energy Security by Minority Staff of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. See Senator Levin's summary at:

http://levin.senate.gov/issues/index4.cfm?MainIssue=Energy&SubIssue=CrudeOilInvestigation

2.Sen. Levin's Press Release: http://www.senate.gov/~levin/newsroom/release.cfm?id=209139

3. The Baker Report, Strategic Energy Policy Challenges for the 21st Century. In a PDF file.

The report is no longer available at: http://www.rice.edu/projects/baker/Pubs/workingpapers/cfrbipp_energy/energytf.htm

4.  National Energy Policy report: In a PDF file.

Or click here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/energy/

Dupa cum se vede destul de clar sunt documente eliberate de oficialitati ale guvernului american care au facut cercetari serioase in domeniu si pot sa exprime o parere pertinenta si citate din rapoartele White House nu sunt doar niste comentatori de tabloid...

Oricum imi cer scuze daca ti-am incurcat programul, eu una nu am nici cea mai mica intentie sa ma "duelez" in citate, am trecut de mult de varsta cand era foarte important pentru imaginea mea sa am intotdeauna dreptate.

Imi pare rau pentru tine si cei care trebuie sa plateasca $3/ gl dar de mine mi se rupe inima :)) ca aici in UK platesc $7.7/ gl !!! Fara exagerare!!  

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Live and let live