Sunday, October 07, 2012

Ouch

Glad I don't live in California right now:
Gary Kazinjian/Associated Press
That's at a Shell station in Fresno. It's worse in other places. The reasons for this? I can think of three:

  • Refinery issues
  • California's insane environmental laws, which make it impossible to get gas into the state from neighboring states
  • Quantitative easing, which means that even after this spike ends, prices won't get much better any time soon
For what it's worth, I just paid $3.64/gallon at the SA at the corner of Old Highway 8 and County Road D in Roseville. Roseville, Minnesota, that is. Current price in Roseville, California, which is near Sacramento if I remember correctly? About the same as Fresno.

I never thought I'd feel lucky to pay $3.64/gallon for gasoline. But right now, I do.

For reference, here are the prices in some of the areas where regular readers of this feature live (all prices available from GasBuddy.com)

In the Inland Empire, it's about $4.63
In south suburban Chicago, it's about $4.09
In Seattle, it's about $3.89
In suburban Portland, it's about $4.03
In my hometown of Appleton, it's about $3.89
In Madison, it's about $3.75

If I missed your location, let me know. This is a story that hasn't been getting much attention, but it may yet.

8 comments:

Brian said...

You know where to find cheap gas in Seattle better than I do, apparently. I filled up for $4.19 a couple of hours ago.

(That said, I fill our tank about once a month on average, so I don't give it a great deal of thought.)

Mr. D said...

It's probably gone up since I looked it up, Brian. Might be the price I found was out in the suburbs; I don't know Seattle geography very well since I've never been there.

Gino said...

i drive over 100 miles a day just to get to work (and back). i am not unusual for CA's 'inland empire'.

i paid 3.98 for gas on tuesday, 4.25 on thurs, friday was 4.49, and its 4.75 today...

ok, i HAVE to pay for this, or quit my job and go on unemployment.
employment in CA is hard to come by right now... with a real-life 20% and higher unemployment rate.
and this state will vote for Obama, and any democrat incumbant, without so much as a thought...

gee, why does Gino have such a shit attitude toward the world?
I dont know why.
he just does.

Chuckwagon Boy said...

And is this Obama's fault? And if so, how?

W.B. Picklesworth said...

The thing about energy production is that a president can do something like turn down the Keystone Pipeline, refuse to develop ANWAR, or screw with production in the Gulf of Mexico while plausibly arguing that each discrete action would not immediately influence the price of energy. But there seems to be a particular party that always does this. Obama's fault? I think a sophist could argue that it isn't. But that's small consolation to those who are getting hosed.

Mr. D said...

CB, you'll notice that I didn't say anywhere it's Obama's fault. However, you might want to look at the underlying reasons I mentioned, especially refinery issues and quantitative easing, and ask yourself if the purported benefits of these policies outweigh the damage they do to people individually. And WBP identifies some other causes.

Although I'm sure that after California spends megabillions on high speed rail it will solve all the problems. After all, a high speed rail line from L.A. to San Francisco really helps people in the Inland Empire get to work....

Gino said...

chuckwagon boy: not that it is obama's fault, just that his name represents the status quo, is the point that i was trying to make.

in CA, we return the same bunch of fools to office every year, when all the evidence points to that being a bad thing.

Mr. D said...

By the way, gas in the Twin Cities went up about 20 cents today. Now most of the stations around here are at $3.85.