Is it the fault of the oil company executives who control the companies? Or the Congress, which is responsible for passing and changing the tax code?

Lawmakers grilled executives from the world's five largest publicly traded oil companies Tuesday, criticizing them for taking tax subsidies and not investing in renewable resources amid record prices for oil and gasoline.

"Americans are hoping that the top executives from the five largest oil companies will tell us that these soaring gas prices are just part of some elaborate hoax," said Ed Markey, D-Mass, chairman of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. "Unfortunately, it's not a joke."

Markey slammed executives from Exxon Mobil (XOM, Fortune 500), Royal Dutch Shell (RDSA), BP (BP), Chevron (CVX, Fortune 500), and ConocoPhillips (COP, Fortune 500) for their opposition to eliminating about $18 billion in tax breaks over a ten year period amid record profits for the industry.

"Last year these companies alone made over $123 billion in profit," said Markey. "What is the oil industry doing with all this profit? Unfortunately, it goes as much to financial engineering as to renewable engineering."

Some members of Congress want to take away the tax breaks. That is their prerogative. Of course, that may very well increase consumer prices as the oil companies pass the increased tax burden along to the consumers in the form of higher prices – just as they have passed the increased cost of a barrel of crude oil along to the consumer.

After all – these executives have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to manage their money in the most prudent manner. That includes taking tax breaks authorized by the tax code – or pricing products accordingly if their tax burden increases.

There is, however, one option that none of these lawmakers have suggested for lowering gas prices – doing away with the 18.4 cent a gallon federal gas tax. Not that such a thing would ever be considered while the Democrats control congress.

Interestingly enough, CNN sticks this little tidbit, similar to something I posted some time ago, near the end of the article.

The industry has argued they need to be big to compete with large state-owned oil companies from places like Russia and China. They also say that while the raw numbers are high, their profit margin - at around 9 percent - is roughly in line with other industries.

Is it truly the contention of these members of Congress that a 9% profit is extortionate? Will we next see laws setting a maximum permitted return on investment -- AKA profit -- for American companies?

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