85% of the US blames Obama personally for gas prices

[conuly]

http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/story/2012-03-08/gasoline-poll/53421786/1

That's 85% of the population that doesn't understand that while demand for oil continues to increase worldwide, supply won't do so for several million years, at which point I'm going to go out on a limb and say we'll probably all be dead.

But sure, the president can really affect the market that much.

Comments

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

We used to have this fantasy image of Dick Cheney going 'heh heh heh' and calling the oil companies to tell them to raise the prices.

[conuly]

Amusing though that is, I'm not sure the free market works that way.

[rainbow-goddess.livejournal.com]

I really don't think the government has that much power over the price of gas. I've seen people on Twitter saying things like, "The price of gas is (x amount) per litre! Why does the government allow this to happen?" I'm thinking: what does this person expect the government to do? Legislate the price of gas? That would cause a whole new set of problems.

[conuly]

I really don't think the government has that much power over the price of gas.

I know! It's like they think we're living under communism or something!

[dandelion.livejournal.com]

I have a lot more sympathy when it's British people saying that rather than Americans or Canadians, because right now, 59% of our petrol price is made up of tax. Our government could easily lower the price of petrol at any time they liked. (This is based on a forecourt price of 137.9p a litre at my local cheapest petrol station, or $8.21 per US gallon. The percentage which is tax goes down slightly as the price rises, though of course the value of that taxed portion is still increasing.)