Quote:
Originally Posted by Canonman
Supply and Demand
During the "lockdown" demand was very low and so were prices. Back in May 2020 a barrel of oil was trading at under $10. So, the oil companies both foreign and domestic cut way back on production. Then in 2021 the lockdown ended, the vaccine was available and people started going back to work, traveling and getting back to normal lives. But the oil companies didn't ramp up production enough to cover the increased demand. Higher demand, limited supply resulted in higher prices.
The oil companies are making up for lost revenues and profits by limiting supply. "U.S. crude oil production is expected to fall by 160,000 barrels per day in 2021..."
Elected officials have very little influence over the price of any commodity especially oil and refined fuels. Today's higher prices are the result of the oil industries profit taking not any political legislation. "The oil giant (Chevron) announced a $3.3 billion adjusted profit in Q2, compared with a $2.9 billion loss in the second quarter of 2020.
Here's a short article from Reuters that may shed some light.
https://www.reuters.com/business/ene...0million%20bpd.
We all hate higher prices, but lets put the blame where it belongs. |
Couldn’t agree more. The herd mentality that says one set of market providers jacks up prices blaming the pandemic’s past impact pushes other market providers to follow suit. But, that aside for a moment; there’s a trifecta happening peculiar to RV’ers. Fuel is rising (even though today, it was announced that prices dropped due to a glut in storage bunkers). RV prices are at a premium while build quality is poorer than usual, and park prices are through the roof and getting spots is way harder than usual. I work in various govt monuments and campgrounds and heard more than a few visitors say they have constrained their future plans to storing their rigs and see what happens later. We are retired and full time. We recently decided to keep our mobility regional which means we cancelled reservations we had out west and up north - save for one - to reduce our travel costs. We’ve increased our length of stay in the places we do park so as to reduce park cost. And, we are staying in moderate temperature climes to reduce propane and electric costs. That’s about all we can do. Groceries and pharmaceuticals are also high, but there’s only so much one can do to affect that.