US GASOLNIE Consumption is now LOWER than it was in early 1980s!!

[uponit7771]

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http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=A103600001&f=M


I'm listening to NPR now and I'm TOTALLY disgusted!!

They're not relaying ALL the facts and this is the biggest story of them all; there's not "supply demand" issue here it's MOSTLY speculators.

How in the world does the US have MORE cars on the road and MORE people to drive them, LESS consumption and gas prices STAY high!?


Just the facts...


Your take?

Thx

[uponit7771]

1. They ended the hour with the "analyst" talking the most and not mentioning ONCE!! ONCE

...the fact that we're using LESS oil now that in the 1980s!!!

So disappointed with NPR...

[FarCenter]

2. Not so many people driving 454 cubic inch V-8s getting 9 miles/gallon?

We're not the only country in the world using crude oil.

So US consumption by itself doesn't drive the price of the 8.7 million barrels of crude oil that we import each day.

[bhikkhu]

3. All the fuel conservation and efficiency measures are working well!

...as I get ready to bicycle off to work.

Realistically, if you look at how much has changed since then in the oil industry, there is no "cheap oil" left, and the number of people competing for what is left has been growing much faster than supply. Recession helped for a little while, and perhaps will bring the price down again, but who wants that?

Two things you won't see together anymore: a healthy economy and cheap fuel prices.

...edited to add (just the facts) demand is up:

[NightWatcher]

4. Gas prices are set internationally. Demand in India and China are way up

It doesn't matter how much we use or where we buy it from. All the "drill here now" schmucks don't understand global trade or market manipulation. It's great to use less because then you'll have to buy less, but it won't affect the per unit price.

[bhikkhu]

7. The worst part of the "drill baby drill" argument is that that's what we've been doing

...there hasn't been any unemployment or idle rigs in the US oil sector for years - basically its all been flat-out, as much as we have the labor and expertise for. US production is up significantly, but there seems to be a psychological block in the party that prevents it from being talked about or taken credit for, so the repug lies are left at face value.

The other interesting part is that the rest of the world, finally, seems to be almost a level playing field. It wasn't long ago that few outside of Europe or the US could hope to drive cars or afford fuel - now it seems to be less of a problem, to the extent that we are almost out-competed for once. I'm not complaining myself. The effect of anything we could do about it would be too much like putting the third-world back under the jack-boot heel for me...

[Zalatix]

16. Except that the third world has put American's working class down, hard.

Not only have we lost our middle class jobs to the third world but they're delivering another kick to the head for good measure with rising gasoline prices.

Meanwhile nobody in the third world cares about our jobless or homeless. Apparently neither do America's pro-globalists, either.

[bhikkhu]

20. An appropriate response to high fuel prices is to pursue alternatives

in the long-term, there is no other choice, and I don't think the pain will be any more or less whenever it occurs. Casting about for blame is valid enough, but has little to offer in the way of solutions. If it wasn't one thing it would be another, and the inevitability of the transition away from fossil fuels for everyone eventually should put us all in the same boat at some point. If we lead the way, that's better.

[Zalatix]

21. Well said. n/t

[ParkieDem]

11. Also,

the weakness of the dollar is a huge driver of the oil price spike.

And, looking at consumption numbers is a small part of the equation. What that really means is that "quantity demanded" is down, but that doesn't mean that "demand" is down.

[Spider Jerusalem]

5. US demand is down? That's great, it's not in China

(China's oil demand has been growing at a rate of 8% a year, and is now at ten million barrels a day), or in India (increasing by an average of 5-6% a year, now at over 3 million barrels a day), or even in Saudi Arabia, where domestic demand has been increasing at 7% a year and is now up to a million barrels a day...which is a million barrels a day they aren't exporting. US demand may be down; the US still imports ten million barrels of oil a day, and indeed even with demand reductions the US couldn't meet demand without imported oil.

[FarCenter]

8. Your point about increased use in Saudi Arabia is an important one

The oil exporting countries are using more oil within their countries, either for energy or as feedstocks for petrochemical plants.

Some former oil exporting countries, such as Indonesia and the United Kingdom, have become oil importing countries due to the exhaustion of their oil fields and increased domestic consumption.

[uponit7771]

10. 8% from what? 2%...the global consumption of gasoline is down also

[Spider Jerusalem]

12. No it isn't?

Global demand for oil is at or near record levels. 89 million barrels a day per IEA estimates. see here: http://omrpublic.iea.org/currentissues/full.pdf

This is 2 million barrels a day above the 87 million level of Q1 2008.

And, 8% per annum, which means that if they maintain that level of demand growth China's oil demand will increase from 10 million to 10.8 million barrels per day.

[uponit7771]

13. Gasoline and oil aren't the same substance

[Spider Jerusalem]

15. I'm sorry, but that's just an incredibly fucking stupid comment.

Unless gasoline is made from cheese, or giant squid, or something other than oil, the price of oil is going to affect the price of gasoline, and demand for oil is going to affect the price of gasoline. And global demand is going to affect prices in the US, because the US is still a net oil importer.

[WI_DEM]

6. I wish we would end all gas/oil subsidies.

[bhikkhu]

9. The effect of most of them is to encourage exploration and drilling

...hard to see how the cause and effect there line up.

[Moondog]

14. Oil, generally, while an international commodity, is priced in US dollars.

The price of oil isn't going up so much as the value of the US dollar is going down.

Bernanke & Co are trying to induce inflation. One will get some argument over why they are doing that, but very little argument over whether they are doing that. They are.

They are succeeding. And (other than precious metals which move up and down for a variety of non-economic reasons) one of the first places that this shows up is in the prices of certain commodities. Such as the so-called petroleum complex (crude oil and products refined from crude oil), and agricultural commodities.

As the value of the dollar goes down, prices at the wholesale and retail levels begin to go up. Oil and foodstuffs typically react early. Been to the grocery store lately?

[Zalatix]

17. If the dollar can beat other currencies in the race for the bottom

it will eventually mean other nations will outsource to us.

[BOHICA12]

18. Exactly - weak dollar policy is spanking us. nt

[bhikkhu]

19. There is a very positive side to a weak dollar policy

In that it makes US manufactured goods inexpensive on the world market, supporting exports. And it makes imports more expensive here, supporting domestic production. Under the current policy both exports and manufacturing are up - a bright spot in the economic picture.

The opposite happens with a strong dollar policy - US products become more expensive, cutting into exports. and imported goods become cheap, which also cuts the legs out from under domestic production. I think we saw how all that worked out over the last thirty years, though much of it was blamed on the lower wages of developing markets rather than monetary policies.