Examine big picture on gas prices

In Martin Schram's Aug. 4 column ("Where's the outrage over Exxon-Mobil profits?"), he decries the "fiscal misery of ordinary Americans who fill up at the pump" and the "soaring" profits of the major oil companies. Mr. Schram promotes conservation as the solution to this "maddening" situation - one he feels has been ignored by Washington and the reporters who cover the White House. He asserts that these outrageous profits are occurring "... at a time when Americans are paying record-high prices at the gas pump."

Schram overlooked that these "record-high" gas prices are unadjusted for inflation. When so adjusted, they are not outrageously high at all. An Internet inflation calculator reveals that a gallon of regular gas that sold for 33 cents in 1955 and 61 cents in 1975 would sell for $2.30 today.

Schram is correct that conservation is certainly needed. However, the ready availability and historically reasonable price of a gallon of gasoline provide little incentive to conserve.

Unless conservation is mandated (gasoline rationing anyone?), it will not act to solve our dependence on foreign sources. Gasoline in Europe is more than double the price it is here, and two-thirds of that is taxes. Taxes are only 20 percent here. Were the price of gasoline at the pump in the United States to increase in real terms - after adjustment for inflation - there would then be a meaningful incentive to conserve.

The "record-high" gas prices and the dreadful mileage of the average SUV have already created a disdain for these guzzlers. Driving more efficient vehicles is a start toward conservation, but expressing outrage over "Big Oil bonanzas" is not. Mr. Schram should have been more forthcoming and explain that either really high prices (increased taxes?) or scarcity are what will ultimately create a conservation-oriented society, not falling profits.

K.M. Towe

Tennille