Another Stupid Idea

A senator in the Philippines is proposing that the government re-caquire controlling interest in one of the country's biggest petroleum companies. This he claims would result in stabilizing the prices of petroleum goods that seems to keep adjusting after the industry was deregulated a few years ago. The government had it right deregulating the industry in the first place and putting politics out of price determination in the petroleum markets. What price stabilization did back then is to contribute to budget deficits as the state continue to jump in everytime world prices shoot up. In the end it is the same consuming public that has to pay for these subsidies by having to deal with increasing budget deficits and spending cuts on other government programs. The secretary of energy got it right by saying no state owned petroleum company can control the movement of oil prices.