Are You Ready For Higher Gas Prices And Stagnant Economic Growth?
Because the Democrats are ready to deliver it.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Big oil companies will be a top target of Democratic lawmakers when they officially take over the House of Representatives early next year.
Democrats picked up enough seats in Tuesday’s U.S. election to win majority control of the House and have promised to roll back billions of dollars in tax breaks and other financial incentives extended to the oil industry in energy legislation Congress passed last year.
Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who is poised to be the next Speaker of the House when the new Congress convenes in January, says oil companies have unfairly earned record profits by gouging consumers at the gasoline pump.
Pelosi says taking away the financial relief given to Big Oil in last year’s Republican-written energy law will be among the six major tasks Democrats plan to tackle in the first 100 hours after she slams the gavel to convene the new House.
She says Democrats will also go after oil companies by enacting tough laws to stop gasoline price gouging, and some Democrats want to impose a windfall profits tax on Big Oil.
There is so much nonsense here.
First of all, there hasn’t been any price gouging on behalf of “big oil.” Yes, there have been enormous amounts of profits made, but the reasons for that are the high taxes and restrictive regulations people like Nancy Pelosi have placed on the oil industry. See, demand for oil goes up every single year in this country. That means supply must also go up every single year in order to meet that demand. Unfortunately, increasing supply is no easy thing given tax burdens and regulations. So the oil industry must raise gigantic amounts of capital so that they can reinvest said profits back into expanding production.
That is exactly what has been happening. Over the last decade U.S. and Canadian oil companies have actually invested 50% more then they’ve taken in profits back into expanding oil production. Of course, if expanding oil production weren’t so expensive thanks to environmental regulations and taxes gas prices wouldn’t be so high.
We must also consider what impacts these Democrat machinations are going to have on local economies. Here in North Dakota we’ve enjoyed incredible amounts of economic growth thanks to the oil industry’s investment and development in the western part of our state. If the Democrats hike taxes on the oil companies again, though, that investment and development may grind to a halt when it ceases to be profitable thanks to the higher taxes/increased regulations.
I know we’re all supposed to hate and revile “big oil” and do whatever we can to keep them from getting big profits, but the truth of the matter is that when American oil companies profit it benefits us all. And not just people who hold stock in those oil companies either but also all the people who are employed by the oil companies and all the people who benefit from the economic stimulus caused when one of the oil companies invests in a certain area of the country.
Democrats talk long and hard about “ending our dependence on foreign oil,” yet the surest way to keep this country dependent on foreign oil is to hamstring our domestic oil companies with heavy taxes and burdensome regulations. The Dems think they’re going to “solve” problems like high gas prices and dependence on foreign oil by sticking it to our oil companies, but the truth of the matter is that they’re just going to make things worse.
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