To get the oil companies' attention, we are going to need a President who's got the balls to regulate and tax them at the rate they have been screwing us. Start with oil company executives. I do not see that on the horizon though. Whether it's Hillary or McCain, they are both corrupt.

I agree with you that we all hope the bottom falls out of this incessant oil price raping of middle class Americans and oil companies get screwed like they have been screwing us over the last 30 years.

I agree with you there. Anything coming out of this administration lacks integrity based on their past performance. You are right about many oil business people getting rich off our backs.

That guy that wrote on this thread with a blatantly false statement that oil companies only make 10% profit is full of it. Either that or he works for the oil company. He sounds exactly like an oil company employee that I talked to last year while on one of my commuting flights. And he tries to blame Chavez in South America for our oil price crunch! Pathetic. Chavez is a Communist but he is not the culprit for this skyrocketing oil price crisis. Culprits are right here in the US, in our government and in the top management of all major oil industry corporations.

For every dollar that goes up in jet fuel price, airlines lose millions, I was told by an American Airlines finance department employee. If this keeps up, something's got to give, and it ain't the oil companies' profits, I reckon.

There have been a number of posts suggesting heavy taxation of oil companies. I seems to me that such action may result in an increase of oil prices.

As taxes increase, the profit incentive decreases. As the percentage of revenue ending up in producer's pockets decreases, so does the profit incentive. Production then begins to decline as investors seek to deploy their capital more effectively. Supplies tighten further without a change in demand and..... you can guess the rest.

What do you think?

I think profit incentive NEVER decrease when oil companies are concerned. Your theory has a lot of assumptions which by the way has been suggested and proven to be not true. Kind a like the trickle down theory. The production level of oil is not determined by how the oil companies are taxed. The OPEC countries determine that, and who knows what formula they use. I am certainly not privy to that information, nor are you for that matter. The number of posts suggested here recommend taxation along with price regulation at the same time. Many have also admitted that that will never happen when the administration and the Congress are in bed with the oil companies and the consumers are brainwashed into thinking like you do.

Harsh words, man. You're name-calling based on one paragraph of opinion? Take another Valium and chill.....

Brain washed may have been a little harsh but tired of hearing same old excuses and theories by oil company officials as to why oil price needs to keep going up. I use this forum to get myself chilled. Thanks.

Profit Margin=Net Income/Revenue

ExxonMobile 2007 profit margin=$40,610/$404,552=10%

The numbers are from its 2007 10K (filed with the SEC).

10% does not seem egregious to me regardless of the amount of revenue its on.

As a typical example, Exxon reported $220 billion in revenues and a $20 billion net profit for one of their quarters last year. That means expenses incurred were $200 billion, from which they made a $20 billion profit. $20 billion is 10% of $200 billion, hence the conclusion that Exxon made a 10% profit. That is a very standard and appropriate American business profit margin. Some quarters may vary within 1-2% of those numbers.

It's a dead end road to bash an American industry that is posting 10% profits. Just ask Congress. I think you, and many others, are projecting the anger and fustration you feel about the underperformance of your own industry on to the oil industry.

If you want to be mad, be mad, but be mad at the right people. Look at your own industry and ask yourself about the competency and motivatioins of the peope running that sector.

Why can't your managers post a standard 10% profit?

And how much complaining would you do if they did?

JP

Everyone still says it's okay to make a 10% profit, but what they can't explain is how the price of a bbl of oil has gone through the roof, yet the oil companies are STILL only making a 10% profit. Where is the rest of the money going? The price of oil is up over 50% in the past year or so, yet the margins are still only 10%? I don't believe for one moment that the cost of refining that oil has gone up that fast. Someone needs to start investigating what's going on before the whole USA house of cards comes tumbling down. :(

You are clearly not an airline pilot, so why don't you go to some other forum and spread false information.

Anyone who has ever taken accounting courses know that net profit is after a corporation has taken out ALL expenses including those multi-million dollar CEO salaries, expense accounts and overinflated costs ranging everything from their corporate flight departments running 100 million dollar jets etc. 10% net profit is after all these so called costs have been taken out. It's kind a like if you made 200,000 dollars and you wrote off $180,000 as expenses and claim you only made 10% profit.
I don't think American public is as stupid as you think they are.

Oil industry has the monopoly and don't tell us that continuing oil price is a natural business phenomena.

As to airline industry not performing, we as pilots don't run the airlines, we just fly the airplanes. But I think airlines profits will go UP considerably if the fuel prices are kept in check by the government instead of letting it run amok to satisfy the greed of the oil industry.