A lengthy story in the Washington Post, titled Oil Price Rises Cause Global Shift in Wealth, caught my eye and raised my ire — what is it about our oil addiction that we don't understand, or simply refuse to face?

The article is well worth your time reading, but just in case you're on the fence, here are a few sobering stats to consider:

• Oil consumers are paying $4 billion to $5 billion more for crude oil every day than they did just five years ago…
• pumping more than $2 trillion into the coffers of oil companies and oil-producing nations this year alone.
• High prices have given a boost to oil-rich Alaska, which in September raised the annual oil dividend paid to every man, woman and child living there for a year to $1,654, an increase of $547 from last year.
• With crude oil prices nearing $100 a barrel, there is no end in sight to the redistribution of more than 1 percent of the world's gross domestic product.
• The benefits, to the tune of $700 billion a year, are flowing to the world's oil-exporting countries.
• The soaring price of oil has helped Russia increase the federal budget tenfold since 1999 while paying off its foreign debt and building the third-largest gold and hard-currency reserves in the world, about $425 billion.
• In China, the government increased domestic pump prices on Oct. 31 by nearly 10 percent with shortages, rationing and long lines throughout the country.
• Britain's national average gasoline price topped 1 pound per liter, or about $8 a gallon, for the first time this week because of record oil prices.

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