I found a Wall Street Journal hanging on my door again this morning. I've been wondering when this would happen:

Stung by Soaring Transport Costs, Factories Bring Jobs Home Again (pay)

The rising cost of shipping everything from industrial-pump parts to lawn-mower batteries to living-room sofas is forcing some manufacturers to bring production back to North America and freeze plans to send even more work overseas.

"My cost of getting a shipping container here from China just keeps going up -- and I don't see any end in sight," says Claude Hayes, president of the retail heating division at DESA LLC. He says that cost has jumped about 15%, to about $5,300, since January and is set to increase again next month to $5,600.

The article goes on to describe various small manufacturers that are finding that transportation costs have made production in China, and even Mexico, less competitive, or even non-competitive with local production. Due to the rise in oil prices and other energy costs we are witnessing either a hiccup or a reversal of a three-decade trend of out-sourcing manufacturing jobs. While this could be some relief for the US worker, the article does not speculate about how China may react if a larger percentage their firms start losing these opportunities. AIUI, China holds a lot of US paper.

Cute young woman sings on YouTube about losing her boyfriend to his obsession with election politics.

Rural U.S. Takes Worst Hit as Gas Tops $4 Average
Clifford Krauss, New York Times (sub)

Across broad swaths of the South, Southwest and the upper Great Plains, the combination of low incomes, high gas prices and heavy dependence on pickup trucks and vans is putting an even tighter squeeze on family budgets.

Here in the Mississippi Delta, some farm workers are borrowing money from their bosses so they can fill their tanks and get to work. Some are switching jobs for shorter commutes.

People are giving up meat so they can buy fuel. Gasoline theft is rising. And drivers are running out of gas more often, leaving their cars by the side of the road until they can scrape together gas money.

The disparity between rural America and the rest of the country is a matter of simple home economics. Nationwide, Americans are now spending about 4 percent of their take-home income on gasoline. By contrast, in some counties in the Mississippi Delta, that figure has surpassed 13 percent.

America’s Energy Nightmare About to Get Worse - 6 Million Families may Need Help Paying Their Electric Bills (Part 1 of 4)
Energy Tech Stocks

A 4-part series starting today (Monday) that looks at how America's energy crisis is about to get much worse. As badly as record gasoline & diesel prices already are hurting Americans, they're about to get hit with record summer electricity prices that could force six million families to seek financial assistance from the government & electric utilities. Then next fall and winter, millions more will get hit again by record heating oil prices. Part 1 is the record power price story. Part 2 on Tuesday is the record heating oil story. Part 3 on Wednesday is experts' fear that record oil and power prices are a "cancer" that will kill basic U.S. manufacturing. Part 4 on Thursday is experts' fear that electric utilities' financial situation will suffer under the weight of so many families who mightn't be able to pay.

Wealth Evaporates as Gas Prices Clobber McMansions
Rich Miller and Matthew Benjamin, Bloomberg

"Our whole economy reflects the relative costs of energy: the cars we drive, the houses we occupy, the kinds of factories we have and the equipment in them,'' says Dana Johnson, chief economist at Comerica Bank in Dallas. ``I'm expecting relatively large changes in all of these things.''

More at:
United States hurting - June 10

While we worry about automotive gas and diesel, Natural Gas rises ...

Nearly lost in the midst of a 400-point drop in the Dow Jones and the $16 dollar jump in oil was the natural gas price jump which reached a high of $12.82 /mbtu on Friday -- the highest it has been since the 2005 hurricanes.

... along with Heating Oil

In New England, retail heating oil prices have risen to more than $4.50 a gallon, nearly double what they were last year at this time. Some oil dealers have delayed rolling out their payment plans for next winter as the world oil markets continue their wild ride.

Congress boldly scapegoats faceless speculators

Despite frequent and fervent assurances from the US Treasury and Energy Secretaries and the head of the futures trading commission (CFTC) that high prices are primarily caused by tight supply, Congress shows no indication that it will let go of the issue. The CFTC continues to investigate and Congress continues to threaten legislative restrictions on futures trading.

and faceless third worlders endure shortages

... in Malaysia ... a 40 percent price increase was accompanied by hoarding and a run on the pumps. In a few countries, national oil companies can no longer afford to sell products at government-mandated prices. In still others, the local importers simply do not have enough liquidity to pay for the products.

More at Tom Whipple's Peak Oil Review