Surprise! Gas prices plummet as Election Day nears!

[Blu Dahlia]

It should be obvious by now who is control of gas prices. And a smart electorate should be pissed.

Will people wake up?

[zanne]

1. I think the response will be something like this...

"DUH...Gas prices are going down. Now we need offshore drilling so it never happens again...DUH".

[endarkenment]

2. the feedback loop on economic activity and oil prices

As the price of oil rises, economic activity starts to decline. As economic activity declines, demand for oil declines and after a considerable lag, the price of oil starts to decline. As the price of oil declines, economic activity starts to increase and after a conisderable lag, the price of oil starts to increase.

The cycle repeats, but the world population continues to increase, pushing up the base and inflexible cheap oil demand level while at the same time the supply of cheap oil to satisfy that demand continues to not keep pace with growth of the base demand for that cheap oil. The consequence is a long term an inexorable increase in the real-value price of oil.

At an unknown crisis point in the relative near future, economies that are dependent on supplies of cheap oil will start to collapse from their inability to sustain economic growth that keeps up with their population growth. Those societies that have been and are doing little or nothing to develop alternative energy sources are facing a rather dire future. We are perhaps the prime example of such a society.