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View Full Version : And yet another perspective on gas...


Goin' Coastal
04-27-2006, 09:11 AM
I received this on my email today. Interesting concept, even though it would have zero chance of actually working - not necessarily because of the concept, but could you imagine the entire country agreeing on anything!?! :D

Something to consider.....





This is a good thought and it could work. It won't cost anything to try.
Think about it !!

A man eats two eggs each morning for breakfast. When he goes to the
grocery
store he pays 60 cents a dozen. Since a dozen eggs won't last a week he
normally buys two dozens at a time.

One day while buying eggs he notices that the price has risen to 72
cents.
The next time he buys groceries, eggs are .76 cents a dozen. When asked
to
explain the price of eggs the store owner says, "the price has gone up
and I have
to raise my price accordingly".

This store buys 100 dozen eggs a day. I checked around for a better
price and
all the distributors have raised their prices. The distributors have
begun to
buy from the huge egg farms. The small egg farms have been driven out of
business.

He checked out the huge egg farms and found they were selling 100,000
dozen
eggs to the distributors daily. Nothing had changed but the price of
eggs.

This pattern continues until the price of eggs is 2.00 a dozen. The man
says,"there must be something we can do about the price of eggs".

He starts talking to all the people in his town and they decide to stop
buying eggs. This didn't work because everyone needed eggs. Finally,
the man
suggested only buying what you need.

He ate 2 eggs a day. On the way home from work he would stop at the
grocery
and buy two eggs. Everyone in town started buying 2 or 3 eggs a day.

The grocery store owner began complaining that he had too many eggs in
his
cooler. He told the distributor that he didn't need any eggs. Maybe
wouldn't
need any all week.

The distributor had eggs piling up at his warehouse. He told the huge
egg
farms that he didn't have any room for eggs would not need any for at
least two
weeks.

At the egg farm, the chickens just kept on laying eggs.

The distributor told the grocery store owner that he would lower the
price of
the eggs if the store would start buying again. The grocery store owner
said,
"I don't have room for more eggs. The customers are only buy 2 or 3
eggs at a
time".
"Now if you were to drop the price of eggs back down to the original
price,
the customers would start buying by the dozen again".

Finally, the egg farmers lowered the price of their eggs. But only a few
cents.
The customers still bought 2 or 3 eggs at a time. They said, "when the
price
of eggs gets down to where it was before, we will start buying by the
dozen."

Slowly the price of eggs started dropping. The distributors had to slash
their prices to make room for the eggs coming from the egg farmers. The
egg
farmers cut their prices because the distributors wouldn't buy at a
higher price
than they were selling eggs for.

Anyway, they had full warehouses and wouldn't need eggs for quite a
while.

And them chickens kept on laying.

Eventually, the egg farmers cut their prices because they were throwing
away
eggs they couldn't sell.. The distributors started buying again because
the
eggs were priced to where the stores could afford to sell them at the
lower
price.

And the customers starting buying by the dozen again.

Now, transpose this analogy to the gasoline industry.

What if everyone only bought $10.00 worth of gas each time they pulled
to the
pump. The dealers tanks would stay semi full all the time. The dealers
wouldn't have room for the gas coming from the huge tank farms. The
tank farms
wouldn't have room for the gas coming from the refining plants. And the
refining
plants wouldn't have room for the oil being off loaded from the huge
tankers
coming from the Middle East.

Just $10.00 each time you buy gas. Don't fill it up. You may have to
stop for
gas twice a week but, the price should come down.

Think about it.

As an added note..When I buy $10.00 worth of gas,that leaves my tank a
little
under half full. The way prices are jumping around, you can buy gas for
$2.65
a gallon and then the next morning it can be $2.15. If you have your
tank
full of $2.65 gas you don't have room for the $2.15 gas. You might not
understand
the economics of only buying two eggs at a time but, you can't buy
cheaper
gas if your tank is full of the high priced stuff.

Also, don't buy anything else at the gas station, no cigarettes, no
bread,
milk or chewing gum, don't give them any more of your hard earned money
than
what you spend on gas, until the prices come down.. Oh, some folks may
not see
this message. Can you afford to print 10 at a time and pass them out
where you
buy gas? If you can afford more, you may think of putting them on
windshields
at the mall.

Becky13347
04-27-2006, 09:29 AM
Boy, I don't know. It sounds good in theory but $10 of gas fills my tank less than a quarter (it was $46 yesterday to fill my tank from empty)

I would end up having to get gas every other day and frankly, I don't want to go to the gas station every other day. Once every seven or eights days is often enough for me.

Meganator
04-27-2006, 09:39 AM
Just $10.00 each time you buy gas. Don't fill it up. You may have to stop for gas twice a week but, the price should come down.
...
As an added note..When I buy $10.00 worth of gas,that leaves my tank a
little under half full.


I understand the point that is being made, but I think there is a logic flaw. Overall, if people use the same amount of eggs/gas, then there is no reason for supplies to increase as long as production remains the same. If I buy a little gas each day, but at the end of the week my total is the same, there isn't any extra sitting at the supplier due to my actions. Right? I will have to think about this some more.

I understand the point that is being made, though. Not practical; my "low fuel" light would be on all the time if I only bought 3 gallons at a time; that isn't even enough for some people's daily commute!

Julia1Pin
04-27-2006, 10:42 AM
Correct me if I'm wrong...

Eggs can go bad, oil can't.

colleency
04-27-2006, 11:43 AM
I want to know where you can find a grocery store that will sell you eggs by the each.

Can you imagine Hummers only putting $10 at a time in their tanks? They'd have to go to the gas station every day.

zwieback
04-27-2006, 01:39 PM
I could be wrong but, I didn't think the gas stations themselves actually make much profit from selling gas. I always thought they made their money from selling milk, soda, candy, chips, etc. So, I don't quite understand how the gas prices will come down if you don't buy a candy bar from the station. Why would the big oil companies care if the station isn't selling candy but, is selling its gas??

Robyn1007
04-27-2006, 02:25 PM
Correct me if I'm wrong...

Eggs can go bad, oil can't.


I think this is the major flaw in the theory. Eggs had to be thrown out because they spoil, oil can just wait until its used.

And a Hummer would probably have to go twice a day on $10 gas. :p ;)

mbrogier
04-27-2006, 09:26 PM
There are several flaws in these arguments... other than eggs spoil and gas doesn't.

The farmers with the extra eggs would just write that off their taxes as a loss--guess who gets to pay for that?

The chickens that continued to lay unneeded eggs would become Chicken and Dumplins...not continue to live their blissful life on the egg farm. :rolleyes:

I get gas at Costco. I know a lot of the people that work there. I would hate to walk in the door one morning and notice that my favorite greeter was gone. When I asked where he went, the answer would be loss of profits = layoffs. These aren't faceless people in a far off executive office. They are people that notice when I don't come in every week. They live in my town.

The same with small gas stations. There isn't much profit in gas, but the owners are hoping you'll come inside for a drink and snack. They're being hurt with the high gas prices, too--that they don't set.

It would be great to hit the large gas companies where it hurts, but so many innocent people are hurt in the process.

jmarie
04-27-2006, 10:02 PM
I heard a good analogy today. A guy was complaining about the high gas prices. He said that he thinks some little guy is going to come in and start refining and charge $1.30 a gallon and bring the big guys to their knees. Was going on about the profit EXXON was making. Neil Boortz couldn't get a word in edgewise. But Neil's rebuttal was supply and demand is what drives up the prices.

He then asked the guy if he owned a home. Yes. Well, tell you what...Lets say that all of the homes in your neighborhood had increased in value and now he was living in a 5,000,000 dollar home...And people were scrambling to get in that ekite neighborhood. In fact all of the homes were selling in that range. He knew that he had only paid $98,000 for his home....so since he din't want to rip anyone off, why didn't he just sell his home for $125,000.....

It's the same way with the oil companies. If that is the price of gas, why would anyone want to sell it for less. If you sell it for less and then it's gone...when the dealer has to replace it, he has to replace it at a higher rate of pay.

jasonhoggan
04-27-2006, 11:15 PM
Can you imagine Hummers only putting $10 at a time in their tanks? They'd have to go to the gas station every day.


I drive 30 miles to work. and if i had a hummer and bought $10 of gas that would be ruffly 3 gallons. On 3 gallons I would ruffly get 30 miles. (10 miles to the gallon)I would be buying gas twice a day and wasting a lot of time. And i really haven't seen gas prices down at all only up. So i would spend the whole time kicking myself knowing i could have bought gas at lower price at the begining of the week. I think we are blaming the wrong people for this problem. The oil corps. cant controll the demand or how much demand there is for oil. The govenment is making more than the oil companies are on the sales of gas and oil. Some areas there taxes up to 50 cent to a gallon. Like California.

Chefzhat
04-28-2006, 05:01 AM
I drive 30 miles to work. and if i had a hummer and bought $10 of gas that would be ruffly 3 gallons. On 3 gallons I would ruffly get 30 miles. (10 miles to the gallon)I would be buying gas twice a day and wasting a lot of time. And i really haven't seen gas prices down at all only up. So i would spend the whole time kicking myself knowing i could have bought gas at lower price at the begining of the week. I think we are blaming the wrong people for this problem. The oil corps. cant controll the demand or how much demand there is for oil. The govenment is making more than the oil companies are on the sales of gas and oil. Some areas there taxes up to 50 cent to a gallon. Like California.

THANK GOD! SOMEONE FINALLY GETS IT!!!!!!

Grace, your analogy is spot on as well - perfect!!!

Let's all remember who is making the most in the current situation - the same bunch of blowhards that are screaming about the price of gas. Yup, government. They always make more money on a gallon of gas than the company does.

Debie

Jazzmatazz49
04-28-2006, 05:05 AM
I wish ignorant people would stop sending me emails about how to do this and how to do that. This one is about the worst. Other than the one that compares the price of gas to bottled water and perfume, etc.