Comments

riredale wrote on 10/7/2006, 9:35 AM
Up here in Oregon, regular gas is about $2.60, premium about .20 higher. In the local paper last week it was explained that taxes here are similar to nearby states, but there aren't any refineries here, so transportation adds quite a bit to the cost. Ditto for Alaska and Hawaii. I recently switched to using my Discover Card to buy gas, which cuts 5% of the cost. Not all Discover Cards offer this discount, you have to make sure you have the correct account-type.

In the old days, if the engine compression ratio and timing were designed around premium, then using regular would result in a whole lot of "knock" (the sound of marbles in a metal can). I understand that nearly all modern engine control systems can automatically retard the ignition timing if knock is detected. With retarded timing also comes a slight loss of efficiency and horsepower, but I don't know how much. I had always assumed that the cost savings with regular would greatly override the increase in efficiency with premium, but I've never run (or seen) carefully-controlled tests to settle this question.

If your owner's manual recommends regular, there is nothing to be gained by going premium, though my elderly father often does, just because it makes him "feel better." (!)
AlanC wrote on 10/7/2006, 10:53 AM
Remember the price of a barrel of oil is about the same the world over. I'ts that TAX that makes the difference.

In the U.K. we get stung because we still pay Purchase Tax on fuel and then we pay Value Added Tax (VAT) on the base price and also on the Purchase Tax. Yep we pay tax on the tax!

Plus we pay around £150.00 per annum Road Tax, £60.00 every time you get caught by one of our several thousand speed cameras, a Congestion Charge for driving through big citys and they are talking about introducing more Toll Roads.

But it's a small price to pay compared to the price of a pack of cigarettes.

How about £5.50 for 20 Marlboro. ($10.36)



Patryk Rebisz wrote on 10/7/2006, 11:33 AM
AlanC, you have to look at the issue from other perspective too. I was surprised when i came to America that the States are not "organised" around a community the way every Europena town/city is. That is, in Europe you can walk (if you choose) to buy your groceries, go to work, got to school etc. Of course on daily basis walking everywhre would be a bit irrational, but still if you chose so it would be only a nuancance. In the States though you HAVE to drive. You want to buy milk, you HAVE to drive, you want to go to work you HAVE to drive, you want to pick up your childreen from school you HAVE to drive. So in the States gasoline is blood flowing through your vains -- if it doen't flow you are dead, or starving. So it's still surprising the in the States you have to pay that *much* for that "bood."
AlanC wrote on 10/7/2006, 12:29 PM
Unfortunately most people have to commute. The workplace is no longer a mile or two down the road and the corner shop is almost history since the mega stores began opening hypermarkets out of town.

I drive 15 miles each way to the office. It takes me 55 minutes when the kids are in school and 25 minutes at other times. If I used public transport it would take me over two hours to get there. And a lot of people travel much greater distances than that.

I think three hours travelling time for the round trip is about the norm these days. Add that to an eight hour working day and you soon realise that, apart from workers in central London, it's impractical to use public transport.
DavidMcKnight wrote on 10/7/2006, 1:05 PM
2.01 a gallon is about average, lowest I've seen is 1.98. Texas City, TX just south of Houston. Commute? I drive 54 miles each way.
vitalforce wrote on 10/7/2006, 2:03 PM
In the U.S., buy all the gas you can this month. I am certain the prices are going to start creeping back up after the U.S. November elections.
alfredsvideo wrote on 10/7/2006, 2:35 PM
Against all the predictions by industry experts, of gas prices continuing their upward spiral, we have this sudden drop in the price of crude. This is followed by the joyous spectacle of a dramatic fall in prices at the pump. I may be labeled a cynic, but somehow I smell a rat. Nothing touches the heart of the driving public greater than gas prices. I think the Republican boys in Texas have conspired with their filthy rich Saud dynasty friends in Riyhad, to head off a disaster for the Republicans in the mid term elections.
winrockpost wrote on 10/7/2006, 2:37 PM
2.20 in Charlotte NC
1.99 across the border in South Carolina
riredale wrote on 10/7/2006, 9:14 PM
PLEASE don't turn this thread into a political rant also.

Having said that, I would suggest that it would be extremely difficult to maintain price control on a commodity that has so many sources (not all of which are OPEC-related) and so many users. I would suggest instead that with the rapid rise in consumption by China, world oil supplies are in a somewhat delicate balance right now. Cut out 5% of the supply (say, Katrina, or maybe a war that cuts pipelines) and the price could temporarily rise 50% before users got used to the new price, used somewhat less, and the price settled at a new level. Conversely, don't have any hurricanes and turn the world tension down a notch, and suddenly there's more supply than currently needed, and prices temporarily plummet before rising to a balanced level. In my view it's all Econ101 stuff. I took such a class in grad school, and it was an eye-opener for me in that it explained how markets worked.
rmack350 wrote on 10/8/2006, 2:19 AM
$2.72/gallon here in Oakland, California. A little cheaper than San Francisco.

When I lived in San Francisco I walked to get food at the corner store and usually took a bike or motorcycle for general transportation. Parking a car was a hassle. Now, in the new house, parking is easy but nothing is in walking distance.

We have fairly good public transit here. In fact, a bus to the commuter train system stops in front of my house every half hour on weekdays. However, the round trip uses three transit systems and costs around 11:00 dollars/day. Rather than that, I car-pool to the city across the bridge. Car poolers cross the bridge without a toll so it works out pretty well--three riders who'd spend $33.00 on public transit otherwise.

San Francisco has this odd custom on Sundays. Churchgoers park in the two center lanes of a road, taking half the total lanes. Normally you'd get towed for this but the city indulges churchgoers on churchdays. It occurs to me that without cars, neighborhoods would probably be mostly of a church denomination, with catholic neighborhoods, baptist neighborhoods, budhist neighborhoods, etc. So I guess that cars promote religious diversity. Who knew?

Rob Mack