Big-five oil companies: $101 billion in profits for 2011

From "Daily Kos" - follow link to original
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Big-five oil companies: $101 billion in profits for 2011

by Joan McCarter

Well, how nice for them.

Another quarter, another $33 billion in profits for the five largest oil companies.

Thanks to high oil prices, BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, and Royal Dutch Shell made a combined $101 billion in profits during the first nine months of 2011. With higher oil prices looming, they could surpass their record-setting profits of 2007 and 2008 by the end of the year. What’s more, four of the companies are using an average of one-third of their profits to buy back their own stock. That enriches their shareholders but it doesn’t add to oil supplies or investments in alternative fuels or other new technologies.[...]

Incredibly, though the big five oil companies are swimming in billions of dollars of profits, the American Petroleum Institute—their lobbying arm—continues to oppose elimination of tax breaks for big oil companies worth $40 billion over the coming decade. Yet these same five oil companies are sitting on cash resources of $59 billion and made nearly $1 trillion in profits over the past decade.

Not so incredible, really. They're making humungous profits and want to hang on to them just in principle. It's way, way cheaper for them to buy off Congress than to pay the taxes that would help pay for the infrastructure that keeps them in business.