- The oil and gas industry spent $111,839,931 on lobbying in 2010, paying for 744 lobbyists (or 1.7 oil and gas industry lobbyists for every member of the House). That followed a record year of $175 million in 2009.
- The oil and gas industry gave almost $18 million in contributions to congressional campaigns in 2010 and almost $23 million in 2008!
- Speaker Boehner received over $100,000 in campaign contributions from oil and gas companies in 2009-10.
- President Obama received almost $900,000 in contributions from oil and gas companies for the 2008 campaign, out of $5,637,348 total industry donations to presidential candidates (28% to Democrats, 71.9% to Republicans; McCain got well over double what Obama received.)
- Exxon Mobil gave over $1.4 million to federal campaigns in 2008.
So what do all these donations get the oil and gas industry?
- The US government spends (well, borrows...) $36.5 billion each year to subsidize the oil and gas industries.
- According to the New York Times, the oil industry alone gets about $4 billion in tax breaks each year.
Not a bad return on their investment, is it?
1 comment:
I agree, the subsidies which China gives to big oil to keep their auto manufacturuing industry working must end. A gallon of gas in China is about 25 cents, this allows average Chinese to buy and run a car. If we stop our subsidies here, I think China must be forced to as well. There is no way we should allow cars to be manufactured in China with huge oil subsidies and sold here for $5000 or less.
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