Be Fair to OPEC?

Hurting suppliers is not the point. OPEC will still have most of the world’s oil. Its members will still make hundreds of billions of dollars in windfall profits simply because they have the good fortune to sit on virtually 100 percent of the remaining cheap oil. That should be enough. Those countries don’t need cartel prices too.

Exxon and the other non-OPEC suppliers will make money just as other businesses do. They have no right to expect a free ride on OPEC’s monopoly prices. But unless someone catches them price gouging, we should leave them alone. They will have good years and bad years.

Consumers should be free to organize to break free of their fossil-fuel addiction if they so choose. That this will deflate monopoly prices is no reason to bail out oil companies.

Also remember that the country hurt most by OPEC is India. Why should poor third world countries suffer so OPEC’s sheikhs can build palaces? A competitive oil price is more than fair to OPEC.