Recently, the GOOD website printed up GOOD Sheet #4, a nice graph of where the money given to gas stations goes. (GOOD defies description, but it's pretty good. Check it out.) Hard-copies of the sheet are available at Starbucks, but interested viewers can find an online copy here.

It's worth checking out: in a clear, easy-to-read manner, GOOD shows how the profit on gas is distributed and outlines the major factors that drive price. What it doesn't cover, however, is the ways that oil-producing companies actually use this money. Unfortunately, this is also the most important aspect of the oil market.

Oil is, perhaps, the most effective tool for wealth consolidation in the history of the world. Whether through technological innovation, conflict, or the luck of the draw, certain areas and people have ended up with large amounts of crude petroleum at their disposal.

When sociologists compile the reasons that people turn to prostitution, the usual suspects are drug addiction, poverty, and abuse. However, as gas prices continue to steadily rise, it's looks like a new reason for turning tricks may edge its way into the top three...

Last Wednesday, police arrested Angela Eversole for prostitution, as well as "doing business without an occupational license." According to Eversole's boyfriend, she is not a professional sex worker; however, when she wandered into a police sting operation in a Day's Inn in Fort Wright, Kentucky, she was performing sexual acts in return for economic remuneration. According to reports, Eversole's customer, Kenneth Nowak, paid her with a $100 gas card and "assorted gifts."

Even the authorities seem to recognize that Eversole may have had non-traditional reasons for drifting into the seedy world of sex for money. As Kenton County prosecutor Ken Easterling noted, "It's sad when people are selling their bodies for gas." What's sadder is that the the police are letting Eversole take full responsibility for the crime, without even a thought for her pimp. Is it really that hard to fill out an arrest warrant for OPEC?

Bruce Watson is a freelance writer, blogger, and all-around cheapskate. He tried to prostitute himself for Tic-Tacs, but the lady at the convenience store just doubled the price.