I have to make a change. Just after I sent my previous reply I decided I needed to recheck my facts. My original mention of $127.9 billion was profit. Net income for ExxonMobil was $40.6 billion, for Chevron was $18.7 billion, for ConocoPhillips was $11.9 billion, for Valero was $5.2 billion, and for Marathon Oil was $4.0 billion. So the tax break is far less than 5%, but still, why does an industry making more net revenue than any other in history need a tax break? By the way, net revenue for the industry was $82.9 billion in 2006. Profit grew by 50% in one year. Does anyone believe that there was greater efficiency or dramatically increased consumer demand that would create such a large year over year jump? I’m not a fan of windfall profit taxes, but I think there’s incredible industry opacity which leads to a system that’s far from a free market and likely hides questionable behavior.

Thanks again for the comment.

Thanks so much for the comment. You are correct. The national highway system, state, county, and local surface roads are a public good that we all benefit from. I raise the point because it’s likely that large trucks do more damage and require more maintenance to road ways. Companies who derive financial benefit from their use don’t pay an amount compared to use or impact. I also use road ways for business. To get to a client office or a job site often requires road travel. But an oil company uses those same roads to move their product to the retail location – it’s vital to their business model. The delivery and distribution of their product is disproportionately dependent upon tax supported infrastructure. My use is not vital to my business model, it’s tertiary. I believe that represents an indirect subsidy for any company that needs the roads to operate.

Tax expenditure is the phrase EIA uses to describe a tax break. I used their word, but did use the wrong word – profit. The $127.9 billion was gross revenue. The 35% corporate tax rate would mean a $44.765 billion tax liability. That amount is then reduced by the $2.149 billion tax break – a 5% reduction. In my business, I feel pretty good if I can achieve 5% profit. I would be overjoyed if I was able to reduce my tax liability and double my profit.

Thanks for reading my post and chiming in. BTW, I deleted your duplicated comment – hope that’s OK.