What do you think the real reason is for high gas prices in the United States ?

Gas stations are way to high, to travel you would have to think twice.

Gas here where I live is 2.79 ---2.93

A combination of corporate greed and people driving giant vehicles because they can. I get 29 mpg in my mid sized sedan as opposed to the idiots driving the Hummers, Excursions, Escalades, etc that get 11 - 14 mpg. They artificially inflate demand by needing twice the gas to get to the same place.

Get Congress to reguire better mpg and the cost would go down because we'd waste less gas.

I'd say greed. Look at the oil companies' profits for the last year. Unbelievable. And from what I've read, places like Venezuela are paying like 10 cents a gallon or some such ridiculous amount. It wouldn't even bother me about the oil companies making such a profit if they turned around and built new refineries to help in the future, but it's just pure profit.

Direct linkage to the Saudi Royal family - (major third band shareholders in the big three oil companies via the shadow companies left over from Aramco. As oil fortunes rise so goes theirs - check out their net worth uptick over the past 8 months and since the first Bush administration entered Iraq!

The real thing is that the gas prices aren't high in the US. They are VERY CHEAP compared to the rest of the world. (I'm in German now and if you convert from liters and Euro it is over $6.00/ gallon.) The problem is that those prices were artificially held low for so long that now they are just going up to normal levels but by comparison they seem high.

bush has to pay billions for the war in iraq
and afghanistan

so he takes over iraqi fuel depot

raises the price of gas

and pays for his war

said and done.......

crude oil prices being 72.00 dollars a barrel!

The price of gas averaged $2.00/gal in most countries in 2005 (check out the "International Prices" link on the site below). The primary difference is tax. Germany, as another answerer pointed out, charged nearly $4.00/gal in tax on top of that, while the U.S. charged about $0.50/gal of tax.

As all investigations into the matter have found, supply and demand is the culprit. We have enjoyed decreasing price of gas (adjusted for inflation) over the past couple of decades as technological advances made it cheaper to get crude from the ground to your gas tank.

Now, we're seeing India and China's middle class grow like wildfire as they start to enjoy western style conveniences, which puts pressure on the supply. Additionally, Katrina took down quite a bit of producing capacity, some of it is still off line. At the same time, the U.S. has not been able to develop new oil fields due to environmental concerns. All of those factors constrain supply.

The theory that oil companies have purposely restricted refining capacity doesn't appear to have good evidence. Again, according to the "Increased Production" link on the site below, in the last decade the US Oil industry has added the equivalent of 20 average sized refineries by increasing the production capacity at existing refineries.

Don't buy into Bush conspiracy theories. On one hand, the same people who claim Bush is not too bright also claim that he is smart enough to corner the world oil market to enrich himself and his buddies, without leaving much hard evidence. Those seem to be opposing thoughts.

Yes, oil companies are making a lot money now. The investments they made in developing oil fields are paying off. But, let's not forget that large profits are driven by two things - higher prices and higher volume. And, if oil companies are truly interested in keeping us dependent on oil, they have a big incentive to bring the gas price down. Otherwise, alternative fuels will become cost competitive with oil and oil's share of the energy market will shrink.

A collusionary effort to charge as much as they can get.

Gas is cheaper in the US that just about anywhere else in the world.

who cares what others are paying that should not be related
if it cost a few cents to make a music cd but other are willing to pay 100 bucks does that mean everyone should be willing to pay that much i don't think so
if they can sell us gas for a certain price and stay in business that is what they should do
anyone who answered GREED that is what it is

Supply and demand.

India and China need more.

US isn't using any less. More demand.

Refining capacity remains the same. Equal supply.

Higher demand, static supply, increased price.

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