My idea for lowering the price of fuel

[takebackourtemple]

   During the Carter era we had runaway inflation and a fuel crisis. Carter had imposed price caps on fuel and it resulted in the oil companies just refusing to sell fuel. The price caps could have worked if implemented properly. Here is my idea of how they should be implemented.

1. A price cap and additional tax is imposed on imported oil.
2. Domestic sources are allowed to charge whatever they want for fuel as long as they do not hold a monopoly or work in collusion.
3. No fuel should be imported from terrorist nations under any circumstances.

   This will reduce imported fuel, but not completely since there is still huge profit to be made at $30 per barrel. It will serve as a check and balance against the price of domestic fuel. Oil companies will have to move their equipment from abroad if they want to be able to sell fuel at market rate. This will increase American jobs.
   To do this the cap should be adjusted so only an acceptable percentage of fuel is imported. This percentage, which I feel should only be around 10% should be determined by the taxpayers and each taxpayer should have representation in proportion to the taxes that they have to pay.

[cjd]

   During the Carter era we had runaway inflation and a fuel crisis. Carter had imposed price caps on fuel and it resulted in the oil companies just refusing to sell fuel. The price caps could have worked if implemented properly. Here is my idea of how they should be implemented.

1. A price cap and additional tax is imposed on imported oil.
2. Domestic sources are allowed to charge whatever they want for fuel as long as they do not hold a monopoly or work in collusion.
3. No fuel should be imported from terrorist nations under any circumstances.

   This will reduce imported fuel, but not completely since there is still huge profit to be made at $30 per barrel. It will serve as a check and balance against the price of domestic fuel. Oil companies will have to move their equipment from abroad if they want to be able to sell fuel at market rate. This will increase American jobs.
   To do this the cap should be adjusted so only an acceptable percentage of fuel is imported. This percentage, which I feel should only be around 10% should be determined by the taxpayers and each taxpayer should have representation in proportion to the taxes that they have to pay.

The thought of Carter and any talk of price fixing or freezing sends shivers up my spine. Its bad enough that the price of energy is so expensive but what would be worse is any shortage that comes about because government tries to impose controls that would limit profit. Oil powers almost everything we do. Electricity, home heating, transportation, shipping, products made from oil and the list could go on and on. Our economy simply can not have a shortage and remain operational. I remember the last two shortages and both were caused by government meddling with the market place. When you had the president of the most powerful country on earth giving speeches in front of a fireplace telling Americans to turn the heat down and bundle up something is really wrong. I for one really would not like to live like that again. At this stage of the game its going to be hard to interest the big oil producers to search and drill for domestic oil. The supply and cost of outside oil is still very inviting. If the government gets to heavy handed a slight disruption in supply always works in their favor. The government should try to interest small oil companies to take oil leases for 5 or 10 years  under some form of subsidy to bring some of this domestic oil on to the market at substantially lower prices. This would collapse the price of the import oil market and possibly give the market a chance to regulate itself.