Wal-Mart

Whether you like Wal-Mart or hate it, the corporation has a measured life span. Wal-Mart conveys everything it sells by truck; one estimate places the number at five thousand trucks, mostly eighteen wheelers. Moreover, many of the hard line items come from China so that means it takes a lot of petroleum to get those products on those trucks from site A to site B. Consequently, the price of that petroleum will rise as time goes by. Someday, and I won't speculate when, the price of a gallon of gas will hit ten dollars. Well before that time Wal-Mart, the airlines and any other business that depends on gasoline for its life will have gone by the wayside. Conversely, should the advent of some new engine that gets 100 miles to the gallon, or a new type of fuel that extends the range of a vehicle, we might see the lifespan of the above extended. However, like anything new, it will be pricey for a while and again making importing from overseas more prohibitive. This scenario will probably not happen anytime soon but it will happen. Oil is a finite commodity, and at the rate we consume it and spill it, we will see a dry tank sooner than we would like. What is the price when you decide enough is enough? One wonders what Wal-Mart will do when the cost of transport becomes an unattainable position! All those trucks and all those big box stores……