Republicans: BP's profits are TRIPLE what they were at this time one year ago---up to 9.3

[Atticus]

BILLION dollars---and you lying ignoramuses are blaming Joe Biden for high prices at the gas pump?

If having a bowel movement required brains, you guys would have to puke!

( Tip o' the hat to 40 RatRod )

[ProudMNDemocrat]

1. Funny how people are still blaming Joe.

When it is blatantly Corporate GREED a la Gordon Gekko.

Of course, big Oil contributes to the GOP.

[Hoyt]

2. Well, to be fair they had loses in 2020. Here's what Paul Krugman says about gouging and inflation:

"Now, what about price-gouging? Elizabeth Warren and other Democrats have been arguing that some companies are taking advantage of an inflationary economy to increase markups, making inflation worse. Many economists disagree, which is a defensible position. But the vitriolic nature of their attacks — talking about gouging is like prescribing ivermectin or injecting bleach — is weirdly over the top, and should provoke some self-reflection

"Consider three positions.
1. Gouging is the main cause of inflation
2. Gouging could be a contributory factor
3. Gouging cannot possibly be a cause of inflation, and anyone saying otherwise is ignorant and dangerous

"Position #1 is clearly wrong — but I don’t know any prominent figure who holds it. On the other hand, position #3 is also dubious economics. Gouging is probably a small factor, but it could be *a* factor. Why the vitriol?

"How can gouging cause inflation? Even if corps have monopoly power, weren’t they already exploiting it to the max, so that it caused high but not *rising* prices? Well, let’s get wonky and learn from labor economics. Many economists who study the evolution of wages — for example the Great Compression of the 1940s, which lasted for decades — end up invoking the role of “norms”. But how can these matter in the face of supply and demand. One answer is that when a wage (or price) setter has market power, small deviations from the profit-maximizing price have only second-order effects on profits

"This in turn implies that seemingly small considerations — like fear of customer or political backlash — can inhibit firms from charging or paying what the traffic will bear. E.g., firms don’t cut wages in recessions bc they worry about morale. And firms sometimes hesitate to raise prices, at least visibly — hence the phenomenon of shrinkflation, where you make stuff smaller rather than hike prices.

"But there will be less backlash if lots of other prices are also going up, so it’s not at all crazy to suggest that some corps are feeling freer than usual to exploit their market power, adding to inflation. How big a factor is this? We have no idea. But the venom with which some economists and commentators are rejecting the very possibility is puzzling and disturbing. It would be one thing if Dems were doing a Hugo Chavez, and demanding that the Fed roll the presses while we use price controls to suppress inflation. But they aren’t; heck, they aren’t even doing a Richard Nixon.

"Even the Warren bill, while it would require large firms to offer explanations for price hikes, is far short of a true price control measure. If you think that would be too intrusive, OK. But the anti-anti-price gouging rhetoric I’m hearing is bizarrely over the top. With everything else going on, why get so worked up about this issue? Something isn’t right here . . . . . . .

Link to tweet

Guess it's time to bash Paul Krugman too.

[TheRealNorth]

3. Krugman has always been a neoliberal....

Going back to at least the late '90's when he crowed about how great it was going to be for everyone when we shipped factory jobs to Mexico and China. So of course we know who's camp he is in. He's part of the reason the Democratic Party is in this mess with blue collar voters- because we listened too much to him.

[Hoyt]

4. Do you have any criticism of what he said? What does your go to

economist say about inflation, is he/she still calling it transitory, temporary, a hoax?

[TheRealNorth]

7. Yes

I was looking at a graph from Business Insider which showed that Q1 Profits for 2022 for the Big Oil Companies (ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, BP) were 2-3 times their profit in Q1 2019. So they are raking it in compared to what they were making pre-pandemic.

[Hoyt]

12. Hey, you own oil and oil prices go up, you make more. You would to if you owned oil.

I'm sure you felt bad for them in 2020 when they lost money.

[Atticus]

6. OK, gouging is probably "a" factor in the inflation, not "the" factor. To my knowledge, no one

has asserted it is "the" factor.

But, where is the GOP criticism of corporate greed as even "a" factor?

Maybe I have missed it.

[TheRealNorth]

9. Considering energy and oil costs affect the prices of a lot of other products....

I think it is a leading cause. Because Big Oil wants the Republicans backnin charge. They did the same thing to Obama in 2012 and to a lesser extent in 2016.

[lame54]

5. We are paying for the gas we didn't use during the pandemic

[Meowmee]

8. The heating oil supply companies

Are blaming ukraine and say when people use less oil they have to raise prices to get by or something to that effect. Ours is going up by $3.50 per gallon.

[TheBlackAdder]

10. 60 votes not in Senate to overcome GOP filibuster of Gas Price Gouging Bill

.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/may/16/house-democrats-pump-brakes-gas-price-gouging-bill/

.

[renate]

11. It is WILD to me that Democrats aren't talking about this nonstop

Oil companies are making profits hand over fist, people on the financial edge are going without food or medicine as a result, and Democrats--not even the GOP that protect the oil companies, but Democrats--are taking the fall for it. People are genuinely suffering and the absolute wrong entity is absorbing 100% of the blame.

I literally don't understand why this isn't the single message of the national party right now.

[Takket]

13. they have a captive audience so they really never have to operate at a loss

and they can adjust prices to make any amount of profit they want. because what are people going to do? not go to work? not get food to eat?