Sure, the economy can withstand high oil prices, but what about the less privileged?

[babylonsister]

High Oil Prices Fuel Winter Heat Fears

By JERRY HARKAVY
Associated Press Writer


PORTLAND, Maine (AP) -- Nowhere in America, it seems, are people more apprehensive about the prospect of a $3-a-gallon winter than in Maine.

Motorists nationwide may grumble about gasoline prices now hovering around $3 for a gallon of regular, but home heating oil that soared this month to $3.09 a gallon - breaking the $3 barrier for the first time - is the focus of concern in Maine.

The reasons for Maine's vulnerability are clear:

It tops the list of states most dependent on oil heat, with 80 percent of homes relying on No. 2 oil or kerosene. It's one of the nation's coldest states, with the northern city of Caribou often singled out by the National Weather Service as having the lowest temperature among the Lower 48. In terms of per capita incomes, Maine is generally ranked as the poorest state in the Northeast. And lots of older homes lack adequate insulation, making them harder to heat.

So as heating oil prices hit record levels and the sound of oil furnaces kicking in becomes more frequent, plenty of people are worrying about whether they'll be able to scrape up enough money to keep warm.

"It's not just low-income people who are fearful. It's the working couple or families who are now going to have to choose between heating, literally eating, and of course driving," said John Kerry, director of the state Office of Energy Independence and Security.

For families struggling from paycheck to paycheck, the cost of filling a 275-gallon tank can easily blow a hole in the budget.

more...

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/H/HEATING_OIL?SITE=DCUSN&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[yella_dawg]

1. I'm not clear on this concept.

The "less privileged" are the single biggest factor of the economy. The wall street types may delude themselves into thinking they matter, but without ordinary workers, there is no economy. When it comes to freezing or driving to work for too many people, the economy will stumble, if not fall.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

2. Well, see, this is a 'global' economy now

They figure they can get workers and consumers elsewhere. The top of the investor class has insulated itself from the impacts of events on the middle and working class here.

[hlthe2b]

5. I long wondered what businesses would do...

when gas abruptly becomes so costly their workers not served by mass transit can no longer get in each day? Will they be forced to allow more telecommuting? Will they be forced to try to lobby for more mass transit? Will business take any pro-active stance whatsoever, or will they just fire workers?

[sandnsea]

7. Yep, the 50%

who earn $30,000 or less. Just regular working people, the real majority, who the country is supposed to belong to.

[jeff30997]

3. From their point of view:

The less privileged can go to hell.

[SpiralHawk]

4. "Why should we have to trouble our beautiful minds about that?" - Bush Family

We and our republicon homelander cronies will be making a killing - smirk - off of high oil prices. Smirk. Oh yeah, almost forgot our republicon propaganda talking point: "too bad and stuff about the noisy proles.*"

- Commander AWOL Preppy Bush




* Proles = formerly known as human beings who are citizens of the United States of America

[Hidden Stillness]

6. The Whole Population is Getting Cut Out of "The Economy"

Lately, several things have started to come together and form a total impression of the way things are going, what with John Edwards's great speech Saturday night at the Iowa Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner and other recent speeches, Naomi Wolf's new book and comments that at base the invasion and continued occupation of Iraq and diversion of all funds from Government operations to shadowy and Republican-connected commercial corporations are market/profit based, the veto of the S-CHIP children's health bill by Bush, the refusal of both Parties to get any of the corporate/lobbyist money out of politics, no matter how corrupting, the Bankruptcy Bill and other corporate-written legislation, complete failure to protect miners or have any consequences for the owners upon their deaths, and many other stories and comments lately. We are approaching a stage of "New Gilded Age," a phrase that has been used many times over the past few years, and this LIHEAP story, yet again, shows the frigid coldness of the corporate profiteer.

The entire story, (link from the OP), has this "chipper, cheery rich-media" attitude, complete with minimizing of the issue, claiming, near the beginning, that "Motorists nationwide may grumble about gasoline prices," when people are actually being crushed by this, unable--with the case of minimum-wage workers--to afford to drive to and from work. They LOSE MONEY doing it! The article claims that the mild winter last year meant that "prices dropped as the winter wore on," which is not true for people on unchanging budget plans, and also fails to mention the horrific and unexplained huge, price-goiging one-month bill of several hundreds to even thousands of dollars the year before, which I got and about which there were many threads here on DU. They were crushing, excess-profits price-gouging, and based on nothing--they were also unpunished. Near the end of the article, there is the all-too-familiar deathly-cold attitude of the rich, a complete lack of compassion for all that is happening. After claiming that "Half the people probably didn't participate compared to last year," the president of the Maine Oil Dealers Association, some prick named Jamie Pye, then said, about the threat of people too destitute to pay the heating bills this winter, "You have a whole network of social services, churches, state entities that are out there to help folks get through. Nobody's going cold. Everybody gets through the winter somehow in Maine. It's always been that way." This comes after LIHEAP officials have been warning people that, because of the worsening economy, they have been getting many, many more applications for assistance, and have not gotten a budget increase to cover even the continuing levels of funding--with increased prices--needed already.

This bastard's dismissive lack of concern reminds me of the recent remark by "President" Bush, on vetoing the S-CHIP health program for uninsured kids. Asked how they will be able to afford to get medical care, the little asshole rich boy actually replied, "I mean, people have access to health care in America, after all. You just go to the emergency room." Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, whom you might not expect this of, made a fabulous speech on the floor of the Senate on October 31st, blasting Bush with powerful and wonderful language--including a great part about meeting a conscience-less, greedy capitalist--available at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?r110:12:./temp/~r110BJowRc:: .

These God-damned rich capitalists do not care even slightly about all the devastation they have caused, they do not care or even think about the many who suffer, and they have amassed so much concentrated power of so many different kinds over the past several decades, that their sadism now is official "Government" (to the degree that there even is still a Government anymore) policy. We are at a historical turning-point now, and we as a country can either wage a huge and unpleasant battle to win back our representative democracy, or we will return complete, to the 19th Century.

[Disturbed]

8. Anyone in America that isn't wealthy doesn't matter.

There are too many people in America. If a few million die that aren't wealthy enough to afford the basics of life that is unfortunate. They will go to Heaven, if they have accepted Jesus, where they will
be better off.