Jim Devine asks:
if we've gone over the Hubbert hill, how come real gasoline prices are actually _lower_ now in the U.S. than in 1980?
1980 was an "outlier," a "spike," caused by the Iranian revolution and its manipulation by the oil giants. Whether or not we're already "over the Hubbert hill," 2005 prices are fluctuating around a long-term trend determined by supply constraints and rising demand from the rapidly growing Asian economies. Incidentally, that chart might look quite different if the price of crude oil were deflated, not by inflation estimates, but by that of the money-commodity--gold. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things...It consents and does not consent to be called Zeus." Herakleitos of Ephesos
