BP's Profits Far Outweigh The Cost Of Cleaning Up Gulf Oil Spill

While the Gulf oil spill has devastated the region, and will have long-term consequences, BP will be able to shake off the costs of the cleanup with little more than a shrug.

Read that again.  While the Gulf oil spill has devastated the region, and will have long-term consequences, BP will be able to shake off the costs of the cleanup with little more than a shrug.

It makes me sick.

The cost per day of the oil spill to BP so far has been $16 million. That number is dwarfed by the $66 million per day the firm made in profit in the first quarter of this year. Indeed, in 2009 BP's total profits were $14 billion. As CNN's Christine Romans notes, even if the cleanup costs were to rise to $14 billion, it would simply mean that BP went one year without make a profit, let alone losing money.

It's difficult to see what incentives there are for BP to operate in a safer and more environmentally conscious manner when the consequences for causing even such a catastrophic crisis as this one are so negligent.

If, as I suspect. there was criminal negligence on the part of BP, the company should be nationalized and the countless thousands of victims compensated.  It will never happen, but one can hope!