Quote:
Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
The economics is faulty if you take him literally, but it's quite easy to envision under present circumstances that eliminating the tax would benefit oil companies far, far more than consumers.
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It's equally easy to envision it the other way around. Basic economics teaches that the incidence of a tax falls more upon the seller/buyer whose supply/demand is more inelastic. If consumer demand is inelastic, but has some elasticity (which even in the short run it does), whereas refiners have no elasticity of supply because of capacity constraints, then they will bear the full amount of the tax.
