site map
C O L O U R K E 'Y

news and comment
oil

  the real price of subsidised filthy oil in the west

“Consider this: in 1929, an average American would have had to pay 1.49 per cent of her or his annual income of $84.90 to buy a barrel of crude oil, which then sold for $1.27. Fifty years later, in the wake of the Iranian revolution, oil prices soared to $31.61. But the annual earnings of the average American rose had risen even more sharply, to $7,956. That meant that a barrel of oil would cost them just 0.39 per cent of their earnings – a quarter of what it did in 1929.

“The numbers for recent years are even more revealing. In 2008, oil prices soared to $96.91 – very similar to now. But the average American earned $35,931 that year, which means a barrel of oil would cost them 0.26 per cent of their earnings: well below what it would have in the oil-shock 1970s.”

the web address for this article is
https://www.abelard.org/news/oil032011.php#oil_subsidies_040311

advertising
disclaimer

advertising
disclaimer

advertising
disclaimer

email email_abelard [at] abelard.org

© abelard, 2011, 5 march
all rights reserved

variable words
prints as increasing A4 pages (on my printer and set-up)