Gas prices

[MillauFr]

Mmm, not sure where that is but it’s not in this country!

In many urban areas in the US a car is a luxury not a necessity.

 

[Robbie Cottam]

In many urban areas in the US a car is a luxury not a necessity.

I’m sorry I though since covid every one in the urban areas jumped in the there SUVs drove out to the suburbs and drove the housing marketing’s insane …..

 

[Robbie Cottam]

Goes anyone remember when gas was Less than a buck a gallon, and gas futures were negative Dollar amounts…..

the good old day

 

[dvcgirl67]

That's only 1 item though. This inflation is really hurting people!

Well, according to the WSJ, Americans are showing "inflation fatigue...with some companies seeing a breaking point." Amazon just reported its quarterly results....had its worst sales growth in over two decades. Cigarette maker Altria sees customers trading down to cheaper cigarettes. Mattress makers are seeing demand falling for higher end mattresses....and 1800-Flowers is seeing demand drop as consumers see bouquets increasingly as a discretionary item they can't afford. Whirlpool and Weber aren't seeing a drop in demand due to price increases they've implemented...in part because they can't meet demand due to difficulty getting parts. So...inflation is hurting us, and it's beginning to impact "them"....corporations.

I read another article about the price of cooking oil skyrocketing...due to the situation in Ukraine. Ukraine happens to be the largest exporter of sunflower oil. And so the price of palm oil skyrocketed....which caused riots in the streets of Jakarta...thousands of miles away, because palm oil is their primary cooking oil. The government of Indonesia responded by stopping exports to palm oil...to calm their citizens down. That caused cooking oil prices to go higher around the world.

The cost of fertilizer has also skyrocketed...which is causing further food/meat inflation. Why is fertilizer so expensive suddenly....Russia is the largest exporter of fertilizer and many countries can't buy fertilizer from them now due to sanctions placed against them.

There's a labor shortage...essentially all over the world. And so companies are having to pay workers more, and as a result...raise their prices.

It would be great if all of this inflation was simply tied to gas/oil prices rising, but it's a far more complex and therefore...difficult situation. We had a huge jump in oil...and then gas prices in 2014. Inflation rose from 1.5% to 2.5% overall. Some items like beef....went up 4%. Americans surely complained about gas prices, but those increases didn't embed themselves into the cost of essentially everything as we're seeing now. Maybe that's due to the duration of that event being short-lived...but I fear this is a much more complicated and entrenched situation that is going to take a long time to unwind. It's happening all over the world, and there's no easy fix to this situation.

 

[EACarlson]

In many urban areas in the US a car is a luxury not a necessity.

In a few urban areas you can get by without access to a vehicle, there aren't all that many. And in order to do that you are being forced to pay more for most things due to lack of options and in many of those same places, higher taxes. Also the time cost, with a few notable exceptions public transit in most of the US is incredibly inconvenient.

 

[MillauFr]

In a few urban areas you can get by without access to a vehicle, there aren't all that many. And in order to do that you are being forced to pay more for most things due to lack of options and in many of those same places, higher taxes. Also the time cost, with a few notable exceptions public transit in most of the US is incredibly inconvenient.

A car is still a nice to have and not a need to have item in urban areas. In the suburbs and rural areas yes I would agree that there is no way to get by without one.

 

[dvcgirl67]

I’m sorry I though since covid every one in the urban areas jumped in the there SUVs drove out to the suburbs and drove the housing marketing’s insane …..

That certainly happened in my area....about an hour south of NYC by train. Yes, plenty have returned to live in the city, but a lot of people have not....and they're making my town busier and less pleasant overall. It's not that the people are unpleasant....there's just an entirely new feel/vibe. There's a lot more traffic during the day, which is a being caused by new (permanent) remote workers running mid-day errands, heading out to lunch, or...in most cases, ordering lunch via door dash, uber eats...etc. My town has a lot of restaurants, and now mid-days we see lots of double parking with hazard lights....people waiting for orders in restaurants to deliver to people in my town...and nearby towns. It's a real bummer.

The upside is that restaurants in our area are booming, the downtown is filled with people out and about...even during the week. They can't seem to build apartment complexes fast enough. And houses are still selling fast. A customer of mine listed their house on Tuesday and had 10 appointments for viewings on Wednesday. They got several offers, but went ahead with an open house today to see if they could generate a bidding war....I'm sure they will.

I don't know...the world has really changed, and so has my little town. My husband and I aren't quite ready to call it quits with respect to work and obligations that we have in our area. But I find myself watching an awful lot of HGTV these days...the shows where people sell their homes and head off into the sunset to travel the world. We're just not digging this new more congested suburbia....and we're native New Jerseyans...so it's not like we don't understand congestion.

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

A car is still a nice to have and not a need to have item in urban areas. In the suburbs and rural areas yes I would agree that there is no way to get by without one.

What about a catapult?

 

[goofyernmost]

Goes anyone remember when gas was Less than a buck a gallon, and gas futures were negative Dollar amounts…..

the good old day

When I got my first car at age 16, gas was 29.9 cents per gal.

 

[Robbie Cottam]

When I got my first car at age 16, gas was 29.9 cents per gal.

i was think like the spring of 20 April 20, 2020. oil was trading at a Negative 37 dollars a barrel.

not sure how that works

 

[Donnainnj]

That certainly happened in my area....about an hour south of NYC by train. Yes, plenty have returned to live in the city, but a lot of people have not....and they're making my town busier and less pleasant overall. It's not that the people are unpleasant....there's just an entirely new feel/vibe. There's a lot more traffic during the day, which is a being caused by new (permanent) remote workers running mid-day errands, heading out to lunch, or...in most cases, ordering lunch via door dash, uber eats...etc. My town has a lot of restaurants, and now mid-days we see lots of double parking with hazard lights....people waiting for orders in restaurants to deliver to people in my town...and nearby towns. It's a real bummer.

The upside is that restaurants in our area are booming, the downtown is filled with people out and about...even during the week. They can't seem to build apartment complexes fast enough. And houses are still selling fast. A customer of mine listed their house on Tuesday and had 10 appointments for viewings on Wednesday. They got several offers, but went ahead with an open house today to see if they could generate a bidding war....I'm sure they will.

I don't know...the world has really changed, and so has my little town. My husband and I aren't quite ready to call it quits with respect to work and obligations that we have in our area. But I find myself watching an awful lot of HGTV these days...the shows where people sell their homes and head off into the sunset to travel the world. We're just not digging this new more congested suburbia....and we're native New Jerseyans...so it's not like we don't understand congestion.

Feels like summer weekends every day now.

 

[tvguy]

In many urban areas in the US a car is a luxury not a necessity.

I guess it depends on the urban area. My cousin lives in an urban area. He drives his personal car to work where he has a company car assigned to him. He does use the Light Rail system to run to lunch, etc, because in his city, if you stay within the city core area, the light rail is free.

 

[MillauFr]

What about a catapult?

They actually were looking at installing a Skyliner to West Seattle. Of course that isn't a real transportation system and would never work.

 

[mrodgers]

We use premium and it's $6.09/gallon.

Just swapped my car out for a "new" one a week ago. First fill I forgot and put 87 in it, $4.19. This weekend I put premium in it, $5.09.

Back previous to 2008, 89 octane was $0.15 more than 87, and premium was $0.10 more than 89, or $0.25 more than 87. Now it's nearly $1.00 difference for premium.

 

[mrodgers]

A car is still a nice to have and not a need to have item in urban areas. In the suburbs and rural areas yes I would agree that there is no way to get by without one.

People use to tell me I should take the bus to work. Yeah, that saves a lot, driving 30 miles to catch the bus which will then backtrack 10 miles to get me to work, LOL.

 

[Robbie Cottam]

That certainly happened in my area....about an hour south of NYC by train. Yes, plenty have returned to live in the city, but a lot of people have not....and they're making my town busier and less pleasant overall. It's not that the people are unpleasant....there's just an entirely new feel/vibe. There's a lot more traffic during the day, which is a being caused by new (permanent) remote workers running mid-day errands, heading out to lunch, or...in most cases, ordering lunch via door dash, uber eats...etc. My town has a lot of restaurants, and now mid-days we see lots of double parking with hazard lights....people waiting for orders in restaurants to deliver to people in my town...and nearby towns. It's a real bummer.

The upside is that restaurants in our area are booming, the downtown is filled with people out and about...even during the week. They can't seem to build apartment complexes fast enough. And houses are still selling fast. A customer of mine listed their house on Tuesday and had 10 appointments for viewings on Wednesday. They got several offers, but went ahead with an open house today to see if they could generate a bidding war....I'm sure they will.

I don't know...the world has really changed, and so has my little town. My husband and I aren't quite ready to call it quits with respect to work and obligations that we have in our area. But I find myself watching an awful lot of HGTV these days...the shows where people sell their homes and head off into the sunset to travel the world. We're just not digging this new more congested suburbia....and we're native New Jerseyans...so it's not like we don't understand congestion.

There were more New York license plates on cape cod the last two winters the Massachusetts cars

 

[tvguy]

I drove from Sacramento to Los Angeles and back this weekend. I was surprised how un-competitive gas stations were that were next to each other. There were 5 gas stations at the same intersection, and prices ranged from $5.19 a gallon to $5.80 a gallon for regular. All are major national gasoline brands. The $5.19 station was a zoo, but people were still going to the other 4 stations.

 

[dvcgirl67]

There were more New York license plates on cape cod the last two winters the Massachusetts cars

We've had that same phenomenon in our beach towns...lots of NY license plates, especially that first summer in 2020. Here in my little NY metro commuter town, the parking lots at the train station are still only 10-20% full on any given work day. NYC office space is still under 40% occupied. I don't have many clients commuting into the city on any regular kind of basis, but the ones who do...drive. They used to take the train or ferry. It's going to take a really long time for things to change...but no matter how you look at it, Manhattan is in for several rough years going forward. And again, in my little town, they can't seem to build apartment buildings fast enough. And I guess they're building them for tenants who will work remotely but need to be close to the city for whatever reason? It's anyone's guess at this point....all that I know is that it's making my little town busier and busier. If we didn't have commitments to elderly parents and two elderly dogs who would be difficult to move around with.....we'd already be gone.

 

[bookgirl]

I bought a car that was equipped to use Flex Fuel. Wasn't looking for that feature but my last two (same make and model) had it standard. Never really used it regularly. both because it's not common at my particular and conveniently located gas station but because I never think about looking for that specific pump at the ones that do have it, but it's currently running about 70 cents cheaper. Giving it a try. I support alternative fuel and honestly have considered an electric car.

I live in a lower priced market so it's not too crazy but I'll be happy when fossil fuel is not king.

 

[RangerPooh]

$4.09 at Kroger. It’s been the same price for about three weeks. Last weekend I stopped in a Kroger nearby town and got gas for $3.89/gallon. No clue why ours is so much higher?