higher MPG ... higher gas prices!!!

[Ryland]

According to the radio program Freakanomics, our personal transportation is the single largest fuel use and that we would all be best off living within walking distance from our jobs and importing all of our food and other goods.
Of course there are a lot of oil based goods that we toss in the trash that are going to go up in price with the price of gasoline but we should stop using that junk anyway!
At work we tow a heavy trailer around and get 9 to 11mpg, costing $100 to fill up, but it's still a very small amount of our cost, even at $10 per gallon it would be a small part of our cost.

[ron]

yep here calif. 1969 I took down the 19cents a gallon sign and heard about it as it climbed all the way to 32cents a gal in 1970 when the 1st kid was born , but back then I would fill up the vw and get food for a week for 10bucks, today reg fuel 4.119 gal. cosco

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by ron

...but back then I would fill up the vw and get food for a week for 10bucks...

Yeah, but back then you were probably earning about $1.50/hour :-)

[ron]

back then I was working as a xray orderly and training to be a xray technition. making 2.65 hr. mim wage was 1.65 ,no jobs for techs back then so I became a mechanic in 70. for the big bucks,3.26hr to start

[jalmir]

Originally Posted by ron

back then I was working as a xray orderly and training to be a xray technition. making 2.65 hr. mim wage was 1.65 ,no jobs for techs back then so I became a mechanic in 70. for the big bucks,3.26hr to start

and to think that some are still stuck at those wages in the US!!!

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by jalmir

and to think that some are still stuck at those wages in the US!!!

Not legally. The gov't has laws concerning the negotiated price one may sell their labor for. The way they see it, being jobless is better than a low paying one.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by ron

back then I was working as a xray orderly and training to be a xray technition. making 2.65 hr. mim wage was 1.65 ,no jobs for techs back then so I became a mechanic in 70. for the big bucks,3.26hr to start

Which is my point. Stop thinking about the price of gas in dollars, and think of it as hours of your labor (or the labor of someone doing similar work to what you did back then).

[War_Wagon]

Originally Posted by jalmir

Damn, prices around here are getting CRAZY!!!

Thank God for this website, my average MPG got up but so is gas price. This morning some place in Montreal had 1.534$ per liter

That's 5.8$ per gal!!!!

Yersterday average was 1.384$ and today it's 1.499, a rise of 11.5 cents per liter (or 43.5 cents per gal) in one night! WTF?!?!?!

/rant

Fuel prices always rise in the first few weeks of September. Over the summer, there is less demand (no parents taking their kids to school, no school buses, less use of vehicles / transit by older students, more adults taking vacation to be with their kids so less commuting to work etc etc). If you have a commute that involves a "rush hour", think about how much of a gong show it is the first week classes go back in - all that extra traffic/busses/people that haven't worked out car pools yet sucking up all that extra fuel. Travel in the summer is more of an option for a chunk of the population, so prices reflect that, but come September the oil companies know that rule goes out the window so prices go up toute de suite!

[ChazInMT]

[QUOTE=War_Wagon;328713]Fuel prices always rise in the first few weeks of September. QUOTE]

Sounds Plausible....then I looked at gas historic gas prices, and...Myth Busted. Gotta throw the brown flag on this September Rise theory. Sorry.




Funny thing, I don't remember gas being $1.80 in 2009. Isn't that when Obama took office? Yeah, I guess we voted for change.

[War_Wagon]

Interesting. If I am wrong I am wrong, maybe it just seems like that up here? I will see if I can find some Canadian figures.

I wonder if there is a way to look at how quickly prices rise over a certain time? Meaning, when prices rise, when do they have the greatest percent change in the shortest period of time? So not the highest overall price, just the quickest percentage of change?