There has been much hand-wringing in the media about high prices at the pump, as the Energy Information Administration reported another rise in average retail conventional gasoline prices to $3.615/gal as of Monday.
Two of the main 3 candidates have jumped in with the genius idea to put a gas tax "holiday" into effect this summer, cutting out 18.4 cents/gal from unleaded and 24.4 cents/gal from diesel.
But really, does the US driver pay a lot at the pump?
The EIA publishes weekly premium gasoline prices for various countries. As of April 21, US premium unleaded was $3.73/gal, at the time the highest on record in America. While that seems insanely expensive, consider that US prices are less than half those in Europe.
A sample of European premium unleaded prices ran from a low of $8.17/gal in the United Kingdom, to $9.51/gal in the Netherlands, as of April 21.
Diesel prices have also been in the news, as truckers protest the high costs, which have cut into profit margins. And, to be sure, prices have risen sharply in America, to an all-time high of $4.14/gal April 21.
But as with gasoline, US prices pale in comparison to our European cousins, who are paying anywhere from $7.32/gal in Belgium, to $8.89/gal in the UK.
So now the "high" prices in the US have started to cut into demand, which is the first step to bringing down costs. And politicians want to get in the way of this normal market function? It MUST be an election year.
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