Biden Lowers Gas Prices
They went down 3 cents a gallon yesterday and have dropped 24 days straight.
Bloomberg (“Gasoline Prices in US See Biggest One-Day Drop Since 2008“):
Gasoline prices in the US just saw the biggest single-day drop in more than a decade.
Average US pump prices fell by 3.1 cents to $4.721 a gallon overnight, marking the largest daily drop since December 2008, according to auto club AAA. Prices at the pump have been falling for the past 24 days — the longest streak of declines since April 2020 — along with losses in crude oil prices, which make up around 60% of the cost of gasoline.
Lower pump prices — including over the Independence Day holiday, one of the biggest travel weekends of the year — have been a boon for Biden, whose previous measures to cap prices, including releasing a million barrels of crude on a daily basis from the country’s emergency reserves, had failed to halt the sharp rise in fuel costs seen a month earlier. Gasoline prices are a major contributor to inflation and a central issue in US elections.
Still, despite the recent retreat, gasoline prices remain about $1.60 higher than a year-ago — and 10 states are stuck with prices in excess of $5 a gallon, with California above $6 a gallon.
On Friday, Biden acknowledged that “we are making significant progress” but there is still work to do to rein in costs.
I’m not sure why President Biden let prices get so high but I’m glad to see that he’s lowering them. I wish he’d do so faster, because he’s got a lot of catching up to do.
A whole 3.1 cents!
I note that they do not graph or list amounts for the drops for the other 23 days. That plus the small decline tells me that the decreases were averaging less than a penny or so.
This is as weak as the 16 cents he saved us on July 4th last year – and likely just as transitory.
Gas at my local CostCo yesterday was $3.86 but still $4.25 at the WalMart nearby.
A couple of weeks ago, gas was over $5/gal, last week down to $4.90-ish and this week down to $4.70, so it is falling. Oil fell below $100/barrel this week and as that cost works it way through the system, gas will fall even more. For reference the average price per gallon in July, 2019, before Covid, was $2.82. Of course the world was more or less at peace, or at least the oil producing nations were.
Way back in June of 2022 regular unleaded was $5.299/gal. Today it is $4.669/gal.
Of course credit where credit is due. Since Trump is the legitimate President according to the True Patriots among us and it was really Trump who raised the cost of a barrel of oil to $130 we must praise his comb over for this relief.
@Mister Bluster:
Correction: Trump is the true president, although cheated of his righteous landslide win by 2000 mules.
Last week on Wednesday oil dipped below $97. It closed on Friday at $104.80. Gas is very likely to start going back up next week.
@Steven L. Taylor: Gasoline prices ranged between $5.99 and 5.39 a week before July 4th and are still at those levels yesterday in my little town on the Left Coast. You’d think Biden would reward us for our loyalty to him, but noooooooooooooo!, all the price breaks are happening in Red States.
In case you should care…
Price at my local supermarket today: 192p/L
Converts to about $8.75 if my calculations are correct.
Prices seem to be still ticking up, but more slowly than of late.
Pound and Euro still trending decline re. dollar.
Incidentally, the forecasts for natural gas prices this winter are absolutely f*ckin’ horrendous.
And I don’t say that lightly.
UK natural gas for this winter compared to the last 5 years – close to 900% higher
Forecast for Germany for winter indicate gas costs total c. €175bn, up from €15bn pre-crisis.
Increase is 4% of total German GDP.
And that assuming the gas pipes from Russia stay open this winter, which I doubt.
Putin will almost certainly attempt to break the European economy this winter.
UK highly likely to see rationing of natural gas and, possibly petrol and diesel, IMO.
Problem: UK currently does not have a fully functional govt. that can address the linkage of UK LPG terminals imports, Norwegian gas supply and implications of EU declarations of energy emergency.
None of Conservative leader candidate even mentioning this.
Short form: we urgently need London/EU negotiation and coordination on this.
Another implication: may need to stop asking Riyadh politely re. oil output.
That is a line into a contingency tree that may see some very flyblown blossoms and sour fruits in the Gulf and wider Middle East.
The key to ironic humor is maintaining it throughout the joke. Never crack, or wink at the audience.
@alanstorm: When did trump do the same. In a global market.
@JohnSF: The idiot Germans had bloody well better not turn off their last reactors and should stop the existing decommissionning and bring back to service. Taking 12% of electricity supply offline… Merkel was a Putin dupe as were the Grunen (continuing a long tradition).
But don’t worry, welcome to the coming new era of pound, dollar, euro parity. It will help on the sunny export uplands.
Or worse should someone of a Priti orientation become PM.
PRESIDENTS. DO NOT. CONTROL. GAS. PRICES.
@Eric:
That’s the joke.
🙂