Fuel up/down again

running a car is a luxary, lol wat?

it's for use to get to work, can't see how it's a luxary, the reason why people can't afford to drive is because of the fuel prices, which means they don't bother looking for work and find out that it's better to be on the dole. Businesses go under due to not meeting profit margins as money is being spent on fuel taxes.
 
Eating is a necessity, running a car isn't.

You only find yourself in the need to use a car to get to work because you've decided to live away from the place you work, this will be on the basis you want a better quality of life.
 
I'd not be able to get to work which is 75 miles away!!.. at the moment I pay 131.9/l which is the cheapest near me, and I FILL my car every 3 days at a cost of £60.

I'm just breaking even at the end of each month!! :(

There's no Bus service from my house to work and the nearest train station is a Taxi ride (well 2 taxi rides.. one from my house to Swindon, and the other from the nearest to Uxbridge to work!!)...

Nice.. way to make me bankrupted in the space of 6 months!!...

At the moment... 1) We can't sell our Flat as its in Negative Equity, 2) Because we're in negative Equity we can't afford to move closer to Uxbridge!!
 
I lived closer to work before, and the circumstances don't change you still end up paying the same amount for fuel even if you lived 20 miles away. for example my workplace is in tidworth a very small town not many shops, which means i have to drive 20 miles down the road to do the shopping, spent the same amount of fuel even though i was closer to work, people shouldn't be forced to move to make fuel cheaper.

i like many others just break it even at the end of the month.
 
Eating is a necessity, running a car isn't.

You only find yourself in the need to use a car to get to work because you've decided to live away from the place you work, this will be on the basis you want a better quality of life.

So running a car isn't so how would you get to work.

lets say i took your car away, and you lived 25 miles away.

Now what?
 
Whilst I realise that like most posts you make these days (For example that silly one about throwing away 15p off fuel vouchers) it is designed to make us all think 'Wow, that Firestar guy is so rich and succesful', I'll skip over that and answer it at face value.

High fuel prices are not good for many people - even those of us like me, who isn't bothered by fuel prices because I don't do big miles, or you, who isn't bothered by fuel prices because you are fabulously wealthy and remind us all you work in oil and gas 3 times a day. High fuel prices harm economic output - it puts more pressure on the day to day costs of business and consumers alike. There is a clear link between periods of high fuel prices and periods of low or negative growth in an economy.

High oil prices are not good long term for the oil industry, either. It gives short term gain at the expense of long term prosperity because the higher and more sustained fuel and oil prices are, the bigger the push and the drive for alternatives and the more of an issue efficiency become. In short, as fuel prices rise, demand for fuel falls, slowly at first, and then quite quickly as demand destruction begins to kick in. Saudi Arabia knows this - which is why its something of a price moderate within OPEC. Hyper-priced oil only benefits producers with small oil reserves, the theory being that by the time the effects of high oil prices begun to have a significant drag on the oil industry they'll have exhuasted the reserves anyway.

It is a common misconception that fuel is a completely price inelastic product. It's not. It's far from a price elastic product, either, but its a fallacy to beleive that price can continue to rise and people will have no choice but to pay it. It's simple - if fuel was £1000 a litre, almost nobody would buy it, if fuel is £1 a litre, almost everyone buys it, therefore there exists a pricepoint between these two where demand destruction kicks in.

The correct price for fuel is not 30p, nor it is £1.30 a litre. It's a balance between the two. Cheap fuel can be as destructive long term to an economy as expensive fuel. The cheaper fuel is, the more wasteful the public become with it and the less value people place on efficiency. This also makes them more vulnerable to price spikes - the Americans have seen the price of gas almost double in under 3 years. We have seen nothing like this level of percentage increase because the high tax content of our fuel price isolates us from the effect of global oil price spikes, to a certain degree. A 100% increase in the price of a household or business bill is more difficult to deal with than a 30% increase, regardless of the actual cost.


I don't think we need fuel at 70p a litre nor do I think we will ever see it again in our lifetimes. This doesn't mean that there are not unfair elements of fuel pricing, though. The key one is the fact that VAT is payable on the product price *and* the duty price. This is, IMHO, unfair. You are paying VAT - Value Added Tax - on an element of a product that does not add value. You are paying tax on, well, a tax.

I would therefore suggest two measures to redress the balance fuel wise.

Firstly, remove VAT on duty. Charge VAT only on the product price. This would immediatly reduce the price of a litre of fuel by 11p.

Secondly, Labours act of hiking duty by almost 10p in the months following the climbdown after the 2008 oil price spike was unjust and opportunistic. Repeal half of this. This would reduce the price of fuel again by 4p. I would argue that it is not appropriate to increase duty by inflation, given that a large part of the measure of inflation is fuel price itself. Increase fuel price, in turn increasing inflation, leading to increased fuel prices, in turn increasing inflation. Great. VAT take increases with increased fuel prices anyway, as does tax take on oil when oil prices increase, so it's not as if the government doesn't benefit from inflationary increases without increasing duty.

The net result of this would be unleaded fuel at 115p a litre and diesel fuel at 122p a litre. Not cheap by any means, but not disproportionately expensive either.

It will, however, never happen.

It is also completely misleading to compare fuel prices here with fuel prices in Europe, converted to Sterling. The Sterling is near record lows against the Euro and considerably down on the average exchange rate over the last 10 years. Put simply even though we pay a fortune for fuel when we go to Europe, the cost of fuel in France to a Frenchman paid in Euros is not as high as the cost of fuel in England to a Englishman paid in Sterling.
 
You only find yourself in the need to use a car to get to work because you've decided to live away from the place you work, this will be on the basis you want a better quality of life.

No, I, like many others, live where I can afford to live. Hence the car is a necessity.

No offence Firestar, but your posts reek of "I can afford it, so why can't others?". Whilst this is great for those with money, back in the real world, the economy is stalling because the average person cannot afford it.
 
No, I, like many others, live where I can afford to live. Hence the car is a necessity.

No offence Firestar, but your posts reek of "I can afford it, so why can't others?". Whilst this is great for those with money, back in the real world, the economy is stalling because the average person cannot afford it.

Perhaps but i'm simply fedup about people moaning about petrol prices, don't like it then do something productive about it.
 
I would cry if fuel ever reached £2.00/litre

It will in the next five years I think, presuming we dont increase oil production in the North Sea very quickly.
The reason being our currency worth is based off the dollar which is weakening meaning we will have higher prices in comparison globally. Demand globally is rising faster then production?


I get pay rises which take into account these sort of costs

Inflation will raise prices certainly, only a few with rising wages will be able to stay ahead of that rise. Working in the oil industry would probably help as it is a global market, same for a few jobs I guess

OPEC is said to be targeting $100 oil for example where as previously it was maybe 80 though obviously in 2008 it was 130 anyway
 
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Eating is a necessity, running a car isn't.

You only find yourself in the need to use a car to get to work because you've decided to live away from the place you work, this will be on the basis you want a better quality of life.

That is a fairly narrow minded way of looking at things. Do people only live by themselves?

What if there is 4 people in a house, do they all work at the same place? Or places with the same amount of distance from work.

Take OcUK for example, it is located on an industrial park by a dual carriage way. No buses run down there, the nearest houses must be at least 1.5-2 miles away.

Not to mention it is on a massive hill. Don't think I will be moving nearer just to give up a car.
 
That is a fairly narrow minded way of looking at things. Do people only live by themselves?

What if there is 4 people in a house, do they all work at the same place? Or places with the same amount of distance from work.

Take OcUK for example, it is located on an industrial park by a dual carriage way. No buses run down there, the nearest houses must be at least 1.5-2 miles away.

Not to mention it is on a massive hill. Don't think I will be moving nearer just to give up a car.

Perhaps it is slightly narrow minded, however peoples home / work locations have been shaped by the usage of cars, people now live further away from work than ever before, this is simply due to the fact they had a choice when the purchased a house or hunted for a job, car transport has always been cheap and convenient way of getting around. It never used to be like this, people used to live very close to work.

However what the above failed to identify (much like those who take out mortgages they can't afford), is a price rise will put them in the ****.

I know the OCUK location well, the closest housing estate is over the road, increase in fuel costs would only be an issue to existing staff, with that in mind i'm going with the above, otherwise you would attract new staff who could afford to get into work.
 
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Whether cars have shaped people's choices or not - the fact is that people rely on them and simply moving house just isn't viable for a variety of means.

Hence the car is a necessity. I mean come on, what would happen if cars were simply banned tomorrow? Would the country's public transport infrastructure even stand a chance of coping?
 
Perhaps but i'm simply fedup about people moaning about petrol prices, don't like it then do something productive about it.

This is it people try to, they cut down on other essentials to try and get to work, which in turns causes more financial problems. £1.50 is just ridiculous which makes it harder for my family.
 
If this country had any kind of "integrated" transport policy that would be a start, also if we built more affordable houses closer to where actually people needed them that would also be a positive.

Up until then the Governments attitude is people should "get on their bike (car)" and find a job, should people only limit themselves to a job that can be reached by public transport, if that's the case I would imagine millions of people would find themselves "out of a job".

HEADRAT
 
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