Makes sense to me.

  • clarence_chapman
    Hastings, MN Lake Isabel activist
    Posts: 1345
    #1249918

    This makes a lot of sense~ read to the end!!!

    A man eats two eggs each morning for breakfast. When he goes to the grocery store he pays .60 cents a dozen. Since a dozen eggs won’t last a week he normally buys two dozens at a time.

    One day while buying eggs he notices that the price has risen to 72 cents. The next time he buys groceries, eggs are .76 cents a dozen. When asked to explain the price of eggs the store owner says, “the price has gone up and I have to raise my price accordingly”.

    This store buys 100 dozen eggs a day. I checked around for a better price and all the distributors have raised their prices. The distributors have begun to buy from the huge egg farms. The small egg farms have been driven out of business.

    The huge egg farms sells 100,000 dozen eggs a day to distributors. With no competition, they can set the price as they see fit. The distributors then have to raise their prices to the grocery stores. And on and on and on. As the man kept buying eggs the price kept going up. He saw the big egg trucks delivering 100 dozen eggs each day. Nothing changed there.

    He checked out the huge egg farms and found they were selling 100,000 dozen eggs to the distributors daily. Nothing had changed but the price of eggs.

    Then week before Thanksgiving the price of eggs shot up to $1.00 a dozen. Again he asked the grocery owner why and was told, “cakes and baking for the holiday”. The huge egg farmers know there will be a lot of baking going on and more eggs will be used. Hence, the price of eggs goes up. Expect the same thing at Christmas and other times when family cooking, baking, etc. happen.

    This pattern continues until the price of eggs is 2.00 a dozen. The man says,”there must be something we can do about the price of eggs”.

    He starts talking to all the people in his town and they decide to stop buying eggs. This didn’t work because everyone needed eggs. Finally, the man suggested only buying what you need.

    He ate 2 eggs a day. On the way home from work he would stop at the grocery and buy two eggs. Everyone in town started buying 2 or 3 eggs a day.

    The grocery store owner began complaining that he had too many eggs in his cooler. He told the distributor that he didn’t need any eggs. Maybe wouldn’t need any all week.

    The distributor had eggs piling up at his warehouse. He told the huge egg farms that he didn’t have any room for eggs and would not need any for at least two weeks.

    At the egg farm, the chickens just kept on laying eggs.

    To relieve the pressure, the huge egg farm told the distributor that they could buy the eggs at a lower price. The distributor said, ” I don’t have the room for the eggs even if they were free”.

    The distributor told the grocery store owner that he would lower the price of the eggs if the store would start buying again. The grocery store owner said, “I don’t have room for more eggs. The customers are only buying 2 or
    3 eggs at a time”. “Now if you were to drop the price of eggs back down to the original price, the customers would start buying by the dozen again”.

    The distributors sent that proposal to the huge egg farmers. They liked the price they were getting for their eggs but, them chickens just kept on laying.

    Finally, the egg farmers lowered the price of their eggs. But only a few cents. The customers still bought 2 or 3 eggs at a time. They said, “when the price of eggs gets down to where it was before, we will start buying by the dozen.”

    Slowly the price of eggs started dropping. The distributors had to slash their prices to make room for the eggs coming from the egg farmers. The egg farmers cut their prices because the distributors wouldn’t buy at a higher price than they were selling eggs for.

    Anyway, they had full warehouses and wouldn’t need eggs for quite a while.

    And them chickens kept on laying.

    Eventually, the egg farmers cut their prices because they were throwing away eggs they couldn’t sell. The distributors started buying again because the eggs were priced to where the stores could afford to sell them at the lower price.

    And the customers starting buying by the dozen again.

    Now, transpose this analogy to the gasoline industry.

    What if everyone only bought $10.00 worth of gas each time they pulled to the pump. The dealers tanks would stay semi full all the time. The dealers wouldn’t have room for the gas coming from the huge tank farms. The tank farms wouldn’t have room for the gas coming from the refining plants. And the refining plants wouldn’t have room for the oil being off loaded from the huge tankers coming from the Middle East.

    Just $10.00 each time you buy gas. Don’t fill it up. You may have to stop for gas twice a week but, the price should come down.

    Think about it.

    As an added note…When I buy $10.00 worth of gas,that leaves my tank a little under half full. The way prices are jumping around, you can buy gas for $2.65 a gallon and then the next morning it can be $2.15. If you have your tank full of $2.65 gas you don’t have room for the $2.15 gas. You might not understand the economics of only buying two eggs at a time but, you can’t buy cheaper gas if your tank is full of the high priced stuff.

    Also, don’t buy anything else at the gas station, don’t give them any more of your hard earned money than what you spend on gas, until the prices come down..

    skhartke
    Somerset, WI
    Posts: 1416
    #441055

    Quote:


    Just $10.00 each time you buy gas. Don’t fill it up. You may have to stop for gas twice a week but, the price should come down.



    Unfortunately, this would mean I would have to stop 3 times every two days. Not gonna happen. Other than that I don’t think it sound too crazy.

    suzuki
    Woodbury, Mn
    Posts: 18625
    #441059

    Dude, that’s how I have been buying gas for years! Chickens cant stop laying eggs but the gas companies can control production so the analogy is not quite the same. If it can work I’m already on board.

    ryan-hale
    NW Ia
    Posts: 1548
    #441061

    Heck I’ve been putting $5-$10.00 worth of gas in my vehicles for a long time.The only other thing I buy at gas stations is a few sodas and beers from time to time.
    Ryan Hale

    fishingscout
    Saint Paul
    Posts: 156
    #441063

    The concept is flawed.

    If the egg consumption doesn’t change then the supply surplus or shortage won’t change, it doesn’t matter if you frequently buy a little or rarely buy a large amount.

    The price will go down if you reduce the demand or increase the supply.

    gary_wellman
    South Metro
    Posts: 6057
    #441065

    I hear ya Clarence.

    You are not that far off either………from the facts……..There was a “farmers organization” back in the 60s and 70s that tried to control the prices the government was setting by witholding their crops/animals. I forget the name of the group………It was a “crazy” time in life…….Almost mafia style of trying to control prices……..

    gordonk
    mpls
    Posts: 145
    #441067

    Your analogy is partly correct. Merely buying the same amount in smaller lumps won’t affect anything, but conservation will. Find ways to cut back just five percent and you’ll see the price dropping. Also, the price currently is way too, high. Speculators have run the price up ten to twenty dollars over “fair value”. The last time they took profits, crude fell twelve dollars. I think (hope) we’re getting close to that again.

    birddog
    Mn.
    Posts: 1957
    #441068

    Unfotunatly 10.00 worth of gas in my truck at 2.70 a gal isn’t enough gas to get me very far, 60 miles or so…that would mean stopping every day for gas. Better off filling up today because it’s more likely to be more expensive tomorrow. The only way the price of gas is going to drop is if people stop buying gas…and that ain’t happening!

    BIRDDOG

    gonefishing
    Lacrosse Wi
    Posts: 495
    #441074

    The news just showed the price of gas around the world. Would you believe 12 cents a gallon in Venezuela? From 4 to 7 dollars overseas. We were stationed in Spain in the middle 80s and gas there was 3.25 a gallon then but we had gas coupons from the military so we could get it at reasonable prices.

    lenny_jamison
    Bay City , WI
    Posts: 4001
    #441079

    Quote:


    The news just showed the price of gas around the world. Would you believe 12 cents a gallon in Venezuela? From 4 to 7 dollars overseas. We were stationed in Spain in the middle 80s and gas there was 3.25 a gallon then but we had gas coupons from the military so we could get it at reasonable prices.


    I believe Venezuela has their own sustaining supply of ethanol made from sugar cane. They mandated ethanol in their vehicles years ago (I believe in the ’80s) and are now reaping the benefits. They must be commended on their foresight.

    ERIKJ
    Chaska, MN
    Posts: 133
    #440881

    Gator Hunter,

    Sorry but, Venezuela is a founding member of OPEC and one of the largest oil exporting countries in the world. They could care less about ethanol. Why in the world would they use it when it takes substantial subsidies here to make it economically viable to produce it.

    EJ

    Jon Stevens
    Northfield, Wi
    Posts: 1242
    #441100

    Venezuela also has a lot of refinerys. They are our 4th largest provider……. Didn’t Pat Robertson want Chavez assasinated not too long ago?

    mikem
    SE Minnesota
    Posts: 200
    #441201

    Was about $5 gal. in Ireland in 94.

    mossydan
    Cedar Rapids, Iowa
    Posts: 7727
    #441222

    One of the ways to get prices down is to use less gasoline. If everyone bought $10.00 worth everytime they had to stop that would show the oil companies and everyone involved that people are organized and they would take notice but they would only take notice of whats happening and i doubt the price would drop much if at all. If this was done and also we bought less gas, the combination of the two would tell them that the prices have to drop to where they were a year or two ago for them to sell more gas and to keep making absorbent profits, they would be forced to take a decent profit instead of an absorbent profit. They have no incentive to drop prices now when they can make just as much or more profit with the supposed oil shortage as they did a year ago. Theres a couple of ways to drop prices, one is put the politicians family plans in a vice and turn the handle and the other is buy less gas. The dairy farmers down here in the 1930’s in rural Iowa did this by hanging the federal judge to get higher prices for thier milk. They were pouring it out on the ground and tried to get help so they could afford to sell thier milk and make a living and nobody would listen. After they had that party the price of milk went up. No ones going to be able to get anything done unless you threaten and then do something about it. I heard on the radio where all during this time of the prices going up the government was putting 2 million barrels of oil a day into reserves. Now our president thinks it (may) be a good idea to put this oil on the market to slow the panic pricing, why because he knows that people are getting mad, why does he care? because its organized people going to put thier votes in other places, thats all and to them thats enough for them to do someting about it. Theres some people still making alot of money during this supposed non manufactured oil shortage. I could go on and some know how i feel about this but i won’t. Yes buy less gasoline to help bring prices back down but tell the politicians to tell opec to do it too or they will be looking for a new job, they will. Organize now and they will know where thier votes are going to go when it comes election time. I think alot of Chuck Grassley, the republican senator from Iowa here, he has the best record of any senator from any state on attending meetings but as of now im voting democrate this time to tell them that Americas needs reasonable (not cheap) oil to run on until an alternative can be found and i doubt wheather he has anything to do with the price of gasoline but if he gets worried about his re-electian hes going to talk to the president. If all the senators and congressmen are worried about thier votes they all will talk to the president too. When you tell a public official that he may have to look for a new job they will listen and do what they have to do. Do it now and you’ll see reasonable oil in 6 months maximum, election time is right around the corner.

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