Can anyone explain (non-conspiracy) how gas prices have dropped so much?

The reserve isn't for you. The reserve is for the Armed Services and other first responders (police, fire dept.) in case of emergency. You think they're going to sell it to the general public if there was suddenly some state of emergency? HA!

And flynavy isn't far off. We have 7-8 weeks reserve. 150 days if you count private industry. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_oil_reserve

you do realize who we have in office, right? I wouldn't put anything past him

and according to what I linked above from the DOE we have over 1000 days of reserves
 
you do realize who we have in office, right? I wouldn't put anything past him

and according to what I linked above from the DOE we have over 1000 days of reserves

do you even know how much gas costs? does your limo driver talk about it or something?
 
and how exactly would you know we haven't? you think you or anyone else in the US is privy to anything they don't want us to know?

we have roughly 1080 days worth of reserves btw
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/..._oil_natural_gas_reserves/current/pdf/ch3.pdf
http://www.gravmag.com/oil3.html#reserves

lol if they were releasing reserves for political campaign purposes they would actually tell us :p that being said, they do have to publish those releases.

Don't forget that crude oil and petroleum are not the same thing. We don't have three years worth of petrol.
 
You're confusing strat. reserve and proven reserve. The data you link to shows how much oil is in the ground ready to be tapped. A strategic reserve refers to oil that's already pumped out of the ground and sitting in a tanker, ready to be processed. We only have 7-8 weeks strat. reserve.

ah, correct...my bad
 
I'll be paying $1.90 when I fill up soon. If I go to a specific gas station, I can make it $0.70 per gallon.

I don't like you very much right now. Hopefully we'll notice a decrease in the next couple days. I'll just wait as long as possible to fill up my car, oh wait, it's already on empty. :(
 
As other people have said before, oil prices are driven by the speculators. As of this moment:

U.S. Consumption of oil was lower than predicted during the peak driving season(which is now over).
Loss of production due to hurricane activity is lower than predicted.
Supply from non-OPEC sources is higher than predicted.


So, we didn't use as much as they thought we would, and there's more available than they predicted. When the Supply is higher than the demand, prices fall. Other factors like the substitution of Ethanol as an oxidant before sufficient supply lines were in place also effected the overinflated price of gas.

The price drop isn't really anything that doesn't happen every year, this year it just got a bit out of hand.
 
Let me add to this...

iirc, light crude is trading around 60-65 a barrel right now. The gas at the pumps was purchased months ago. There is supposed to be a lag between oil prices and gas prices, suddenly there isnt?

Additionally, if you were to play the ratio game, it doesnt seem like the percent change in oil has matched the almost 33% drop in prices at the pump.

What in the hell is going on?

edit: btw, this election talk is fucking insane. Government isnt that cool, but I dont rule out collusion between the oil companies to effect the election, if you REALLY want to talk conspiracies...
 
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Let me add to this...

iirc, light crude is trading around 60-65 a barrel right now. The gas at the pumps was purchased months ago. There is supposed to be a lag between oil prices and gas prices, suddenly there isnt?

Additionally, if you were to play the ratio game, it doesnt seem like the percent change in oil has matched the almost 33% drop in prices at the pump.

What in the hell is going on?

edit: btw, this election talk is fucking insane. Government isnt that cool, but I dont rule out collusion between the oil companies to effect the election, if you REALLY want to talk conspiracies...

The price at the pumps is typically what it will cost the station to replace the fuel you just pumped, instead of the tried and true 'you pay what we pay with a mark-up' method of selling every other damn thing in the universe.
 
The price at the pumps is typically what it will cost the station to replace the fuel you just pumped, instead of the tried and true 'you pay what we pay with a mark-up' method of selling every other damn thing in the universe.

Are you telling me that the station makes no money on gas? :confused: iirc, markup is between .01-.10 per gallon...