You hit it right on, Ed. The discussion I have been involved in on another list essentially ends up with your conclusion that the base cost of the 'raw' material is exorbitant, however, everyone finally agreed that the Q4 profits of Exxon were in line with normal profit not price gouging. OBTW, Exxon had 116 billion Q4 2007 revenue with a profit of 11.6 billion -- 10%. So, the problem is in abnormally inflated 'raw' material cost.
Now the rest of the discussion was about what should the US do to neutralize that abnormally high 'raw' material cost. Care to guess where that part of the thread went? v/r //SIGNED// Stephen S. Wolfe, YA2, DAF 6th MDG Data Services Manager 6th MDG Information System Security Officer Comm (813) 827-9994 DSN 651-9994 -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ed Leafe Sent: Friday, May 02, 2008 8:56 AM To: ProFox Email List Subject: Re: [OT] Opinions? On May 2, 2008, at 7:30 AM, Wolfe, Stephen S Civ USAF AMC 6 MDSS/SGSI wrote: > " but to say that oil company profits are "out-of-proportion" is > pure propaganda. I'm more concerned that our government continues to > give oil companies billion dollar tax breaks when they clearly don't > need them. Double-edged sword, though...if the breaks were > eliminated, the oil companies would pass that cost along to the > consumer." > > Do you agree with the above statement fragment? Normally costs are passed on to consumers on thin-margin items; when there is a healthy margin and competition, most companies absorb changes in production costs rather than lose market share. The key here is competition: even though there are several companies involved, they are all moving their prices together. As far as the "pure propaganda" goes, name one other business with competition where the raw material costs can quadruple and everyone's profits increase. -- Ed Leafe [excessive quoting removed by server] _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech Searchable Archive: http://leafe.com/archives/search/profox This message: http://leafe.com/archives/byMID/profox/[EMAIL PROTECTED] ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
