http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Unrest-in-Egypt-Unsettles-nytimes-4027218866.htmlWith the United States economy seeming to gain a foothold only recently — government data released Friday showed the economy grew by 3.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010 — a sustained increase in oil prices could choke growth, analysts said. It could also undermine the more general optimism that lifted the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index by 1.5 percent in January, after a 12.8 percent jump in 2010.
“A one-dollar, one-day increase in a barrel of oil takes $12 million out of the U.S. economy,” said Jason S. Grumet, president of the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington research group.
“If tensions in the Mideast cause oil prices to rise by $5 for even just three months, over $5 billion dollars will leave the U.S. economy. Obviously, this is not a strategy for creating new jobs.”(more)