Government Gets More Money From Gas Sales Than Oil Companies

See Gasoline Taxes vs. Exxon Profit, per Gallon at Carpe Diem. Excerpts:

"...gasoline taxes by state (combined local, state and federal), ... range from a low of 26.4 cents per gallon in Alaska to a high of of 66.1 cents per gallon in California, averaging 48.1 cents per gallon across all states. How does that compare to oil company industry profits per gallon?

According to this post on Exxon Mobil's Perspective Blog , "For every gallon of gasoline, diesel or finished products we manufactured and sold in the United States in the last three months of 2010, we earned a little more than 2 cents per gallon. That’s not a typo. Two cents."

"Exxon also reports that in 2010 it "made less than 8 cents for every dollar of revenue from all of our businesses around the world."

So even if Exxon would have been able to earn its full 8% profit margin on gasoline sold in the U.S., it would still only have made about 23 cents per gallon at the average price per gallon in the last quarter of $2.88. And that would have been less than half of the average 48 cents per gallon gasoline tax."