So it’s just a bizarre coincidence in timing that gas recently went below $3 per gallon despite the intense conflict currently happening in the Middle East?

Solar energy is cheap and will be available LONG AFTER oil is used up. Same for nuclear energy.

If it was cheap (and reliable) we would all be using it.

I believe that one factor is that people in the US are driving less. Possibly due to an aging population? Lots of young people living in cities do not even OWN cars. They take public transportation everywhere. A likely FUTURE would be nuclear energy plants producing electricity and most vehicles being E-vehicles. Then a gallon of gas might sell for 50 cents because no one uses gas that much.

I was talking in the foreseeable FUTURE.

Do you have a link to data supporting that statement?

It's not plausible that the price of gas dropped bc people SUDDENLY started driving less. Even if true, which is unlikely, that would only affect the long term price of gas, not short term swings.

All I had to do was go to Google and put in "are people driving less in the US?" The answer was a resounding .......YES and there were various reasons behind the drop. One was young people do not drive as much.

No they are not.

the 4 political taxing entities that claim to own us (Fed/State/County/Municipal) steal 75% of our earnings using taxes and inflation...and you think the USA is Capitalist?

I'd sure like to see the math for that 75% claim.

Add it yourself...Don't forget "fees" and mandated insurance and other taxes an employer is forced to pay on your behalf. Productivity gains are stolen by inflation plus 2% which is at least 5%.

What's sad is, it wouldn't be too hard to get there with a couple million bucks.

37% Fed
13% Calif
20% inflation (what we jus went thru)
Then throw on RE Taxes, Gas Taxes, Sales Taxes.

Ouch.

Ya'll gotta stop watching television and try to think for yourselves, LOL.

Fusion energy would be the end game but I have my doubts it will be commercialized. Creating a sun on earth? You would need to contain 150M degree F plasma in nothingness. Yeah...

Let's see:
Fed income tax: 15% (effective rate)
FICA tax: 0% (7.6% if employed, 0% if retired)
State income tax: 0%
State Sales tax: 6%
County Sales tax: 1%
Property tax: 1% (effective rate)
School tax: 1% (effective rate)
Total taxes I pay: 24%

But even then, I get something in return for most of those taxes so I can't really call it stealing. The only clear exception is the school tax, I don't get any products or services in return for that money.

Mandated insurance? If I pay for a product or service I don't consider that a tax.

Inflation? 1. Many of my sources of income increase along with inflation making it a net zero; 2. Inflation is the increase in the cost of a product or service that I pay for so I don't consider that a tax; and, 3. At worst, inflation increases profits which is absolutely a goal of capitalism.

Taxes an employer is forced to pay on my behalf? Might have had some meaning when I was employed but even then, what the employer paid did not come out of *my* pocket (and no, it would NOT have gone into my pocket otherwise)

Solar energy is not cheap...Oil will never be used up because it is constantly being created in the earth at volumes we could never use up. Nuclear energy is cheap, clean and safe but it is vertually illegal to build nuclear reactors due to government regulations. China is building 500 SMR/LMR reactors at a cost of about $1B each. China now has their own designed reactors and don't rely on USA or France.

I sure would like to see the science/chemistry behind *that*!!

The money your employer pays on your behalf comes out of your wages. It is money the employer can't pay you because they are forced by law to give it to the government. Where else would it come from?

haha! You believe if your employer did not have to pay those taxes they would put it into *your* pocket? How cute!

How cute! They don't have a choice! Do you understand?

I will buy the last 2 sentences, but NOT that oil will NEVER be used up "because it is constantly being created in the Earth". I have NEVER heard of that. That boggles my little brain.

The Canadian system won't even treat you if you have a major medical problem after the age of 49. If you seek medical treatment outside their system, they will throw you in jail. That's why Canadians escape to the USA for treatment. The Buffalo hospital parking lots are stuffed with Canadian tags. It''s Utopia! The Canadian medical system will now offer to kill you...no long appointment wait necessary...And they will kill you for free!

And an organization as large as a Government is NEEDED to do things like create an army and national defense and have a space program. Without government we would have moved BACK to the stone age.

You never heard of that because you get your information from the idiot box. Hydrocarbons are created in the earth...Hydrocarbons are literally liquid sunshine. How do you think they got there in the first place? God?

Oh wait, are you talking about FICA taxes? Yeah, I forgot about that 7.6% and will see how it fits into my math above. Sure, if the employer was not required to withhold those then they would be returned to your salary. But ultimately they would still need to be paid. A self-employed person has no income tax withheld by an employer but it still needs to be paid. If the FICA tax was in my wages I would still be required to pay it later.

I thought you were referring to the employers portion of the FICA tax. If the employer was not required to pay that tax I'm sure it would not find its way into my paycheck.

Okay... Fess up... Who said "Beetlejuice" 6 times (we now have two of our resident climate experts serial posting non-stop)...

You can create hydrocarbons by cracking H2O and CO2. This requires more energy than the energy than you get out. Using atomic power with your input source being ocean water (Which is H2O with 8% concentration of CO2), you can make methane and then us a Fischer–Tropsch process to create long chain hydrocarbons. This is hugely expensive so drilling/refining the stuff is quite cheap.

Here is the Fusion energy EU boondoggle called ITER:

ITER - the way to new energy

Shell Oil Pearl Gas-to-Liquids Project in Qatar...stupid expensive :)

Pearl GTL - Wikipedia

What is your CV? You actually need to study university STEM as a prerequisite to "see" and "hear". How do you think the hydrocarbons got there?...And don't say dinosaurs :) And hydrocarbons are not "fossil fuels"...anyone who states that I know are just indoctrinated by the idiot box :)

Yes God -----SHE is my friend.

Amigo, "Trust the experts!"

Hydrocarbons are literally solar energy in gas/liquid form. Methane/Ethane/Propane are gaseous at room temperature whilst Butane and longer chain hydrocarbons are liquid...Then you got coal. There are quadrillions of barrels of oil under the artic/antartic.

Idiot box, most real science…. I’ll take it. Better than some odd theory that hydrocarbons just appear or pseudoscience that predicts their creation but cannot find them.