Want to buy that awesome dress at Old Navy’s website, but shipping costs make it way out of your budget? Not anymore! The new website www.getfreeshipping.com has a ton of big name sponsored listings that may just offer to cover your shipping costs if you link to their sites through getfreeshipping.

Shipping costs are seemingly on a high speed escalator with no end in sight. Oil prices are continuing to increase, and the United States economy is declining. With that come more expenses related to import, export, and even coast to coast shipping. Companies just cannot afford to send their items without charging the consumer to the hilt.

This is a great deal, especially considering typical shipping rates from the top companies. Most products ordered online weigh 5 pounds per package or less. To ship a 5 pound package using the United States Postal Service from Cincinnati, Ohio to Beverly Hills, California it can cost up to $30.70 for next day air.

The same package, using FedEx to ship for next day delivery can be from $64.76 up to $101.38! This doesn’t even include picking up the product - it has to be taken to a FedEx staffed location during operating hours., which will add even more expense to your order charged by the company from which you are purchasing the product.

One last comparison for reference is the rate for shipping this 5 pound product using UPS. To send the same product from Cincinnati to Beverly Hills, it will cost you $71.75 to get the product there the next day. Again, this does require the merchant to deliver the product to a staffed UPS location during business hours; therefore the merchant will pass on the added expense to the consumer.

This goes to show that research can save you big time money. And the great folks at get free shipping are going to do a lot of that research for you, and then spoon feed it to you on their website. It will be so easy to do all of your online shopping, beginning at their site, and end up paying the absolute lowest shipping - if any.

For the first time since October of 1992, the non-petroleum portion of the trade deficit fell BELOW the petroleum portion. This shows the rise in oil prices, and the fall in demand for high ticket items made in foreign countries (appliances, furniture, televisions, and clothes.) Much of this is directly because of the high cost of oil, over $108 a barrel according to trading records from March 12, 2008 - an incredible $0.84 over the price from just one day earlier.

So not only will you be saving money for your own purchases, you will be contributing to the overall economy in an effort to counterbalance this apparent recession we are falling into.

Or at least that is what you can explain to your spouse when you get all of those great packages in the mail…