A new study on gas prices by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (Gas Price Gouge: The Sequel) has generated a lot of news in Vancouver. Understandably so, as the report claims that we are ‘overpaying’ by 27 cents a litre here. I haven’t read the report yet so I have no comment on the methods used or embedded assumptions, but I find myself resistant to the idea of ‘normal profit margins’. I really don’t have a problem with a company charging whatever it wants for its product, as long as there is no monopoly or collusion in play. Oil companies seem to have discovered that consumers, despite war or disaster induced price hikes, are willing to pay more. So they are charging more. How is this different from any other industry? People make their own choices and if they want to commute alone in a gas guzzling vehicle, and want to pay a mint for it, so what? Others make different choices:
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – Gas price pains
appear to be driving people out of their cars. More people appear to be
turning to transit and car pooling. TransLink says overall transit use
was up 3% for the first quarter of the year, and up more than 11.5% on
West Coast Express. The big gas price hike happened in April, and
TransLink is still waiting for official ridership numbers for that time
period.Leon Tuebes at the Jack Bell Foundation says there is also more
interest in van pooling, car pooling and ride sharing. "The biggest
surge we’ve seen is for people looking for other people to car pool
with them in their car, or to find someone willing to share a ride in
their private vehicles."Tuebes believes once the price of gas hits a $1.30, there will be a
sudden spike in people looking for alternatives to single occupant car
use. He says at that price, even sharing one or two trips a week can
make a big difference. He says the number of hits on their car pooling
website has gone up 25% since February as people check out other ways
to get around.
Let the price of gas soar, says I.
iBiome 