Does the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives own any gas stations? With that much knowledge of the gasoline industry they should be able to make a killing if they switched to that business.

;-)

Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives should be named N.D.P. Socialist Alternative for (honest "making a profit" )Capitalism. I saw a bumper sticker once. It said, "Free enterprise is too expensive". Must've been an NDP worshipping driver.

Doesn`t this sound a bit like housing prices?

Tell me Owl does an engineer or an architect have to own equipment or buildings to be able to design them? Do they make a lot of money from sales?

Cheers

Gas prices are too high because we let them be. We're way too dependent on automobiles. Myself included. I live out in the sticks and work in town, so I have to drive, so I have to pay. The only way to get prices to substantially drop is if we used less - consistently.

We should all be filling up at stations that at least offer something back.
I use Canadian tire and at least I get back 5 cents on the liter. Then when I have about 200 dollers worth (takes me about 6 months) I cash it in on a gift card and buy gas with that.
Maybe if these other stations did less buissness they would have to charge less

Let us just assume the following for sake of this discussion:
• $0.26 per litre EXCESS profit
• 60 litres per average fill up
• 12 cars per hour
• 16 hours open per day

that means about $3,000 per day EXCESS profit
and $21,000 per week EXCESS profit
and over $1million a year EXCESS profit per service station.

Just to make sure we all understand, EXCESS profit is that profit after all other expenses have been paid for, including the cost of money to operate a business and build a service station as well as NORMAL profit of say, 5 to 10%

So, where does this EXCESS profit actually go to? The service station operator? The trucker? The refinery? The well head owner? The State? Or all of the above?

If it is the service station operator, then I would love to be in that business. I’ll start it, make my million for a year, then sell it to the next guy to make his or her million.

So, as I have posted on here once before with the frequency that this topic is on this site, I want to know where the EXCESS profit goes to and what is done with the EXCESS “so called” profit. Without that, the information is useless since we do not know who to go after to change it. In fact, we do not even know whether this really is EXCESS profit. It isn’t EXCESS just because some outfit thinks it is. Where is there an opposing, well-researched point of view?

There have been many commissions or whatever that have looked into EXCESS profits in the oil/gasoline industry in North America and probably other parts of the world and no one has come out with a statement that there is EXCESS profit.

When professionals such as architects and engineers and business analysts give opinions to clients that they can make a million dollars per year EXCESS profits by building a corner gas station with a 711 attached for good measure, the smart ones will typically get involved with such an enterprise themselves. However, such opportunities with that order of magnitude of EXCESS profit are virtually impossible to find. So, yes, they actually do get involved with resorts, strata housing, etc. If there is a good opportunity and they feel they can put there money where their mouth is they will invest in something they consulted on in lieu of fee for services.

So, back to the question. If the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives think that there is so much EXCESS profit to be made where are they putting their investment dollars to show their confidence?

The excess profit is not in the hands of the fellow who owns the corner gas station with the 7-11 attached. Typically the margin on gas for the station operator does not change no matter what the price. The profit goes into the hands of the big oil companies. They are making this massive profit on a crude product that is owned by all of us, the oil in the ground. Now here is where I get really torn, I don't big oil to be making huge money, but on the other hand, our energy prices have been lower than most of the rest of the world for years. We are amoungst the worlds energy hogs. Will the high prices help us to rethink how we use energy? That could be a positive result of the whole energy mess.

I would like to know if the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives have ever been in business? Do they think it prudent to set money aside when things are good so they can survive times when things aren't so good? We all know that there are cycles in business. At the banks and at the gas bars. So, what would they do? Chester