More than half of it is tax, so that money is economically 'neutral'. Doubling prices will always affect the economy. The longer it doesn't the deeper the fall when it does.
Yea thats probably true Also there is no srong positive corellation between rising oil and rising gas prices. Gas is still in the high 2's while oil has surged. Even if oil hits 150 will gas prices shoot to $5? Um probably not. And if gas goes to $4 will it be a dissaster? No it won't/ The American consumer will keep on spending, the dow will keep going higher, and all will be good. The europeans are accustomed to paying a lot for gas and so are Americans.
That is just nut job with oil around 100 and gas is still around 2 to 3 dollar a gallon; when did refineries become an charity organization?
Absolutely. Just one example: transportation costs would skyrocket on the trucking side. Trucking is already struggling in many ways as an industry. Rail is actually doing very well and projected to do even better as fuel costs skyrocket because it can transport 3X the load for a given amount of fuel compared to trucking...
The price of oil is only about 55% of the cost of the cost of a gallon of gas. From what I've read, there's not a huge correlation to any one aspect of the industry...
Here's a great article by an economist explaining why we can even better handle $100 oil for anyone int'd. (This is a very good blog btw.) http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2007/10/energy-efficient-economy-can-handle-100.html