Written by Mitch Rheingold   

Every day I keep expecting gas prices at my local gas station to drop. Why? The price of crude oil has dropped from $106 a barrel from about a month and half ago ago to around $82.00 today, and yet, for some inexplicable reason, California gas prices have barely dropped. The rest of the country has dropped but not California. Is it possible we have another “Enrongate” going on here where there is some market collusion to keep our prices high in the biggest gas market in the United States? The price of gas was around $3.75 a gallon when crude was last at $82.00 a barrel. So why is it still stuck at around $4.20 in California?

The reason in the press is that,by coincidence, four of the biggest refineries all are doing maintenance. I find that amazing that four of the larger refiners all decided to due maintenance at the same time. That maintenance is bringing millions of extra profit to the oil companies especially when the cost of their commodity has recently plunged.

California legislators, CNN, Fox, and MSNBC should do some investigative reporting on this potential collusion. After all, four refiners control 68% of the California refinery market so it would not be hard for the oil companies to collude and manipulate prices. I must say I amazed at the lack of outrage by consumers,the media,and our lawmakers. Let’s figure out what these guys are up to folks?