Should we Boycott Exxon on 6/15 to make a statement to make gas prices drop at least to $3?

We should, but we won’t. People always say one thing and do another in my opinion.

Sure! Why not?

HaHa.. People won’t drive less. They will just fill up on 6/14. How about this.. Ride a bike or walk or take the bus for the rest of the year. Or simply drive less. Driving 25% less is kinda like having 3$ per gallon gas.

They’ll probably lose a million dollars that day. Out of the TRILLIONS GIGABILLION DILLION dollars they make a year. They know we can’t function without them. I’d love to, but I don’t think may others will.

this thing has been tried since it was “drop at least $1”. See snopes.

”[Collected on the Internet, 2001]

Gasoline Prices

Whoever started this has a good point.

By now you’re probably thinking gasoline priced at about $1.49 is cheap. Me too! As it is now $1.58 for regular unleaded. 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 less than $1.50”

No.
It won’t change the fundamental law of supply and demand.
As JP said, the only way to pay less is to drive less.

I don’t get why you say boycott Exxon on this day only. Where I live(nj), I have several gas stations to choose from. I never buy Exxon. Maybe I have more choices than most, but I always try and buy from a privately owned gas station.

Sure, they’ll lose money that day, but they’ll just make it up either before or after. Some people are in rural areas and can’t ride a bike or take public transportation, or even walk. My mom lives about 15 miles from work and my dad lives about 40 from his. If you don’t like gas prices, the best thing you can do is not drive. Sell your car and walk.

Gas companies may be greedy, but its because they can be. There is a demand for gas and they happen to be the ones who fill it. Just like any business, they are out to make money so what do you expect. If you don’t like it, tough shit but bitching will get you no where.

If you were selling lemonaid in a hot neighborhood, and that was what you did to make a living, would you lower your price because it was hot and people complained? I wouldn’t expect someone to.

@Randy
The problem is collusion. All the big oil companies have bought each other out. It is a oligopoly. The energy market is the last example I would ever use to describe the“Free Market.”

How is not buying something for a single day boycotting? A. I don’t think its a boycott unless you refuse to buy it until they meet your demands, and B. Why would only day make a difference to them? You’ll fill up the next day or the day before. C. Why aren’t you demanding a more efficient car or non-gas-combustion engine? D. Isn’t our gas price still much lower than it is in other countries?

Exxon is bad. But I don’t know how a short boycott will affect anything. We would have to always avoid Exxon (not a bad idea) to even have a drip of an effect on them. Meanwhile, isn’t it better to have higher prices? to force the big gas guzzling cars off the roads, to make people carpool and think twice about optional trips, to begin to use public transportation, to be aware of how much our mammoth use of oil is really costing us in terms of a natural resource being squandered at an scary rate.

The only thing that doesn’t equate is that the oil companies themselves seem to be making more and more money. Something is off in that equation.

Gas prices are set on the price of futures so I don’t think anything but ridding your bike or staying at home will put a dent in the gas prices (see other post… I’m going to the future! LOL)

A better way to respond to Exxon and other oil giants is to do this or this just look at the car innovative approach to replace fuel for wind, no need to listen to the music in the background

Too late. I’m still boycotting Exxon for the Exxon Valdez disaster that they still haven’t been held responsible for.

all of these tactics to get people to not but gas on certain days or from certain places are so dumb

@skfinkel

You say that it doesn’t make sense that the oil companies make more and more most. I respectfully disagree. Sure the oil companies are making record profits, but there is also more and more dollars being pumped into supply. These new dollars are going to necessities first. Look at the whole housing debacle. Dollars are being printed in record numbers, so the price of houses go up, oil goes up, food goes up, gold goes up, the dollar goes down. It just takes more devalued dollars to buy the same items. I hear every excuse under the sun, but inflation is the only thing that makes sense. It seems the media and politicians talk about quick solutions, without actually pinpointing the REAL problem.

For what it’s worth, the profit per gallon is something like 5 cents. That means, if they started selling gas at their cost, you’d see gas prices drop… 5 cents.

The problem, at present, is that the US is having trouble importing oil at reasonable prices because the dollar has been devalued (and not because we’re printing more of them, mostly b/c our economy is tanking & our foreign policy sucks). Other countries with stronger currencies can pay better prices for the oil, so OPEC & al. are selling the oil to them. Oil prices have been being driven up globally because of increased industrialization levels.

So when the Federal Reserve lowers interest rates and more money is being borrowed, where does the new money come from ? Isnt it essentially new money in the system, devaluing the money currently in circulation? Congress has risen the debt ceiling several times during Bush’s presidency.

You are talking about two different things (and let me disclaim that I am not an economist)...

When the debt ceiling is raised, that allows the treasury to sell more t-bills, the largest purchaser of those lately has been china. So that money comes from somewhere, generally large investors.

Lowering the federal funds rate makes cash cheaper but it doesn’t make there be more of it. Cheaper cash can drive up inflation, but not as simplistically as printing more money.

That minor conflict in one of the countries with a massive oil reserve isn’t helping either.

Instead of griping about gas prices, perhaps we should celebrate the fact that US prices are moving in the right direction. I know high fuel prices hurt the average consumer in the short run, but I think that prices which are more in line with the actual costs of oil use (including environmental costs) are the only way in which people can be spurred into using less oil. That means paying more (lots more) at the pump.

@margeryred is correct. Gas prices are controlled by the cost of future gas Contracts. The US oil companies only buy 5% of the futures. The rest are bought, rolled, bought, rolled by speculators. They are the real villians. Not that I am defending record profits….

I doubt that many will participate in any boycott, and if there is, few will actually participate in it.

lol scamp, you must be a representative of the department of redundancy department, yes?

Um.. yeah

No because it would not change the amount used people would just fill up on a different day. If people would stop driving for a little while this could make an impact. It’s a supply and demand issue in my opinion.

Youv’e got it nailed, @gooch. If we could just get everyone to change their air filters and correctly inflate their tires, we could begin reducing our demand every time we start our vehicles. Little things, but they help with mileage without forcing us to change ingrained driving habits (like when and where we drive). Not that those habits don’t need changing.

ITS THE DAMN DOLLAR!!!!

Its not supply and demand. Its not speculation. It simply takes more depleted dollars to but the same item. Why is this such a complex issue? It is very simple.

Gold has quadrupled. Oil has quadrupled. It takes more dollars to but the same amount of gold. It takes more dollars to buy the same amount of oil.

I know im not an economist or anything. Im just a simple 25 year old, trying to figure out how the hell Im free and why are we getting screwed so bad. But I know that when our debt goes from $5Trillion to $12 Trillion, that $7 Trillion was not in circulation a few years ago. That means that my money and all of yours, has lost much of its value. Stop believing all these smoke screens on the news. Its all BS.

Bravo chris6137

Another thing is that now that other large countries are developing (China) and need the fuel, the suppliers have no reason to sell us oil at at a lower rate. (supply and demand)

There is no reason to favor the U.S.A. verses China or other countries…. The people who sit on oil are thinking DOLLARS/PROFIT/SUCCESS/GREEN/GREED/MOOLAH… they don’t care about your economic status and how much we end up having to pay or what our dollar is worth. (They don’t feel sorry for us or want to bargain down a price for no reason other than to just be nice.)

If you happen to travel to Dubai you’ll find out a sweet surprise….....these Arabs light their cigars with $100 dollar bills. I first heard it from a friend and I couldn’t believe it, then I heard it from a trusted friend. These guys are making so much money $100 is like a penny to them. Just imagine $140 a barrel times 10 million barrels a day times 30 days, that’s $42 Billion a month…...........they think let the poor die while we dive in green pastures

edmartin101: I’ve been to Dubai, stayed there for quite some time, and never once saw anyone light a cigar with a $100 bill. I’d also like to say that I doubt they do this. It sounds like an exaggeration. Also, if someone does do it, I doubt it’s on a regular basis. If you’ve been to Dubai and seen someone do this, I’m guessing they were showing off. Did your friend actually witness this, or did they hear from a friend of a co-worker who knows a person who went to Dubai? (By the way, the sheiks I met didn’t flaunt their wealth is such ways.)

The Supreme Court just let Exxon get TWO BILLION dollars removed from their 2.5 billion dollar obligation for the Exxon Valdez disaster. Boo hiss…..

my friend actually witnessed it, I mean he was astonished…..ya you’re right they just do it to show off of course. He went to a biz meeting so this guy pull a $100 bill and just lighted up his cigar in front of him

We all like to blame the oil companies,but gas would be cheaper if the elected in Washington would take away some of the tax placed on each gallon.They try to explain the tax away by saying it goes to build and repair the roads and highways we all know what a joke that is.