Does anyone know how much extra money went into buying oil over the last 4 years say vs a price of 20 dollars a barrel and how this would effect the economy. TPTB claim its had no effect but they also claim a lot of things that simply are not true. I agree I think the effects have been masked by the huge amount of liquidity thats been pumped into the system. Once this stops I think we will find that 70 dollar oil did and does have a real effect on the economy.

One aspect that makes me think its had a big effect is even with the debt boom we have seen US car makers not do that well. This tells me that in general people have not been able to afford cars unless they used home equity loans for the purchase. It seemed from the outside that US car purchases where tightly tied to the HELOC craze and not any sort of general gain in income.

On the other side since buying and selling goods simply moves money around its seems that high priced oil causes capitol to be concentrated and slows the velocity of money for daily business. So it seems that in might be a big factor in the overall concentration of wealth. Since the ME countries tend to reinvest in big companies etc we have wealth flowing from the middle class through the Middle East and back out into the hands of the banks and other wealthy people for reinvestment for a fee.

The recent concentration of wealth is obvious but I don't think people have looked at the role that expensive oil plays in the process to me it seems to be a big drive in causing concentration of wealth.