Paul Bloom, lawyer fought overpricing by oil firms; at 70
NEW YORK - Paul L. Bloom - a lawyer in the Carter administration’s Energy Department who pursued oil companies for overcharging and won billions of dollars in refunds for customers, the government, and others - died Oct. 10 in Chevy Chase, Md. He was 70.
The cause was pancreatic cancer, his family said.
James Schlesinger, as the first secretary of the new Department of Energy, appointed Mr. Bloom in 1977 to investigate oil companies’ compliance with oil pricing regulations. President Nixon had begun oil price controls as a temporary measure at the time of the Arab oil embargo of 1973, but enforcement was lax.
Mr. Bloom, as special counsel for compliance, accused 33 of the 35 largest oil producers and refiners of overcharges amounting to $11 billion. By 1987, the government had collected $6 billion in refunds as a result of Mr. Bloom’s suits.
But other than the pleasures of success, it was often a thankless job. Oil companies complained, with some justification, that the rules, and Mr. Bloom’s interpretations, were maddeningly arcane. Economists said price controls, by definition, weakened market efficiency. Consumer groups criticized Mr. Bloom as being too willing to settle cases, often on terms favorable to the industry.
Mr. Bloom, who had been a natural resources lawyer in New Mexico, responded bluntly. “I had to make myself obnoxious, or nothing would have ever been accomplished,’’ he said in an interview with the New York Times in 1980.
The Carter administration began to address oil pricing by appointing a task force to study it. Mr. Bloom was a member. The task force found a lack of direction and inertia among the 350 people monitoring oil prices.
Mr. Bloom angered critics of the oil companies by allowing the industry to keep some overcharges that could not be readily refunded and to put the money into exploration.
Asked by the National Journal in 1980 whether he was letting companies off the hook, he said, “I don’t think I have to apologize to anybody, if I can get them to spend that money here instead of Nigeria or the North Sea.’’