The critics weren't nearly so verbose when multi billion oil speculators pushed the price of oil up from $13.00 a barrel to well over a hundred!

And given they were the ones swimming in entirely unearned oil revenue, just focused on avoiding tax!? $13.00 to a $130.00 is an increase to the power of ten and there's no doubt harming most western economies with their greed is good speculation!

And where were the strident critics then? Okay for private tax avoiding oil mogul speculators, but not the state? And then we wonder why America had to have financial crisis that shook the world! Not for nothing is it writ large a fool never learns!

Perhaps the Obama administration could take a leaf out of the oil speculator's handbook, and just buy and stockpile cheap oil, and then when they have created scarcity, simply eke it out at prohibitive prices?

And given the way that'll force car manufacturers to the wall, hardly a bad thing, given the oil industry's massive investment in vehicle manufacture, and their predilection for gas guzzlers.

If the Obama administration is short of tax revenue, they could do worse than simply force the avoiders to pay a fair and reasonable share!

And that requires courage enough to impose an unavoidable but modest expenditure tax that everyone pays. Then set about reducing corporate tax, and a good move, when most aren't paying it or just a tiny fraction of it?
Rhrosty.

To quote E. Presley 'it's now or never'. Free marketeers can excuse government intervention when the market system fails. There's obviously something wrong when shortlived factors see a price collapse in a depleting commodity. If the market sees the oil price rebound to something like 2008 levels of $150 is that a good thing?

Either there will be a major oil price correction in the next few years or we're descending into permanent recession. When/if oil is back to $80 the $10 levy can be removed. Poor people should drive something other than giant pickups. The only caveat is that the $10 should be spent wisely.

America has been underinvesting in its infrastructure for a long time, and that's very costly to its economy. Taxing oil at a rate that adds 6 cents per litre to the price of fuel is far from dumb if it is used to fund new and upgraded roads and railways. Though with most existing rail infrastructure in private hands, there's still a significant danger it could be neglected.

The dumbest idea ever is to ignore infrastructure needs in order to meet short term budgetary constraints.

The Americans have little to complain about when it comes to fuel prices. Apart from the oil rich Arab states, they have the cheapest fuel. The young blokes all drive "trucks" about the size of an F350, the F100 isn't big enough. My heart bleeds for them, not.

David

Don't get ya knickers in a knot, folks. This is a proposal from a lame-duck president that has as much chance of being implemented as Turnbull has of making up his mind about tax.

Its just part of that legacy thingy that the Obamessiah is now so concerned about. For the next 20 years he'll tell anyone who'll listen that he tried to reign in CO2 via the tax. Well 20 years assuming the great warming scare lasts that long.

" oil speculators pushed the price of oil up from $13.00 a barrel to well over a hundred!"

Wow Rhrosty. When was crude at $13 last? Its funny how those who don't understand markets always attribute things they don't understand to some evil cabal in the background. Speculators pushing price up by an order of magnitude. Honestly!

"There's obviously something wrong when shortlived factors see a price collapse in a depleting commodity."

Except oil isn't a "depleting commodity". Compared to demand there is more of it today than the last 20 years. Hence the low price. The only people who still think this way are those who can't let go of their peak oil fantasies.

Oil was just $13.00 a barrel before the first oil shock, and no doubt manipulated by the usual suspects who were living only on oil revenue?

However, I just don't see oil making a return anytime soon given the way batteries are being developed and a 1.8 trillion barrel sitting in Edmonton Alberta, just waiting to be developed! And they now have the technology to pump most of it up from the deepest parts of the reserve.

That said, I do believe we also have a reserve to rival the middle east to our immediate north, and locked up by insane pollies, who just refuse to understand that every western style economy is supported by just two economic pillars, energy and capital, neither of which ought to be in private hands, given the way unbridled speculation, price gouging and artificially contrived scarcity, can harm a sound economy, and just via those two instruments.

We seem to be hedging our bets solely on ultra fragile service provision, given we're selling coal and iron ore at a loss? Why does anyone believe a faltering Chinese economy in transition won't chose to go down the services route also, leaving us to depend on tourism, and tax minimisation, the usual solutions for banana republics!?

We have it in our hands to convert to other more dependable alternative sources of home grown, ultra reliable energy and indeed endless self sufficiency.

Keeping the 26 billion plus we spend P.A. on fully imported oil, would do as much as 175 billion dollars P.A. worth of economic work if spent here! It really is about choice and making the right calls, rather than leaving our economic fate to hostile strangers!