It is time for a "windfall profits tax" --begin with $10Bil/Q Oil Co .....

[Blackhatjack]

Since when is the company's "obligation" to its shareholders, to make them as rich as possible, a higher moral calling than the security of our country, and the life and death struggles of the less fortunate.

Likewise, is it more important that those "shareholders", who tend to be some of the richest Americans, get their "return on their investment" rather than alleviate the suffering of folks who cannot afford food, medicine, insurance, AND pay the skyrocketing cost of everything connected to higher oil prices?

They might as well be telling the rest of us "Let them eat cake" ... and you know what that led to, right?

[ixion]

1. no, it's time to start making utilities act like utilities

and, like it or not, gas is a utility, like electricity or water.

Utilities should not be for-profit companies, IMO.

[Democrats_win]

2. Winfall profits tax should include provision to protect employees and land

owners. The rich will demand their profits! In the 70s, Big oil screwed land owners by reducing the amount they paid the land owners who held the mineral rights. Wind Fall profits must punish the oil companies for manipulating refinery production to cause this fiasco.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

3. Great idea, but...

With this bunch of thieves running things, we'll get one of those right after pigs file flight plans.

[northzax]

4. I agree

no company should ever be able to make more that 5% a year on its assets. no matter the circumstances. I don't care if you invent a drug that cures cancer, you make 5%.

oh wait, no, we're only talking about Oil companies. Because you're addicted. I am sorry that your pusher raised the price on you again, but what do you expect someone to do to an addict? I don't remember anyone complaining on my behalf when cigarettes went up to settle the lawsuits. And I'm addicted to nicotine like you are addicted to gasoline. Both are slowly killing us and the people around us.

So get out of your car, buy a motorcycle, buy a track bike, ride to work, more to where you can ride to work. the number of people who really 'need' to drive every day is actually pretty small, most people can do just fine switching their lives around to accomodate the reality of high fuel prices. The rest of the world manages, so can we. Start planning your life around $4.00 gasoline, you'll be much happier in a couple of years when you get off the pusher's needle.

or, complain about how much money a company is making while you keep buying their products. If you don't like it, stop bitching and do something about it, like maybe stop buying their products. I don't like how WalMart does business, but instead of saying "the government has to do something" while standing in the checkout line, I take my business elsewhere. put your money where your mouth is, or stop complaining while you pay the pusher.

[Blackhatjack]

5. Some of us already do that, but there is more to it than that ...

It takes a lot taxpayer resources to be expended to create a safe and profitable environment for companies to use in making "their profit." How many businesses would be making "their profit" if there were no government services like police, fire, water, security made possible by our defense, etc.??

However, we are talking about a "necessity" here, not another IPOD.

There should be government regulation when it comes to acquiring and distributing limited resources. The windfall tax on oil companies is needed. And nothing you can say squares with the need for shareholder profits trumping public welfare.

IF you took that position to its logical conclusion, oxygen and water could and should be sold only to the highest bidders who can pay the highest prices necessary to ensure the highest return on investment to shareholders. Not enough money to pay the price, too bad -- you're dead. But hey, the shareholders get theirs!

[northzax]

7. so you are willing to put petroleum

on the same level as water and air? frankly, my iPod is much more of a neccesity to me than gasoline, I use it much more than I use personal supplies of gasoline.

What I would do, if something needs to be done, is to establish a rationing system, everyone gets, say, 100 gallons of gasoline at a certain price, then the next 100 gallons is a new, higher, price, and so on. it's what my power company does. make enough of a difference between levels that there is a strong disincentive to consume, and allow for a secondary market on those levels. You want my first 100 gallons? no problem, I will sell them to you, for the right price (slightly lower than what your second or third or fourth level will cost. Issue everyone a tax card, and you pay an increase of $.25 for every hundred gallons you consume. by your 400th gallon, you are paying 1 full dollar more, per gallon than you were for the first gallon. and so on. the less gasoline I use, the more I can sell you.

say it with me: "cheap gasoline is not for the public welfare" cheap gasoline is destroying the planet, feeding totalitarian states, creating lung disease and polluting our cities and wilderness. Cheap gasoline enables the construction of shoddy housing and the raping of previous greenspaces for short term profit. I am happy that gas prices are going through the roof, even if it means that companies make more money. I think there should be an additional $1 federal tax on gas as it is. the more is costs, and the more people realize that this is permanent, the more we win, in the long run, by weaning ourselves off the teat.

[Blackhatjack]

9. Yep, when consider lack of electricity contributed to 120 deaths in Calif

Energy in its various forms is a life and death commodity. When asthma rates skyrocket, temperatures go over 100 degrees for weeks at a time, then lack of electricity to run fans and air conditioning does result in deaths, so I would put it on the same level as water and air. You are just as dead.

As prices for oil go up, just take a look at every item in your local grocery store --it goes up too since almost all its inventory is "trucked" to the store, using gas or diesel.

Don't stop there -- paying more for gas and food leaves less "discretionary" money to spend on medicine and insurance, which are necessary for some people to survive.

[northzax]

10. and yet somehow

people in every other country in the world manage to survive, must be magic or something.

free and low cost energy is a thing of the past, a fallacy based on unsustainable projections and severe inequities. Get used to them being gone, every smart economist and geologist has been saying this for 30 years, at least. And finally, it happens, and we are shocked, shocked! to learn that our economy is based on cheap energy, and probably not sustainable in its current form without cheap energy. Only problem is, cheap energy don't exist no more.

guess what, by the way, it is that very energy production that is making asthma rates rise, much is attributable to bad air quality in cities. So don't tell me that's really an issue. and people die from neglect, not from lack of energy, every degree you have your AC on, is one degree that someone else can't use, it's a finite commodity. And don't go telling me that air conditioning is a human right now. your entire scheme is based on something that is gone and should be forgotten about.

[Blackhatjack]

11. Using your theory, we should forget about healthcare too, right?

All the medical advances made in the last 50 years are tied directly to the use of energy in some form. You cannot efficiently run clinical trials without it, you cannot research and bring to market new drugs without it, undergo diagnostic testing like MRI or CAT scans, nor get to the primary care physician, specialist or trauma center without it, and ....
..... you could not pass on valuable information on the internet without it.

I have no problem with conservation, investing in alternative energy sources, and rationing available supplies of energy.

I have a big problem with saying each of these advances are based upon "something that is gone and should be forgotten about."

PS. If you check the actuarial tables for life expectancy in the rest of the world you will find that a majority of people living in the world do not "manage to survive" as long as those living in the US, quality of life issues aside.

[northzax]

12. if you compare the developed world

to the US, then sorry, we die sooner, based on your actuarial tables. you can't compare life expectancy between developed nations and developing ones, that's not fair. compare the US to our peers, Canada, Japan, France, the UK, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland, Austria, and even top range developing states, like Poland, Czech Republic, and others. All live longer than we do, and use significantly less energy, per capita.

Obviously energy isn't going away, what is gone and should be forgotten about is unlimited cheap energy, like the US has enjoyed, for the most part uninterrupted, for 80 years or so. we have built our entire society on unfettered acess to cheap energy, based on the size of our houses, our commutes and our love of the automobile. no where else do people routinely drive 25 miles to work. No where else do people have such large houses, so far from cities, as a daily residence. no place else do people routinely waste as much water and energy in day to day living. Our society is based on a dinosaur (sorta literally, actually) and this isn't going to work for long. Conservation is a lfestyle, not an act. how have you structured your lifestyle to adapt to escalating energy prices and reduced supply (if nothing else, to free up energy for things like health care you mentioned above?) Don't say "I won't drive as much" change your life so you don't need to drive as much, for instance.

[Yupster]

13. No company should make over 5 %

on its assets?

One year CD's in my town are currently going for 5.35 %.

Why would anyone try to take a risk running or owning a business when they can make more in a bank CD?

Am I understanding you right?

[northzax]

14. yup, exactly right

everything above that should be confiscated in windfall profit taxes. including, by teh way, any profit you make from investments above 5%, that's a windfall profit, earned on the backs of others who are suffering by having to pay higher rates. Why should you get a pass?

[Rageneau]

6. The last time a windfall profits tax was suggested, we got screwed.

Old-timers might remember that the LAST time Congress started discussing a windfall profits tax was back in the early 70s. The public mood was against excess profits and ALSO against what was then the 'proposed' Alaska pipeline.

Next thing you know, nobody can buy gasoline. A sudden shortage miraculously occurred. People could only buy gas every other day and had to pay new, higher prices for it.

Pretty soon, the public mood switched. "Do what you want to," the people said, "just give us back our cheap gasoline."

Soon, all talk of a windfall profits tax disappeared and work began on the new Alaska pipeline that was never going to leak or hurt the environment.

Until this week.

Anybody who doesn't think the oil companies collude to exploit us isn't smart enough to CARE that they are.

[Odin2005]

8. Nationalize them.

such a vital resource should be under the control of the people as a whole, not plutocrats.