BP Alaska president pleads for lower state taxes

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Reuters

BP Alaska president pleads for lower state taxes
By Yereth Rosen

ANCHORAGE, Alaska | Thu Apr 14, 2011 8:32pm EDT

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - Alaska must lower its state oil production taxes to attract the investment needed to boost dwindling flow in the Trans Alaska Pipeline System, the president of BP's Alaska unit told a pro-industry group Thursday.

"I will stake my career and my reputation that this will make a big difference to Alaska and it will be good for all Alaskans," BP Exploration (Alaska) President John Minge said.

Alaska's North Slope holds enough untapped oil to continue production for decades, he said. "I absolutely see 50 years more," he said.

But without a major change to the state taxes, Alaska's oil patch faces a grim future, said Minge, whose company operates Prudhoe Bay and other large North Slope oil fields. It is one of the three major oil producers in Alaska and holds a 47 percent ownership share of the Trans Alaska Pipeline System.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/15/us-bp-alaska-idUSTRE73E03A20110415

[JohnnyRingo]

1. There they go. maybe it's time for Alaskans to learn the GOP values they vote for

They can give up that oil check each resident gets every year and hand it directly back to the oil companies so they can "create some of those jobs". This is no time to get "wee wee'd up" over a few dollars when the job creators are down on their luck up there.

Put your money where your vote is Alaska.

[Confusious]

4. haha

If I get your meaning, anyone who ever spoke of people giving up their permanent fund check would be skinned, tarred, feathered and then quartered. The bodies would then be flown out to to Grizzly bear territory and dumped. The bear shit would then be burned, and the ashes then used to fertilize a field which would then be burned and the ashes of that scattered to the four corners of the earth.

They love them free money. ( It's not really "free" it sucks ass up there )

[roguevalley]

16. boy are you full of it. do you live here and have personal

knowledge of how it sucks up here? God.

[Confusious]

19. No, I don't live there anymore

I did live there 20 years though and my father still lives there.

That it sucks is my personal opinion.

[roguevalley]

15. you obviously don't have a clue what you are talking about

Here's some facts.
The legislature is telling these idiots to ram it up their butts. The governor wants to give them the farm and the legislature is not only saying fuck you but they are running out the clock on this tax give away.

secondly, the majority 'party' up here are independents. The other two follow it.

thirdly, our state shares the benefit of our resources. If your state doesn't do that then too bad. they could but they don't. Don't blame us that we are enlightened enough to think the people should share in the wealth.

we have a span of ice age through space age economic and social situations up here. We have about 700 miles of roads in a state that is two and a half times bigger than Texas, used to have FIVE time zones, stretches from New York to LA and whose capital city can only be reached by boat or plane, not car.
We have people living in villages in eco systems so extreme that they don't get even light in the sky for six weeks at a time. -54 is common in many areas. Most of the villages don't have sewage systems. They collect it in buckets and drop it in the poo lagoons. Hepatitus and TB are epidemic up here.
Some of the villages pay 8$ a gallon for milk and over 10$ a gallon for gas. They fly in a years supply of food before winter and work like slaves to lay in food that they gather, fish and hunt to keep hunger away.
Some of the villages in the past few years have had to choose between freezing and starving because the heating oil must be brought in and some of the heating bills were over 2500$ a month.

People here are good, decent and kind. They love this state and put up with shit that would curl the toes of the weenies in the lower 48 who don't even realize what they have half the time. Driving on a road that takes you from here to there, flying on low fares that we subsidize with our giganto fares that only take us to a hub destination where another fare takes us everywhere else.
We put up with a lot. We get a lot of benefit here. I see eagles all the time, not just on webcams and a pregnant moose walked across my front porch a few days ago.
We are used to hearing people bitch about us and getting it wrong. Most of us let it go. I just can't tonight.
Its getting on to late evening and the sun is still out. Ravens are bitching on light poles nearby, ravens as big as cats.

Our legislature is telling the oil companies to go fuck themselves. I find that encouraging. But then I live here and know what I'm talking about.

[JohnnyRingo]

20. My apologies. I stand corrected

I don't know where I got the impression Alaska is populated with conservative republicans. I now see it's the independents that elected a republican senator, governor, and congressman. This could be why the media paints the state as a red state stronghold that gave Sarah Palin a job until she quit.

I was mistaken on the article. I read it to say the oil companies were coming after the state that garnered yearly payments from them to lower their share of the tax base. Now I see that the independents (who keep supporting the republicans) are standing up to them. I'm glad and wish your state well.

I'm from Ohio, so go ahead and have a crack at the rednecks who came up here for jobs with benefits and consistently voted in the likes of John Boehner, James A Rhodes, Bob Taft, and John Kasich until they ran out the unions and legislated the state into one big McRust Belt. Instead of telling you we're actually populated with good common sense moderates, I'll join you.

Sorry again Alaska.

[roguevalley]

21. ah sarcasm. nice. personally, I like Ohio even if they vote themselves

stupid every time. Independents are the majority up here. Libertarianism is a strong element. But even though they do vote red here a lot they can't be predicted. This tax crap should have been a cake walk but it isn't. And if there is a state out there that isn't an asshole from time to time, I don't know where it is. Alaska is a helluva lot better place than that grifting wanker palin painted it. As for the media? Fuck em. When have they ever been right?

[JohnnyRingo]

22. Point taken

I'm sure just like Ohio there are many sane progressives there and never would assume otherwise.

I live in the most democratic district of Ohio, and from my porch Ohio looks pretty liberal, but I can't, and would never, deny the majority of morans who live in Columbus, Cinci, and the rural expanses between.

[No Elephants]

2. ....

[JJW]

3. Oil is over $ 100 barrel

How were they drilling in AK in the 90s when oil was around $ 10 per barrel?

[Confusious]

5. Record profits and they want a tax break

fucking blood sucking pieces of shit.

[Hubert Flottz]

6. "Drill Baby Drill"

You bend over long enough, somebody's usually going to come along and drill ya.

Maybe Dr. Jane Goodall can come up north and study the Palin klan/tribe and make another epic documentary for the Dizzy channel, to make up for the oil company's tax cut money.

[LiberalFighter]

7. Do Alaskans really have it good now?

[roguevalley]

17. alaskans are having it as good as any other place. Our

guys are telling the companies to fuck themselves, hence the whining. Good move for us.

[Bandit]

8. The most profitable industry on the face of the earth...EVER..needs government subsidies

or it won't do what makes it so much money..The governor has issued his threats trying to get the Senate to pass this 2 billion dollar tax give away to the oil industry but so far the Seante has said NO. Our legislature ends this Sunday and the tax break is still tabled. This year....Unless the Governor calls a special session it looks to be dead until next year. Imagine if the Governor took that 2 billion dollars and handed it out to ten thousand small (under ten employees), what that might do for Alaska's economy..A small business receiving a quarter of a million dollars would actully do some good, but to hand it to the most profitable business in the world is ridiculous IMO.

[Thor_MN]

10. handed it out to ten thousand small (under ten employees),

One simply can not stimulate supply. It's a ridiculous concept. If I am the owner of a small struggling company, I faced with not enough demand for my products. I'm scaling down because no one can afford to buy what I make.

Now, the government come along and gives me a big pile of cash. What to do? What to do? If you believe Repuke thinking, I'm going to go out hire back the people I laid off and ramp up production - of a product I'm struggling to sell. It makes no sense at all.

If on the other hand, that money goes to people (especially the people I laid off) they are going to go out and spend it. By buying things, they increase demand, I now have more of a market for the stuff I make and I start hiring back people becasue I have to produce more to satisfy demand, which puts more money in the pockets of those people that I laid off so the spend more, so demand goes up, lather, rinse repeat....

Stimulate demand and supply will take care of itself. That is how the market works, not the supply side crap the conservatives spew.

[fatbuckel]

9. Hey BP, fuck you. If you don't like it, don't drill for oil,

[Moostache]

12. Hear, hear!

If the poor oil companies cannot get by on ONLY record profits for the history of the industrial age, then they are cordially invited to fuck right off and cease to exist. They can also take their "job creation" and shove it up their ever-loving asses.

[Zorra]

11. Dear BP: Watch the film "On Deadly Ground" over and over until you get it. nt

[Grins]

13. But...but..but it's a tax cut!

And what Republican doesn't love a tax cut!!!!

As I recall, the abdicated former half-Governor of Alaska was the one to raise the tax so she could cut "soshilist" checks to the masses.

Alaskans voted for that idiot; it's time to reap what they have sown. Now sit back and watch the fireworks.

[roguevalley]

18. again, you don't know what you are talking about.

I never vote for pugs but the situation up here was ripe for a twit like her to exploit for the governorship. she was going after the repug machine and their corruption and got voted in over it. She wasn't a bit like she turned out to be and pissed more people off when she became what she is than you can imagine. She couldn't get elected to her own hanging up here.

She has NOTHING to do with the Permanent fund. Nada. ZIP! God, how many times do we have to tell that to people? It was set up to be our savings account and to share with our citizens. Come up here, stay for the residency and eat the shit this place gives weather wise and you can get one too. Palin has nothing to do with the fund. And tough shit if your state doesn't share the benefit of your resources. Get them to do it but don't dump on us. We are enlightened on this issue.

Tell me what a-hole your governor is and then bitch about Palin who I didn't vote for and neither did a lot of others. I would lay money down that your governor is probably not much better.

[ThomCat]

14. Tell them to go F*ck Themselves!

And use their own oil for lube!

They already get 1.3 Billion dollars per year of government subsidies they don't need and don't deserve simply because our government is too cowardly to cut the subsidy.

They are the single most profitable industry on earth right now. They don't need any kind of subsidy to do anything.

[primavera]

23. Umm, what "reputation" would that be? - n/t