Please continue to feel free to comment to our antics. You seem intelligent and those kind of people are always welcome. Sidenote: I am one of the Starbucks guzzling douchebags to which you refer!

1. Inelastic demand for the commodity
2. Inability of supply to grow at any price
3. Result is price increases until real “value” of gasoline to the consumer is exceeded; i.e., the real “value” of any comodity is the price it will demand in the market place.

Gasoline is sufficiently important to us (as individuals) and to our economy, that we continue to purchase about the same amount as before despite a doubling in price. How many other commodities can boast such importance in our “market baskets?” We complain bitterly, but we buy, and will continue to do so until we either change our life styles dramatically or find a successful alternative product.

If you want to examine a real ecomomic mystery, examine the price of “gourmet” coffee. What does a latte cost at a place like Starbucks – - about $3.50 for 16 oz??? That makes the per gallon price roughly 8 times that amount or $28.00. The per barrel equivalent cost of designer coffees then is about 42 (there are roughly 42 gallons of crude in one “barrell”) time that or $1276.00. Any people willing to pay that price for for coffee has no right to complain about crude oil at $150 per barrell or gasoline at $4.00 per gallon.

Pretend gasoline is a latte for your car that has the side benefit of getting you to work or where ever you need to be to do business. In fact give up your one latte a day habit and use the savings to buy 4 or 5 gallons of gasoline!