Lucas,
The oil subsidies fight is really starting to heat up in both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives. Senate leadership has indicated that a vote will come to the floor before Memorial Day.
And as the vote to repeal massive handouts to Big Oil become more imminent, Big Oil's PR machine is scrambling to convince the public that taking away the handouts will hurt them at the pump. But that is false: Doing away with oil subsidies will have little or no impact on gas prices.
Tell Congress to repeal Big Oil giveaways .
One reason repealing subsidies won't raise gas prices is that the price of oil is set in the world market, of which U.S. petroleum accounts for a very small percentage. Any small change in oil production that might result from cutting oil subsidies will have no effect on world oil prices -- and therefore no impact at the pump.
But enough of what repealing oil subsidies are not going to do for us. Here is what it will do!
The Senate bill would recoup $4 billion in tax subsidies the oil industry majors are showered with every year.
The prevailing House bill would close tax loopholes for the oil industry, saving taxpayers roughly $40 billion over the next 5 years.
In both case, the billions of dollars recouped through those means could be used to promote demand for clean and domestic fuel, provide incentives for the purchase of fuel-efficient vehicles and build a clean energy infrastructure.
Tell Congress to repeal oil subsidies and invest in clean energy.
The time to stop throwing away money in yesterday's energy has come. Now is the time to invest in our future. That means we must deploy clean, sustainable and domestic fuel, promote truly fuel-efficient vehicles, provide incentives to offer more public transportation, and build a clean energy infrastructure.
Thanks for all you do,
Allison Fisher
Outreach Director
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