Oil is down to around $48 a barrel

[Andy823]

Last year it was up around $103 a barrel. Last year the local gas prices where I live were around $3.60, this year we are at $3.29. The $3.29 price has been the same since around the middle of June. Oil is down $55 a barrel, and yet gas prices are only down .31 cents. When oil prices started going up this spring, the price at the pump went up at least every other week, and in june it was every week until it hit the $3.29 mark.

What is it in your area? I know that congress won't address this issue, not with republicans in charge of both houses, but it seems that once again, the consumers are getting the shaft at the pump while the oil and gas companies are trying to make back all the money they lost last fall, and winter.

Total GREED if you as me.

[villager]

1. They're still successfully gouging us in California at around $4.00 a gallon

The various lines they get everyone to buy into the gouging are "offline refineries," "California is an island," and the "summer mix" of gas.

This seems to be enough to not question prices that remain completely anomalous for weeks, or months, on end.

[SoapBox]

23. plus a million!

The same...old...excuses...that we have heard for YEARS.

I've been here for almost 30 years and it's the same old lies.

[villager]

37. Exactly -- the excuses never change, and the prices stay artificially high

Might be one thing if the high prices were funding meaningful alternatives to fossil fuel use -- but this is just the blatant fattening of oil company bottom lines, in a market where they can "get away with it," since prices are otherwise trending downward...

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

42. California is an island for the purposes of crude oil

But I'm not anticipating a huge outpouring of support for the Kinder Morgan Freedom Pipeline project. 250,000 barrels a day from Winkler County Texas to San Emidio California.

[Orrex]

2. Three cardinal rules:

When oil prices go up, gas prices go up.
When oil prices go down, gas prices go up.
When oil prices stay the same, gas prices go up.

[Scurrilous]

12. ....

[ChairmanAgnostic]

3. Outside of Chicago 2.64

Which seems incredible compared to the 4.09 last year.

[GummyBearz]

4. Just filled up for 4.55/gal

July 2014:
Oil was $105/barrel
Gas in southern California was $4.08/gal

July 2015:
Oil is $48/barrel
I just filled up in southern California for $4.55/gal


Of course this missing piece to this puzzle is "REAL" inflation. Not the fake inflation that excludes energy, rent, housing, food, etc. If you do a quick calculation using the ratios of $/barrel/$/gallon with the above numbers, inflation is roughly 250%/year.

[Tree-Hugger]

5. $2.69

This is the lowest it's been for a bit. It had been dropping steadily at the beginning of the year, then rose steadily at the beginning of Spring. We were told, "oh, it's just because they are switching to the Summer blend. Prices will drop shortly." Nope, prices did not drop. We had a few weeks of rising prices. Then, it would drop a penny, rise two pennies, drop a penny....etc. Prices did go down three cents this weekend. Wooooooo!

Oh, I am in SEPA.

[No Vested Interest]

21. Southwest Ohio - Just filled today @ 2.69/gallon - minus .10 Kroger pts = $2.59. nt

[madinmaryland]

24. Hey neighbor!! It was $2.58/gal here in Kettering and Centerville today!!

[ChazII]

6. North Tempe/South Scottsdale

Around $.2.95 per gal at the 87 grade. We have the summer blend right now.

[thelordofhell]

7. Time to have another refinery "accident"

Gotta keep those prices up!!!

[Jim Beard]

14. You are 100% correct

They have it all figured out how to screw us. I live close to the Midland/Odessa area and last time it was this low, gas sold for $1.95. Currently in my town, it is selling for $2.61 but just 60 miles away, in Lubbock, it is $2.30. The convience stores have it figured out. They have their prices "stair stepped" whan leaving the larger city. Its amazying how the price can go up 10 cents a callon every 20 miles.

Thugs, everyone of them.

[HereSince1628]

8. Ranging between $2.89 and $2.65 going west along US Hwy 18 from Milw.

I'd guess at an avg around $2.69

[The2ndWheel]

9. Not at least a little greedy to want cheaper gas at the pump?

Knowing how its use contributes to many different problems?

[Andy823]

11. Well

"If" the extra money was actually going into say a fund for research for alternative fuel sources, then I would not have a problem. However when it goes into the pockets of multi billionaires, then I have a problem with it. Many people spend a lot of money getting back and forth to work, higher prices for fuel hit them hardest. I see where some places here are lower, and that's great, but over $4.00 is insane.

[Facility Inspector]

10. It's called a scam

and we're the marks.

[Scurrilous]

13. Cry free enterprise and let slip the dogs of greed. n/t

[Frustratedlady]

15. Our gas raised 10-12 cents, this week.

It was stuck at $2.59 for weeks, then jumped to $2.69 and up.

Our groceries haven't gone down all that time, either. In fact, the meat is outrageous and the cans/boxes keep getting smaller. You have to change recipes to adjust for the decrease in size.

[Fuddnik]

16. Around $2.45 around Tampa.

[Jim Beard]

17. Keep up with daily crude oil prices with this link

http://www.oil-price.net/

[n2doc]

18. 2.40's here in Georgia

Should be 2.20's or less with that oil price. they are sticking it to people where and when they can,. especially in California.

on edit, here's a map of prices. Shows the crap going on in Cal quite well

http://www.gasbuddy.com/GasPriceMap

[mountain grammy]

19. Around $2.50 in Colorado.

Agree, total scamming, greedy bastards.

[loudsue]

20. Americans are getting the shaft EVERYWHERE. Not just gas prices.

There is a "trend" that is sucking every last dime out of Americans....food prices, insurance, rent, medical bills, banking fees and double-fees, alternative minimum tax on middle class wage earners, education, school supplies, cheap clothes that cost a bundle, shoes with no engineering or style whatsoever costing $79 and above, and of course GAS.

The quality products can still be found in some cities, but most cities are crammed with cheap junk; toxic, unworkable junk. It doesn't look like a random accident to me. It just doesn't.

[laundry_queen]

28. +1

It's not an accident. It's all by design. All in the name of corporate greed.

[jomin41]

22. It will be interesting to see what happens when/if

Iran comes back online. Will the Saudis slow down? or continue pumping? At least, it looks like the economic picture for fracking, going forward, is "challenging", at these crude prices. Count blessings!

[jomin41]

25. Taxes add about 49 cents/gal. (fed/state/local} average.

Your results may, of course, vary.

[Cleita]

26. Gas in my world went up .20 a gallon last week. Funny? No? eom

[Octafish]

27. Time for a New War.

Put a crimp in the hose works wonders for Houston.

[gvstn]

29. Once they realized people will pay $4/gallon during the GWB years

It will never go down to market value. They know what people will pay. The $.89 of the Clinton years are gone.

[joshcryer]

41. Yep.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

30. Oh no! How can the oil companies expect to survive!!!!???? Of course, Obabma is to blame!

I'm sure that will be FoxNoise's stance. No matter what happens, it's probably bad, and if it it's bad, it's definitely Obama's fault.

High gas prices: Bad. Obama's fault.
Low gas prices: Bad. Obama's fault.

US at war. Bad. Obama's fault.
US not at war: Bad. Obama's fault.

National Parks open: Bad. Obama's fault.
National Parks closed: Bad. Obama's fault.

And so on...

And yet they maintain a large and loyal viewership with this kind of ongoing, blatant hypocrisy.

[kentuck]

31. It's getting real close to the price of war...

Somebody has to protect the profits of Big Oil..

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

32. I suspect it has something to do with the "crack spread," which is

not something naughty, but the differential between the price of crude oil and petroleum products produced from it. In other words, it's the profit margin that the refinery can expect to make by refining (cracking) crude oil. Where they make the money is when they simultaneously buy and sell contracts in crude oil and its derivative products like gasoline. Oil producers use trading in crack spreads to hedge against a down market, and speculators do it to profit from a changes in the oil/gasoline price differential.

[Fred Sanders]

33. The only other viable options other than public shaming are to break up the oil cartels or nationalize them.

[Stellar]

34. Well they claim it's going down in Chicago.

and will continue to decline, or so they say.

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2015/07/06/after-the-bell-drop-in-oil-prices-bodes-well-for-chicago-area-drivers/

eta: could be looking at $2.00 per gallon come Christmas...they say.

[Andy823]

35. And what about diesel?

It's been selling on the commodities market for less than gas, which it used always be. Diesel is a byproduct of making gas. All year the price of diesel has been around .10 cents or more below the price of gas, yet it has been selling for over $3.00 a gallon locally all year. Last week they dropped the price of diesel from $3.35 down to where it is the same price as gas at $3.29.

I can remember when diesel was always way under the price of gas. Of course since more people are buying diesel trucks, and cars, that price has gone up till it has become more expensive than gasoline. None of what they do make sense, but it sure increases their profits.

[wolfie001]

36. This decrease in price per gallon has saved me between.....

...... $750 and $1000 per year. Long commute but I upgraded to a more fuel efficient car.


Thanks Obama!!!!

[tritsofme]

38. We had gas below $2.00 for a few weeks in Chicagoland about 8 or 9 months back

When oil took its first big tumble. It had been higher lately, but I've seen it in the $2.60s the past few days.

[hifiguy]

39. $2.80-3.00/gallon in Mpls.

[Ghost in the Machine]

40. I got gas for $2.09/gal yesterday in Athens, TN. It was $2.12/gal but I got a 3 cents/gal discount

by using my Speedway Gas Rewards Card! I am hoping to see it go below$2/gal again before summer is over. It's ranging from $2.25/gal out in the boonies, down to $2.12/gal in town, right off the interstate...

Peace,

Ghost

[spanone]

43. traveling today i saw diesel cheaper than regular gas

[Andy823]

44. It should be

Diesel has been selling lower than gas on the commodities market for months now, but the price around my area has not dropped until last week when it dropped down to the same price as gas, $3.29. It used to always be cheaper than gas back before George W. Bush took office.

[spanone]

46. it always was until recent years.....

[phylny]

45. Rural Virginia, 2.199 this morning. n/t

[ChisolmTrailDem]

47. Saw $2.06 at Valero in Mesquite, TX a little while ago. Looks like the price is dropping from

around $2.48 on the back of this downturn in oil prices.

Give it a week or so to start seeing the lower prices. I believe the stuff already in the gas station tanks has to run out and new gas bought at the lower price before you'll start seeing it at your pumps.