Oil hit $51.24 a barrel today.

[wulimaster]

U.S. light crude set a high of $51.24 a barrel in afternoon trading, while London Brent moved to a record $47.40 a barrel.

Opis weekly average for diesel is $2.057 and $1.926 for unleaded.

Expect another 9 cents added in a few weeks.

Cheap diesel here is $2.119 and gas is $2.039.

Any guesses how high it will go by the end of the year?

Anyone driving less this year?

 

[fasty]

Oh man, That's sucks. Yes, I started less and less drive lately instead ride high mileage by motorcycle.

 

[twigdog]

It sucks here in Georgia as well. I traded in my V8 for a four banger.

 

[Jakebrake]

Gas will be in excess of $3 per gallon by this time next year!

 

[Jakebrake]

quote:

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Originally posted by fasty:
Oh man, That's sucks. Yes, I started less and less drive lately instead ride high mileage by motorcycle.

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Maybee my wife will let me buy a new Honda VTX1800 to drive instead of my truck to save on gas?

 

[dropitby]

Ya I hope it keeps going so the stock market keeps going up.As soon as things get better look out.

 

[Doug]

I won't trade my V10 Dodge no matter what it gets to. It hasn't kept me from driving less, or kept us from taking the trailer out camping.

Gas at $1.50 - equals about $45 to fill up

Gas at $2.00 - equals about $60 to fill up.

I'm not going to sell my truck or stop doing things because of $15.

 

[buster]

quote:

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Gas at $1.50 - equals about $45 to fill up

Gas at $2.00 - equals about $60 to fill up.

I'm not going to sell my truck or stop doing things because of $15

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I agree. In fact you can get a deal on gas guzzling V8's when gass prices go up long enough.

And like you said, $15 ain't breakin the bank.

Gregory Mankiw and most Fed members don't see these oil hikes having a huge impact on the economy. I can't see how it can not, but their the experts....hmmmm..politics.

 

[keith]

Adjusted for inflation, oil peaked at about $80 per barrel in the early 1980's. $50 per barrel won't do much economic harm. $75 would stop economic growth. I don't see the possibility of a big movement downwards in price. When the "terror markup" reduces, the increasing oil usage in China will fill the void. New supplies are there but apparently we don't need them

(ANWR can supply the same amount of oil as our total import from Saudi Arabia). $2 a gallon gas won't change driving habits significantly. $3 will start to bite.

I can't cut back on miles driven, because all of my miles are driving to work and school and the grocery store. Getting a more fuel efficient vehicle makes sense when I replace what I have now, but makes no sense at the moment. The energy used to make a new vehicle I could buy far outweights the very small fuel savings that result from the change.

 

[Doug]

Also,

I have never heard where trading in a vehicle where it didn't cause them to lose $$$ overall. If someone has a newer vehicle, it's worth (a lot?) less than what they paid for it. So they money they'd lose in selling that vehicle, plus the $ they'd lose in buying another vehicle once driven off the lot, it would be probably in the thousands of $$$.

I can buy a lot of gas for that.

 

[Patman]

The long term forecast for oil prices has it coming down in the next few months, so I think it'll be down under $40 a barrel by Christmas.

 

[Gary Allan]

I remember the first and second gas crunches (yes, folks the stuff was actually scammed as being in short supply). People were trading in perfectly good Buicks and Oldsmobiles for thriftier rides ..losing thousands of $$$ ...all for the price of a pizza a week in fuel costs.

I don't think my wife an I do a whole lot of recreational/optional driving anyway. We took ONE three day vacation together with the youngest child. I went to western PA to visit a life long friend for a week end ...the rest is our commute(s) to work and errands.

I can't fit in anything that gets really good gas mileage anyway...

 

[Terry]

High oil costs will toast this nations economy in short order. Those cost increases are just beginning to ripple through the US and Global economies.

Like the early 70's it will not be pretty. Took until the late eighties to recover. Regardless of who is US pres. Those of us living on debt will fall like flys.


I hope,that crude prices remain high long enough to viably develop economically stable alternative commodities for energy and LUBES !!!!! Generated here.

Then maybe we will allow the sand fleas to fight over the Islamic holy sites and which sect gets control to graft the offerings...

 

[wulimaster]

US light crude set a new high of US$52.15 a barrel before settling at US$52.02, up 93 cents on the day. London Brent, the benchmark for European imports, peaked at US$48.10, settling up 86 cents at US$47.99.

 

[Mark in NY]

I took the opposite path from the comments above.

I traded in the family gas guzzler for a gas mizer before the stampede. In theory I beat the rush before the SUV's and minivans market value sinks and even the old beater economy cars get pricey.

Now that I have posted this, it will be a record. We can sit back and see what unfolds in the next 6-12 months.

When it comes to this topic, my optimism is slowly fading month by month. The financial press gives us new reasons every day to justify the ever higher petrol prices. All of the "fear premiums" seem more lame each month........maybe the reality actually is the ultimate supply and demand equation exerting its allmighty influence.

In any case, if the commodity price stays around $48-$52 per barrel it will manifest itself as the price at the pump and at your heating oil tank around election day.

Hang on to your hats then. It will not be just another $12 in your SUV tank, it will be higher prices for plane trips, UPS deliveries, hot showers etc.
Our economy with the "traction" problem would rapidly deteriorate.

[ October 06, 2004, 08:06 PM: Message edited by: Mark in NY ]

 

[JustinH]

Good post Mark. The snowball effect that alot of people don't think about.

I drive a 4.6 v8 f150, and am happy with it getting 19-20mpg. Thing runs great, and has a 25 gallon tank. About 37 bucks to fill it up with 89. I could care less, I wouldn't trade it for an econobox because i'm too tall to fit in one.

And my tbird racecar, forget about it. Its gets about 9mpg, and drinks 93 octane with xylene mixture. I only put about 2500 miles on that car per year.

JH

 

[rjundi]

I recently purchased a new commuter vehicle. A WRX that gets 26MPG with Premium fuel vs my old Civic with 35 MPG on cheapo gas. So it goes, fuel is still pretty cheap relative to the rest of the civilized world.

 

[GROUCHO MARX]

I've heard that gas might average around 3 bucks a gallon by next summer. It wouldn't surprise me.

 

[rjundi]

quote:

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Originally posted by GROUCHO MARX:
I've heard that gas might average around 3 bucks a gallon by next summer. It wouldn't surprise me.

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I have also heard they will fall back to our comfortable norm and I heard the what you have. No real answer yet.

One major answer is to decrease our consumption however our current political outlook is wait till later. The Big Three and all other auto makers continue supplying higher HP vehicles with some no real gains if not losses in MPG. Some Americans consume lots of energy in larger homes that take enormous amount of energy to heat or cool and power them.

We are the largest energy consumers in the world. Some for the good of the country like industry etc, but the personal consumption is quite high too.

We have no one to blame except ourselves. US has a large influence on the price of oil due to our demand.

 

[Al]

quote:

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Originally posted by rjundi:

Originally posted by GROUCHO MARX:
[qb] We have no one to blame except ourselves. US has a large influence on the price of oil due to our demand.

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5% of the worlds people consuming 30% of the worlds oil can not continue. We are a debtor nation in trade, in government spending, and in personal debt. Hang on to your ankles.