Bellyaching about gas prices is a lot like complaining about the weather. Forces much greater than us as individuals that we don't completely understand and can't fully account for or predict are at work.
The complaints of price gouging in Prince George go back at least a decade. A former Citizen columnist wrote continuously during the fall of 2003 about how outraged he was at having to pay the horrible sum of 85 cents per litre for gas.
85 cents!
Outrageous!
And we have this perfectly good refinery here, so we should be paying less than everyone else, goes the argument. Funny that local residents don't also demand their lumber and paper be dirt cheap, since we have the mills right here, but I digress.
There's a sense of entitlement that comes from many folks who believe it's their God-given right to enjoy cheap fuel at the pumps. Free enterprise supporters start talking out of the other side of their mouths over fuel prices, suddenly suggesting that the government - the government! - should have price controls on gas.
That's the quickest way to have gas at more than two bucks a litre, starting tomorrow. What do government price controls look like in practice? Stop by your government liquor store and see for yourself.
Despite the fact that local residents are paying a whopping single penny more than the national average for a litre of gas, the moans of protest are as active as they were 10 years ago.
Everybody loves a conspiracy so the idea that there must be some funny business going on makes perfect sense, except that it doesn't. It's called capitalism. When demand goes up, prices go up until it starts driving demand down. Prices rise in the summer months across Canada because people are driving more.
Gas station owners are forced to get more frequent deliveries and those deliveries cost money, so the price goes up. Gas station owners in Prince George and everywhere else deserve to make a living, like any other entrepreneur, by setting a price for their product that is competitive in the marketplace and that will generate a profit for their business. They do not operate as a non-profit charity, nor is it their responsibility to worry about those who are shocked by a 12 cents per litre increase overnight or how their prices compare to the price for a barrel of Texas crude.
Gas station owners are the ones taking the risk by investing in their business, with the hope that it will be profitable. As entrepreneurs, they put their money into land, equipment and staff, before anyone pulls into the station to fill up. That risk can turn badly for them (no one uses their station) or it can be rewarding (their station is popular). That's also the way capitalism works.
Capitalism gives consumers a powerful tool to control market price and that is by reducing consumption. That requires a level of personal sacrifice that few seem willing to make, hence the cries that the government should step in.
On a larger scale, Canadian oil and gas companies enjoy handsome profits, but this is a blessing to most Canadians, not a curse. Along with the hundreds of thousands of jobs in the energy sector across the country, if you own any mutual funds or you belong to a large pension fund, you're almost certainly earning money for your retirement on the quarterly profits and dividends paid by Canadian oil companies.
In other words, the profits of the oil and gas sector will pay for your lifestyle once you're finished working.
The only serious reason to hate gas prices is because of that ridiculous number after the decimal point. No other commodity is sold in the marketplace for a fraction of a penny. Since consumers have no means to pay for fuel in fractions of a penny, gas stations should not be allowed to advertise such a price.
Other than that, as drivers we should be more thankful we don't pay what Europeans pay for the same litre of gas and stop comparing ourselves to our under-taxed American cousins.
