Perspective on Fuel Prices

Time for a rant. Oh yes, I love a good rant. They are so relieveing... detoxifying... even cathartic... Since you get to read my rants and not my elations, I must seem like a pretty dark and stern person. Oh, well, so be it. Here I go!

I've about had it with all the whining, moaning, and even instistance on probes into the oil companies. I do not like paying three bucks for a gallon (of fuel and corn-derived ethanol in my case), but I roll with the punches, suck it up, and thank God that I bought a Ranger with a 3 liter engine instead of an F150 with a five liter chipmunk cage.

Here is my earth-shaking perspective:

Many are upset at the 400,000,000 (I like to write out the zeros for perspective) retirement package that Exxon-Mobil CEO Lee Raymond just got. Oh by the way, it's closer to 398,000,000 dollars, but if you think that's a small difference, ask yourself what you could do with 2,000,000 dollars.
To continue, people I've spoken to are even angrier at Exxon-Mobil's recent profits. For my example, I'll choose the net profit from the third quarter of last year, since that was the the quarter that started most of the whinefest: 8,300,000,000 dollars. That comes out to $1.58 per share. It's also worth noting that 23,000,000,000 dollars were paid to shareholders in one form or another for all of 2005... anyway...

If Lee Raymond was to give away his entire retirement package to the American people, each person would get about 1.33 dollars, leaving himself 1.33 dollars to retire on after a long career as the head of one of the most successful global corperations. One and a third dollars... how would you spend it? Might I remind you that this leaves him with one and a third dollars as a retirement package? If you can't figure out why he has $1.33 still, you should never comment on anything to do with money ever again.

Let's zoom out a step now and look at the world. Exxon Mobil is a global company. They opereate in nearly 200 nations according to their website. The U.S. recognizes 192 nations worldwide, so I think it's safe to assume that Exxon Mobil pretty much does business everywhere in some form. Why is this important? Because it means that we Americans are not feeding all of that 8,300,00,000 dollar profit. The world is, but some of the world less than others. So, for that sake of argument, say that half the people in world buy from Exxon Mobil... shoot, say that one third are buyers.
If Exxon Mobil operated at no profit at all, 2,000,000,000 people would become four bucks richer every quarter at current profit levels. This leaves nothing for expansion beyond what is already happeneing and more importantly, nothig for the shareholders to whom the company is accountable.

Get the picture now?

Do not be upset that this company is successful. That's just petty jealousy and I dearly hope that we all got over that sometime in kindergarten or grade school. Because somebody has does not mean that he or she stole from somebody else. Get that straight!
I think that if I can be at peace with oil profits driving what I drive (Late 90s Ford Ranger if you care to look up fuel economy) and making what I make (Examine the Airman pay grades for the first few years of service and you'll have a clue), you can too. I'm not rich and I've had to change many of my habits to accomodate fuel costs, so I know of what I write.
It's not convenient to have fuel prices high when so many of us have lived for so long with cheap fuel, but our ancestors have ridden out times like these. We can too. Last, shut up about that $5.33 that you don't have if you are one of the ones moaning about 'obscene profits'.

Wow, rants feel good. That one had its caustic moments... and at the risk of seeming like I too well enjoy seeing myself in digital print, I'm off to smell the roses... or whatever is blooming at the moment!