Why oil is cheap; what does it mean?

[Frank Lee]

Yeah, saw the Russian economy in the news today. Things are going to get interesting...

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by jcp123

It means Russia will have trouble flexing it's muscles.

The Ruble is hitting historic lows.

[Fat Charlie]

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

The Ruble is hitting historic lows.

So it's almost time for the tanks to head for a few historic borders...

[some_other_dave]

Hopefully it won't get this interesting: Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Because we all know what happened in that country immediately after that time frame...

-soD

[darcane]

Originally Posted by some_other_dave

Hopefully it won't get this interesting: Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Because we all know what happened in that country immediately after that time frame...

-soD

I don't know about "immediately" and it doesn't necessarily mean the same effect will happen in Russia. The vast majority of countries with hyperinflation did not start a world war...

But, hyperinflation is bad news and who knows how Russia would deal with it.

I find it fascinating and have some authentic $500 trillion dollar notes! (Zimbabwe dollars, not US...)

[IamIan]

Just a historic tibit I found a little interesting.

US Gasoline Price .. 1950 to 2010 ..
Pump $ Price at that time.
The 2012 $ inflation adjusted price.
The 60 year average of that 2012 $ inflation adjusted price.

[darcane]

Originally Posted by IamIan

Just a historic tibit I found a little interesting.

US Gasoline Price .. 1950 to 2010 ..
Pump $ Price at that time.
The 2012 $ inflation adjusted price.
The 60 year average of that 2012 $ inflation adjusted price.

Interesting, but I'm not sure how valid the numbers are.

"inflation adjusting" is typically based off the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The CPI leaves off large segments of the economy, so it's a little off anyways, but one of those segments is energy, which includes gasoline.

So, using an Index that ignores gasoline to adjust the price of gasoline is inherently flawed IMO.

[user removed]

It's 10 to one in 1950, but a 1964 silver quarter was worth 14 times face value earlier this year and that was selling it to a dealer. Realistically based on the price in the mid 1960s, about 30 cents a gallon, it should be $4.20 today. Silver has dropped to just over $10 wholesale, which would be $3 a gallon.

I spent about $8.20 on gas last week. Not including the gas I drained out of the scooter since it was 5 months old, put it in the wifes car, well diluted. 90 miles on the scooter since July.

regards
mech

[freebeard]

If it curtails the environmental destruction caused by fracking, then we should be willing to tolerate a lot of downside. Too bad about the unemployment.


US Lawmakers to Gazprom: Keep Sending Gas to Ukraine or Face Sanctions — Ukraine owes Gazprom billions of dollars

The US Senate has declared that it will impose more sanctions, if Russia stops delivering natural gas to Ukraine who are in arrears to the tune of 3 billion dollars. Why doesn't Congress just pay their bill for them?

1998 and 2014: Russian crisis in perspective

“If you compare this crisis to 1998, the Russian economy is like night and day. In those days we had an eight percent deficit, the economy wasn’t growing, and the country had no reserves. Today, it is running a triple trade surplus and a budget surplus of two percent, and it has more than two years of currency reserves,” Ben Aris, Editor and Publisher of Business New Europe, told RT.

Russia is spending their US dollars for gold. See where this is going?

[Fat Charlie]

Originally Posted by darcane

So, using an Index that ignores gasoline to adjust the price of gasoline is inherently flawed IMO.

As flawed as the CPI is, isolating the variable that you're measuring for makes good sense- you don't want the gas price to be affecting the baseline that you're measuring gas prices against.