O/T - Gas Pricing

By getting the most-efficient car for the job, even if you'd feel more comfortable and look better to your customers in a Continental. By keeping the vehicle properly tuned up at all times. And by driving gently rather than coming off the line like a funny car.

Now, maybe you've done all these things. But an awful lot of people in this country haven't.

--scott

Mathematics seldom lie... You either have to - raise your prices, - get a more fuel efficient car, - find a way that you don't have to drive 100 miles a night to satisfy your customers, or - change your profession.

Do a sensitivity analysis.

I don't know about you, but I expended all my "use less" ideas as soon as gasoline hit $2.

Right. The world OWES us cheap petroleum.

Change driving habits is another alternative. Stick to speed limit on highways, stay off brakes, coast to red lights, don't tailgate. Keep speed as constant as possible on highway.

Well, we do give the world cheap food...

I've often thought that when we get socked with something like OPEC, that we should raise the prices of what we sell them proportionately to the amount they raise the prices of what they sell us. (Oversimplified.)

I know some like you who have done about all they can including riding a motorcycle to work daily, carpooling, etc. But there are enough people out there that'll pay whatever it takes to drive what they want as fast as they want and as far as they want that it hurts us. It'll take a lot of us trying to save to make a difference. It'll be interesting to see how high gasoline will have to get to do it.

Stop to think through what you took great pains to write and apply it to the real world. Whether you buy $40.00 worth of gasoline once a week or 4 times a week the demand for refined oil is the same. And you will be running around 4 times as often looking for a station. Imagine trying to take a trip from South Carolina to Maine on that basis. If we all did that imagine the traffic, wasted gas, confusion and long lines.

The only way to have an impact on prices is to use less gasoline. If you can convince enough of us to carpool, walk to the grocery and reduce our overall usage of fuel by 50% over 6 months now that would have a major and immediate impact on sellers of crude. I would imagine that several middle eastern countries would be considering a strike against us rather than the other way around.