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The law of supply and demand. The Invisible Hand self regulates the market. When supplies are limited, price goes up, people use less and at the end of the day, you still have enough of the commodity to buy if you have the money. Enter gasoline. Price has gone up 50 cents in the last month. I don't know anybody who is driving less so where is the Invisible Hand?
I drive less 2000 a miles a year for work, my wife is under 10k a year so I don’t even pay attention to gas prices
Gas would have to at least triple in price for there to be any fewer cars on the road. As long as driver's can get gasoline on credit, they'll but it. After that, they'll steal it. This may be a slight exaggeration, but I'd bet it's not far from the truth.
Gas would have to at least triple in price for there to be any fewer cars on the road. As long as driver's can get gasoline on credit, they'll but it. After that, they'll steal it. This may be a slight exaggeration, but I'd bet it's not far from the truth.
It DID happen in 2008. Roads were emptied out, shopping centers and restaurants deserted but the climb to $4 was steep. At the time, I was driving a truck and I had to fill up once every three days, each time costing 70 bucks. It was not unusual for the fuel cost to be higher than your car payment. And God forbid if you were driving a Diesel.
OH young grasshopper gas isn't expensive now. I've seen a LOT worse, including no gas available at all. Whether gas is expensive or not it still makes sense to be efficient and conservative when burning it. I have relatives overseas and can remember them routinely paying the equivalent of $9 a gallon for it. You can guess how much they drove.
It DID happen in 2008. Roads were emptied out, shopping centers and restaurants deserted but the climb to $4 was steep. At the time, I was driving a truck and I had to fill up once every three days, each time costing 70 bucks. It was not unusual for the fuel cost to be higher than your car payment. And God forbid if you were driving a Diesel.
I’m not sure the truth supports the roads were empty claim, the chart in the link below certainly doesn’t
The law of supply and demand. The Invisible Hand self regulates the market. When supplies are limited, price goes up, people use less and at the end of the day, you still have enough of the commodity to buy if you have the money. Enter gasoline. Price has gone up 50 cents in the last month. I don't know anybody who is driving less so where is the Invisible Hand?
When I got my drivers license at age 16 (1953), minimum wage was around 75 cents per hour. Gas was about 25 cents per gallon. So , work one hour and buy 3 gallons of gas. Now days minimum wage is around $10 per hour, depending on your state. Gas is around $3 or so per gallon. So work one hour and buy about 3 gallons of gas. So, nothing has really changed, except the cars get better mileage .
Elasticity of demand for driving probably depends on the availability of alternative modes of transport. If you live somewhere with good train and bus services, or somewhere that walking and cycling are realistic for short day to day trips then higher prices might push more people to use those methods of transport rather than drive.
If there are no public transport services and everything they need to access is too far to walk or cycle then people just have to suck up increases and accept lower disposable income after getting to work and back.
Considering inflation, gasoline in Texas would have to be around $2.40 a gallon right now to be the same price level it was in the mid 1960s when it was selling for $0.32 a gallon to drivers crowding the 2-lane highways with all steel, gas guzzling, 10 to 15 mpg cars. Considering that the price of gasoline in Texas right now in most places is around $2.30, and with some approaching $2.00, few of us here worry that gasoline is so expensive that we'll choose to drive less. This is especially true since we now are driving our plastic and aluminum vehicles on 4 and 6 lane highways and are getting upwards of twice and more the mpg of those cars in the 1960s.
Although I do drive a lot less than I used to before retirement, the price of gasoline is one of my lessor concerns.
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