[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 36 (Tuesday, March 6, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H1163-H1164]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1210
                IT'S TIME TO GET RID OF THE SPECULATORS

  (Mr. DeFAZIO asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. DeFAZIO. I paid $4.01 a gallon at home in Oregon last weekend. 
There's a lot of people who've got long-term plans, drill now, drill 
here, drill everywhere, conservation, whatever. They

[[Page H1164]]

say there's nothing we can do in the short-term. Well, there is.
  Seventy percent of the oil futures, the supply of oil, is owned by 
speculators on Wall Street and other places around the world--70 
percent. The head of ExxonMobil testified that about $38 a barrel is 
due to speculation. That's the head of ExxonMobil. He says we're paying 
38 bucks a barrel for speculators on Wall Street.
  Goldman Sachs says, well, it's only $22 to $28 a barrel. Let's take 
the lowest number, $22 a barrel. That would lower regular gas by 64 
cents a gallon if we got rid of the speculators.
  I've proposed a tax of 1/100 of 1 cent per transaction that would 
drive most of these speculators out of the market and raise some 
revenues.
  It's time to get rid of the speculators, provide price relief to 
Americans, and then we can talk about a long-term plan for energy self-
sufficiency.

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