Long Ago in a Very Far Land

GON

$150 Site Donor 2025
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Nov 28, 2014
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Location
White Sands, NM
Look at the spread between unleaded and premium :rolleyes:
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I got my drivers license in August of 1968. IIRC regular was about 30 cents a gallon. 100 octane was about 35 cents a gallon. That pic looks to be from about 1974ish after the oil embargo that sent prices through the roof….:sneaky:
 
Yea, I remember pulling up to the pump and requesting “two bucks, regular” and then driving the circuit in town all night. That was in my buddies F150.

Remember rationing in the 70’s? Stations around me had a $5 minimum so you didn’t hoard and line up every day. My Fiat 850 had a six gallon fill to overflowing. I could not take $5 even on fumes. One station was owned by an Italian guy. He understood and went by a min of four gallons.
 
I'm not being combative, I think current gas prices are insane and I think in the same people are the reason for it. But wasn't the minimum wage like $0.75 back then
 
I distinctly remember driving to Calgary around 1978 and noticing the cheaper gas was 17 cents a liter. It is now 10 times that amount. A good paying job for a summer student was $800 per month. How may summer student jobs pay 10 x 800 = $8,000 per month?
You're absolutely right about wages (or at least minimum wage) not keeping up with inflation!

I don't think gasoline was being sold by the litre yet in 1978, though. IIRC, metrification started with temperatures (F to C) c. '75 or '76, then speed and distance signs (MPH to KPH, and miles to kilometres c. '76 or '77), and finally weights (lbs to kg), pressures (PSI to KPa), and volumes (including gasoline, which went from Imperial Gallons to Litres) on January 1st, 1979.

Drove from Winnipeg, where I was a student, out to see my family in BC for Christmas '78. Bought gallons on the way West, and litres traveling back East.

Through the first half of '79, I remember gas bouncing around between about 18.0 and 21.3 ¢/l. We were always jealous of Albertans!

That same year I worked PT in a warehouse pulling in $2.95 an hour unloading semis. Overall, gasoline got a lot cheaper in relative terms for me as the years went by, and my cars generally used less of it too.
 
NZ$12.20 a US gallon here today. And those dollars are just as hard to earn as they are in the US.

I think my Vega cost $10 to fill in California back in 1974 and that would last me a week.
 
NZ$12.20 a US gallon here today. And those dollars are just as hard to earn as they are in the US.

I think my Vega cost $10 to fill in California back in 1974 and that would last me a week.
Gah! That's C$10.57 or US$8.30.
C$10.57/US gallon = C$2.80/l. 🤯

I guess I shouldn't complain about the C$1.739 we're seeing here.

When we lived in Whangarei in 2003/04, I was amazed to see petrol over $1.00/l for the first time.
 
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