Though there are plenty of reasons to believe that oil will never again cost anything close to $11.00 per barrel, there is also a growing recognition that the current state of the oil market bears some resemblance to a number of other over excited markets like Dutch tulips, Internet stocks, and new home prices in Fort Myers or outside Las Vegas. The similarities include daily headlines, constant water cooler discussions, and fears of missing a big boat.

Unlike some of those other bubbles, however, the recent rapid increases in oil prices are painful for almost everyone but those involved in selling or transporting crude oil. Even though they bear the brunt of consumer anger, oil refineries producing gasoline and gasoline retailers are actually being squeezed as badly as most of the rest of us by high prices. The wide spread nature of the pain caused by rapid oil price increases was brought home to me on Sunday as I visited the Newseum in Washington, D. C. and saw that oil prices were front page news on at least half of the world’s Sunday newspapers.

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