White House Explains Transport-Energy Future

blair1q writes "Today on the White House Blog, the President (ok, his staff) released an infographic showing various facts about transportation energy, and how current gas prices need not be so worrisome. Highlights include rapidly increasing domestic production and rapidly decreasing prices for electric-car batteries, requesting Congress to shift tax breaks from oil producers to wind/solar/geothermal energy producers, and increasing domestic oil production (yes, there's a conflict there)."

Anybody believe this?

[operagost]

How do we expect to continue increasing oil production when he's not approving permits? The fact is, people are not going to be able to afford heating oil and gas for their home this winter.

Um... It is about EROEI

[Colin Smith]

The amount of energy you get out compared to the amount you put in.

Oil from Saudi huge. Oil from Canada, not so much.

The lower EROEI is, the larger the proportion of the economy must be dedicated to energy production.
 

Re:Something blowing (in the wind)

[oGMo]

And then charge us for how many miles we drive because gas consumption decreases. As discussed yesterday. [slashdot.org] Move us to clean energy and then tax the wind.

Or not, for those with a clue [slashdot.org]. But sure, if those conspiracy theories are what give meaning to your life, keep believing them.

Re:Domestic production?

[Surt]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]

134 billion barrels known, just requires more work/legislation to get at some of it. So 18 years. Still, your children would get to experience a Mad-Max style collapse of civilization.

Re:Can we please get bicycle tax credits?

[rwa2]

Lets get tax credits for every mile that we ride on a bicycle. That should help solve these problems.

Mark

Already done since 2009: http://www.bikeleague.org/news/100708faq.php [bikeleague.org]

Ask your employer about it!

Oil company "subsidies"

[Kohath]

Detailed here [powerlineblog.com]:

1) oil depletion allowance, [which is only available to smaller, independent companies, not "big oil"]
2) expensing indirect drilling costs, [which is an accelerated expensing schedule. It changes the timing of expense writeoffs, not the amount.] and
3) a tax credit for taxes paid to foreign nations during foreign operations (foreign tax credit) [which every multinational company gets, not just oil companies.]

When you hear about oil company "subsidies", this is what they're talking about.

Re:Lower Taxes & Cut Regulations. Poison the E

[lowflying]

So how do I parse these "liberal guys" from CATO, published in Forbes, saying that [forbes.com] oil and gas firms get special tax breaks?

"Another significant tax break allows companies to accelerate the deductions of the costs of labor and various other inputs associated with drilling oil or gas wells. Now, there's nothing wrong with deducting the cost of doing business from one's tax bill. In other industries these expenses would be capitalized and deducted over time as income is earned. But in the oil and gas sector, the tax code allows oil and gas firms to deduct 70% of these expenses in the very first year of a well's operation and the remainder over the next five years."

Or this guy over at The Volokh Conspiracy claiming that [volokh.com]:

"The best example is the percentage depletion allowance which, as applied in some cases, enables oil companies greater depreciation than the value of the initial investment."

Because, I wouldn't want to look dumb and uneducated, thereby hurting my claim.

Re:Domestic production?

[Americium]

It's impossible to get cheaper prices by increasing prices (taxing imports). With the current rate of monetary expansion it's impossible for oil prices to go down. Unless the dollar stops falling in value we won't be getting cheap oil anytime soon.

Re:Domestic production?

[WillAffleckUW]

You'd be wrong. Texas is actually a purple state, slightly blue, that was gerrymandered into a red state.

(but then I'm a Texan)

Re:Anybody believe this?

[d34thm0nk3y]

How do we expect to continue increasing oil production when he's not approving permits? The fact is, people are not going to be able to afford heating oil and gas for their home this winter.

Obama administration approves fourth Gulf deepwater drilling permit [thehill.com]

Re:Is there anything in there about suburbs?

[HeckRuler]

I was skeptical at first, and then I hit this:

Imagine if there was no FDR, the recession of 1929 could go the route of the recession of 1921 and there would be no public projects and no Great Depression (which is not going to seem so great once the current one really hits with the debt and currency crisis).

Which just shows that you're out of your gourd.

You're just a fear-mongering conservative trying to push your agenda, or have succumb to that ilk. Who modded this up?

Re:Anybody believe this?

[causality]

1) Have you ever even filed your own taxes? Do you not know how tax credits work? You make it sound like you think that the government cuts you a check if you come up negative.

They do, actually. If you come up negative, the tax return you receive after filing is greater than the sum total of income taxes you paid that year. Though technically they probably won't cut you a check. In most cases they will deposit the money electronically into your account. So maybe that was your point?

Jests aside, it's a form of welfare though we strongly prefer not to call it that. It'd be easier for us all to admit that there's something seriously wrong with our economic system if mass media openly acknowledged that some 40% or more of all adults are receiving a type of federal welfare. Most people who work for a living, pay their bills, etc. would like to feel independent, and would not like to think of themselves as welfare recipients.

A more neutral (though also loaded) term would be "redistribution of wealth". Euphemisms like that help keep the average person from realizing that we're seriously doing something wrong. That, in turn, preserves the status quo and that seems to be the only thing that matters to the people who run the show.

Re:Not a speculation problem

[slashqwerty]

Who pays corporate income tax in the end? You do, by paying more for that corporation's products.

The price is set by supply and demand. When demand far exceeds supply, as it does with oil, taxes don't figure into the price, they just cut into the oil company's very substantial profits.

I don't know where you come up with the $26 billion figure. What I have found is Exxon claiming they pay substantial taxes and proving it by pointing to sales taxes and payroll taxes.