With the new news that El Presidente has signed a bill for 2020 that will mandate cars get at least 35 mpg from the showroom, it got me to thinking about something.
I haven’t been driving that long. I got my license in 2001. I had a Thunderbird SC with a 19 gallon tank that I could fill with 93 Octane for $23. I think gas was around $1.10-$1.30/gallon.
Now I have a 4 cylinder Cavalier with a 14 gallon tank and it costs me $43 to fill it up.
It doesn’t seem like the price of gas really increased from the 70’s and 80s, as I think my parents said it was around $.75/gallon in the mid-70’s. I’d have to look this up for sure.
Now, what I want to know is, how in the fuck did gas only increased a max of $1.00/gallon in 25 years, only to increase roughly $2/gallon in 6 years?
I know that our dependency on foreign oil hasn’t increased that much. Where in the fuck is all this money going?
Edit: I stopped paying attention to politics years ago, but this just baffles me as to what’s causing this spike.
I have heard in the past that gasoline was one of a few products that hasn’t risen with normal inflation through the 80’s and 90’s, maybe due to government subsidies. It could be that we are now experiencing a correction for this.
btw, I filled up my parent’s 84 olds cutlass in 1996 and 1997 for 89 cents per gallon.
technically speaking, we are spending the same percentage of our paychecks to buy gas, as our parents spent in the 60’s and 70’s. While that doesn’t make me feel any better about spending 75 a week to fill up the truck, its a pain i have to live with.
Write to your congress man tell him to kick the tree hugging Elk Loving hippies out of Alaska and let us tap into the billions of barrels of oil lurking up there and we can have a americian owned and operated refinery.
If someone works at Mickey D’s making 5.15/hr they probably shouldn’t drive something that gets 12mpg(not sayin you work at micky d’s trump). But its like people here, they bitch and whine about the price of gas, but none of them thought about it when they bought their big ass H2.
Hell, gas was over 2/gallon when I bought my truck, I KNEW it would cost a bunch to fill up, and that is the reason I don’t bitch about it, I put myself in the paying 70ish a week to fill up.
Think about it, it’s just another business. This is just an example, keep in mind.
Pretend you are a water distributor. You can buy barrels of water for $70 each. There are 55 gallons in a barrel. If you can sell water for $3.00 a gallon, you make $165. Overall, you make $95 on the barrel. If you were in this position, wouldn’t you dig the outcome?
While this is true, fuck OPEC and fuck paying $3.00/gal for gas.
Over Thanksgiving on my way back from vacation I flew back and sat next to a local gas/oil guy. I won’t mention any names, but I promise you that this really did occur. He explained to me that currently there is so much money to be made in gas that it’s ridiculous. He said that there is nothing really holding gas at $90/barrel (was really $98 at the time). Truth be told, if there was a gas strike the price would come back down. Basically what he said is that oil companies have our balls in a vice and know it and since people pay it why would they ever really bother coming back down in price. He told me how in the late 90s/early 00s they were excited to see prices get into the 50s and thought it was great then. He sort of almost suggested in our conversation that oil COULD be in the 50-60/barrel range pretty easily/quickly and they’d still be turning a pretty damn good profit. Of course this doesn’t factor in OPEC and all of their BS. Imagine what that would mean to consumers though. The other thing to consider is this… And I’m sure someone is going to get pissed…
The minimum wage is/has (I’m not even sure if/when it is 100% in effect?) gone up to $7.15. Quick math… 7.15-5.15 = 2. 2/5.15 = .388. So basically min wage has gone up 39%. As it has been mentioned proportionally gas prices probably aren’t that ridiculous. The thing that really sucks is that with min wage increasing the people earning it hurt the most by gas prices, but in the same token gas prices have no chance of ever going back to where they were due to the increase in minimum wage. This also sucks because no one else, who isn’t making min wage, is really seeing a 39% increase in wages, but inflation will catch up to everyone in the next few years and that huge jump in minimum wage will be moreso felt by all then - though there are of course some cities that have held that min wage for a few years now, but of course most of those cities are the ones known for having a higher living cost. Who knows… Just speculating I guess? But sure seems like oil won’t be going down and that oil companies are going to continue making bank off everyone.
The prices have gone up due to world demand (I.E. china and other developing countries) and due to the fact that gas/oil was very underpriced for the 80s and 90s so now it is being compensated for.
I really don’t pay too much attention because I get reimbursed milage for work at 48.5 cents a mile. So if I am driving to a client or out of town on business I get paid back for gas and for the use of my car (depreciation, wear, etc…). So as long as I am getting paid back for my gas, it can go as high as it wants to.
Some good points above. Also, keep in mind that the U.S. dollar is worth less than ever before in history. The treasury and the Federal Reserve continue to introduce new money into the marketplace, diluting the value of the dollars already in circulation. That means, everyday, the dollars you and I earn, are worth less. You can thank the monetary policy dating back to 1913 for that.
I have seen estimates that place it around $.04 today equal to $1 about 90 years ago.
No matter how you slice it, the working class is being screwed.
I do know how to spell, we are on the internets, so don’t spew your 1337 talk to me cause I don’t care.
Yeah, let’s all vote Ron Paul because of this thread :rolleyes:
I took economics micro and macro and public accounting in college, things haven’t changed that much since 01 when I graduated. The monetary policy isn’t what is messing up the economy. We are practicing both expansionary policy and a contractionary policy! As you pointed out, we are printing more dollars. We are slightly raising interest rates which have been climbing over the last several years (but we have to do this very carefully because too many banks farked up and there are a lot of foreclosures). Currently we are under stagflation (stagnation and inflation both). So, this is a bit more difficult and different then your average econ class. We are essentially waiting to see what the economy is doing. The fed was so worried about the stock market they were really conservative and the mortgage fiasco is making banks raise interest rates so the economy is stagnant. All in all you made 0 points about anything, you just blurted out something you read in economics class last week junior.
