ExxonMobil has grossed over 100 billion in profits (more than walmart), think boycotting them would help?
339460
Gas prices are set based on production,not demand.Boycotting would be a waste of time.
917333
A good american corporation that has gone global is Wal-Mart, it helps and hinders the ecomony at the same time, here is some sites on the arugments                           http://walmartfacts.com/   http://www.walmartsucks.org/                            http://www.walmart-blows.com/
775294
I have read the book and seen the film High cost of Low prices.  I boycott them because they send American jobs overseas.  Because they treat their eimployees like crap.  Because of the slave labor and child labor.  They are very greedy and evil.\n\nI am poor and thier prices are decent, but I just can't support the things they do.
257294
If these companies weren't so greedy and always thinking about profits all the time...americans needs jobs, too.  The state in which I live in have offered some companies here very nice incentives for them to stay instead of moving operations to Mexico or somewhere where is are plenty of cheap labor.  There are too many greedy companies and corporations out there.  Seriously, what are they going to do with all that money?
300409
...just some quotes...\n\nBP\nCommenting to the BBC on its own figures, BP chief executive Lord Browne said the company's profits had been "magnified enormously by the high price of oil, high refining margins, and high gas prices". "We of course first of all make most of our money in what I think most people would regard as the wholesale market - that is the production of oil and gas - not in the refining and sales of petrol and so forth," Lord Browne said. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4688106.stm\n\nExxon Mobil, Shell Profits Soar as Oil Prices Surge to Record \nOct. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Exxon Mobil Corp., Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Marathon Oil Corp. posted record net income as demand growth and supply disruptions caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita lifted energy prices to unprecedented highs. Profit at Exxon Mobil, the world's biggest publicly traded oil producer, jumped 75 percent to an industry record of $9.92 billion, the company said today in a statement. The Hague-based Shell set the previous profit record about six hours earlier, when it said net income rose 68 percent to $9 billion.\nhttp://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000006&sid=aaD5XaibDV48&refer=home\n\n...end of the quotes...\n\nPlease peruse the URL's to get the dates and maintain a true perspective.  Seems that when crude prices escalate and the oil companies have to charge more, they make even more...in otherwords they use the price hike as an excuse to overcharge us.  Of course we pay it.  There doesn't seem to be a better way to do this...If we federally regulate the oil prices then the supply will diminish. We will literally run out of gas.  If prices are regulated, the oil companies will only buy in quantities of which is still profitable leaving us with empty pumps like in the days of the gas shortages.  This is a free enterprise system and it just works that way.  If you want to be on the profit taking side instead of just the paying end, you are free to buy stock in the major oil companies as well.  \n\nWe are only victims in the system if we choose to be; not participating fully makes us a victim--participating empowers us.  It's like voting...if you don't vote you don't count.  Buy even a little stock in Exxon, Mobil, Shell, BP (just one share of even one of them) and see if your viewpoint doesn't change a little the next time you read news of crude prices rising or ethanol e-85 being adopted or automotive manufacturers moving towards hydrogen, etc.\n\nPlay the game.  Don't be a victim.
1129497
Yes, i agree. They did it for greed and oil. Haliburton makes billions a day because we went in. And They are buddied up with the Bush administration. It is sad how much power the big corporations have over our government.
562396
Bush and the oil companies record profits. If there wasn't record profits there wouldn't be any problem. They are gouging America, and Bush is allowing it to happen.
337489
We should riot against the oil companies. Their the most greedy people I've ever seen or heard of. \n\nThe oil companies need to go under strong investigation (not governmental investigation cause the government could care less about us) Whoever is found out (how ever many people that is) that have raised gas prices to where certain families struggle to get to school and work should be immediately forced to donate ALL their money and be thrown in prison awaiting the public's vote on what to do to them. -- that sounds a little extreme but the oil companies have ruined so many lives that they deserve it.
436573
Good for you, as you are on the right track.  If everyone decided to take two days off from work, say a thursday and friday and for those two days and the weekend no one drives or uses gas what the impact would be.  OPEC TO THE KNEES begging us to take their crude on the buy one get one free plan.  I have often said the same thing you did but I think billboards and a planned event of 'JUST STOP'.  This would be an event, if it could be pulled off, that would change the manner the oil people do business.  After all, look at what they do to their customers, me and you.  Do you think they would care after 4 continual days of no sales at the pumps??  There has to be more like us and when the number grows to be significant that are willing to perform such a simple task to such a major impacting event we will again be in control.  Where did we lose it, by hanging our heads and bitching every time we fuel.  The station attendant has nothing to do with it so I tell people, if you are going to do nothing about it don't bitch cause I do not want to hear it.  Bless you as I thought I was the only one with that philosophy.  There is hope.
1022089
Absolutely not.\n\nhttp://www.walmartmovie.com/\n\nYou want an explaination - go to that site and get a copy of that movie. You will never shop at Wal-Mart again.\n\nWal-Mart does not create jobs - it creates more cases of unemployement. It forces other businesses, especially locally owned businesses, to close because they cannot compete with Wal-Mart. Sure, they hire a bunch of people when a store opens, but because they are putting other businesses out of business the unemployement rate stays the same.\n\nAnd a local business cannot just lower their prices to compete with Wal-Mart. It's not that easy. Wal-Mart gets HUGE government funding to build their stores and keep their business running, but the little guy, the small business owner isn't allowed such luxuries.\n\nWal-Mart has also been very bad about hiring illegal immigrants - taking jobs away from American citizen living in communities. And whatever you've been told - not all Walmart products are made in the U.S.A. They pay a lot of Chinese workers next to nothing to produce goods for their stores.\n\nAnd did you know... there is an employee emergency relief fund that Wal-Mart has created for their employees and their employees have given MILLIONS of dollars to this fund, but the owners of Wal-Mart, the Waltons, who are billionaires, gave only $6,000 in one year.\n\nMost Wal-Mart employees are not well paid. Most of them can't even afford to enroll in the company's health insurance program. What does Wal-Mart tell them to do? They are refered to government funded programs. So the taxes you pay from your job help Wal-Mart employees get health care - it sounds noble and all, but it is money that could be spent on more important things like education, but since Wal-Mart doesn't want to give their employees affordable health care the American public pays for it instead.\n\nThese are just a few reasons.\n\nhttp://www.walmartmovie.com/\n\nWatch it.\n\nWal-Mart was NOT made by a black guy and why would that make it any better or worse?
884531
It's a bad idea.  Yet it makes a great point in alerting the public to a corporate structure that seems to be taking over every country it can gain access to.  Perhaps Wal-mart is owned by the government & they just want it to look like a private enterprise?  Things that make ya go hmmm!  :o)
317053
disagree. fine those who ruin the environment use that money to give tax breaks to clean companies and business.
458065
I don't mind profits.  However, it illustrates how anti-trust law in the US failed.  Exxon was originally part of Rockfeller's Standard Oil over a century ago.  It was broken up due to the excessive influence that the company had as a monopoly. Over time, it has reformed back into the beast it was and, once again, is excessively influencing the markets.\n\nNotably, it should be criminal that Exxon's profits and still refuses to pay the jury's $5 billion award to fisherman from the Exxon-Valdez Oil Spill from 1989.  The abuse of the courts illustrates a complete disregard for the legal process as well as excessive corporate influence in the court system.
196972
Nay, it will never work.  Wal-mart would make to much money if they didn't sell it.  And a protest wouldn't work either as Wal-Mart is to convient for people.  \n\nAnd they family values is BS.  Saw II isn't a family movie and they have no problem with it being sold there.  I hate it when they push their homophobic agenda and try to cloak it with it just being 'family values'.
320049
there are too many ignorant people in this world to organize a proficient boycott. It would work though!
316100
From basic economics, a price ceiling would just cause massive shortages and gas lines just as you saw in the 1970s.  It's trading one problem for another problem.  Whether this is desirable is debatable.  There are price ceilings for various things out there, such as rent.  There's some info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_ceiling\n\nYour other solution about boycotting just one company is just another urban legend floating around.\n\nBoycotting Exxon isn't going to work to bring down prices.  If everyone stopped buying from Exxon and used the other providers, then the other providers would run out of gas pretty quickly due to supply and demand chain effects.  What would happen is that they would buy their gas from Exxon and overall all prices would go up, not down.\n\nFull mythbuster at Snopes.\n\nhttp://www.snopes.com/politics/gasoline/gasout.asp\n\nTo lower gas prices, you have to lower demand, which includes things like carpooling, public transportation, alternative sources of energy, and better milage vehicles.
444714
"Reasonable" is completely subjective.  Exxon's profit margins have floated between 5-10% for the last 20 years.  The nominal amount of profit has gone up because their raw materials (crude oil) have gone up in price.  They should actually scale linearly with the price of crude oil assuming fixed net margins.\n\nTheir profit margin is actually pretty small compared to other companies.  It's just that they do massive sales.  370B in the ttm.  Even McDonald's (symbol MCD has higher margins).\n\nI posted a more complete argument over here: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Agt6_O2xvS55gC8q24AuWYfsy6IX?qid=1006042628391\n\nAnyway, the question seems so one-sided that any form of logical argument isn't going to convince you.