sain

or you see a lot, but don't recognise them.

Not to defend the petrol companies, but.... One of the things that makes collusion so hard for the ACCC to prove is that the big oil companies don't need to get involved at all. All the franchise holders need to do is go for a quick drive around the nearby service stations and have a look at what their prices are. If the competitors are more expensive then they arn't going to miss many customers being more expensive. There is no actual collusion here, because the franchise holders don't actually have to talk to each other about it at all. Things like the various online fuel price sites just make life so much easier for them. They don't even need to go for a drive now. The tax rates on fuel are interesting as well. I believe the commonwealth stabs us for about 40c / litre for most fuel types, plus GST. so a $1.49 litre of fuel (cheapest of the ones I drove past in canberra today) gets 54.9c / litre going to the commonwealth (around $33 for a 60 litre fill up). Most states also have taxes on fuel, which is one of the reasons we pay more for fuel in canberra than in nearby goulburn or sydney. I believe the margin for the service stations (above the wholesale cost of fuel, not taking into account wages, and other costs) is something on the order of 10c / litre, but I don't have a source for that. We have to face it guys, the governement isn't going to smack the petrol companies because they make too much money from it. The only time they stop increasing the tax rate on fuel is when the economy goes even more pair shaped than it is now. Time to upgrade to electric sonexes!

source: http://xkcd.com/951/ see also: http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=951:_Working

I really like Alibre. simple to use, lots of features.. I think it goes by GeoMagic Design these days.

guess i was offended by an implication that wasn't there... dazza, please accept my apologies.

Maybe I'm over reacting to this, but I would much rather see the spelling mistakes than to see comments like that. I'm an atheist and I'm deeply ashamed to be a member of a forum where thoughts like that are stated openly and nobody seems willing to speak out against it. first they came...