Exxon Mobile record profit

Question

Has any one here read Exxon Mobile's 2nd quarter earnings report?

http://www.exxonmobil.com/Corporate/Files/news_release_earnings2q08.pdf

Record crude oil and natural gas realizations increased earnings approximately

$6.1 billion.

Also if you read their earnings report you will find Exxon Mobile isn't buying all of their crude oil from Opec. Guess what, they have oil fields where they may own entirely or they pay the owner of the land a royalty

Based on the information released by Exxon Mobile, Should Prices be set by the government as to the price per barrel? Does anyone believe for a second that Speculators, and Oil Companies are both to blame?

In addition Wouldn't opening up offshore drilling give these oil companies an even larger profit with no gguaranteeof prices decreasing?

Answer 1

No, I havent read the report, but will now that you shared that link.

I dont buy "the speculators and oil companies are to blame for our high prices."

Any first semester econ 101 student learns about the law of supply and demand.  Right now there isn't any excess supply and there's lots of demand that will continue to increase as China, India, and other countries grow.

Any increase in supply will help to lower prices provided that the demand dosent out pace the supply increase.  

I personally think that were spoiled by cheap oil for the last 20 plus years and now we've got to get used to it.  I have, I cut my driving by 2/3rd and I can still drive my 4x4 that gets 14mpg.