Gas prices -- symptom or sin

(This is a stretch for a community thinking blog - but)

Walking this morning and happened to glance a sign at a station/store that said gas was now $2.47 a gallon for my type. Yesterday, same station, it was $2.39. Wonder how the supply/demand curve changed overnight for that increase to take place?

Anyway the current run up in gasoline prices, Again, is aggravating and I also believe it is dangerous. There are lots of trial balloons being launched to convince the American people we are beginning to see the end of the recession. I hope we are. But, the businesses that see an opportunity to cash in in the chaos of economic troubles may find ways to make the predictions of an end of the recession more fiction than fact. My problem here is that there is less money available to average American house holds. In fact, the headlines in this morning's paper indicate the American families have lost $1.3 trillion in wealth during this economic downturn. That is money that has disappeared -- it is not money that has been stored waiting for a change in circumstances -- it is money we no longer have. And, when certain staple items begin to not just creep up in price but soar in price (as gasoline has been doing the past three weeks)we are again faced with depleted resources. Faced with less available money how can we expect consumers to help spend the way out of this recession?

Big banks have been recognized for their greed, though they do seem to be getting off without much downside. Major car companies have been embarrassed for their lousy management, though that management has been rewarded with taxpayer funds. So, what is the profit picture of the major oil companies, most of which have no national allegiance whatsoever? They are making more money than ever with plans to continue making more than ever without a care as to ultimate effects. I know there are many who will say -- that is the capitalistic way and that is the way we want it -- free markets are self regulating. That may be -- but we know full well that the markets are not free. Every couple of days when the prices of gas go up by nearly the exact hundredth of a cent at stations around the country (supposedly supplied by competing companies)we have to understand we are not operating in a free market environment.

It seems to me that many companies have been using these times of economic uncertainty as an opportunity to raise prices, cut costs, decrease service and blame every entity but themselves for the economic mess. It seems to me that if we are going to build communities it is going to take all of our organizations, all of our sectors of community and all of us individually to identify a common good that is at least as important as our individual bottom lines. It appears to me that if some new kind of paradigm is not accepted, and implemented pretty quickly, the recovery for which we are hoping might be years instead of months in arriving.

Now, I wonder how I could get all that from gas prices up eight cents over night?