Ahhhh summertime! It’s time for trips to the pool, backyard BBQs, vacations, and oh yeah…higher gas prices. And unfortunately for Washington State, that last one is especially painful right now.
Here are Five Fast Facts on WA’s painful gas prices:
- 😣 Just How Painful Are they? Really painful! Because oil prices are constantly fluctuating it depends on the day, of course. But the average price for gas here is now just under $5, the most expensive in the country. Yes, even worse than California! This is NOT the #1 we want.
- 🤦 It Could Be Worse - To be fair, a year ago it was worse at $5.54 per gallon. But does that really ease the pain much? Yeah, we didn’t think so, either.
- 📉 What’s The Cause, Part 1 - There are probably several reasons, but one of the biggest is a lack of supply. Inventories are tight overall, and that always means prices go up. It doesn’t help that the feds have sold so much of our strategic oil reserves to other nations that we’re at a 40-year low!
- 💨 What’s The Cause, Part 2 - Another big reason is definitely the new cap-and-trade program. We’ve looked at these programs before, so this shouldn’t be a surprise. But hey, we aren’t telling anyone who or what they should vote for or against…we’re just giving you the facts. 😉
- 👍 What To Do? - There are some things you can do to minimize your gas costs, like keeping your tires aired up properly, staying current with maintenance on your car, avoiding sudden accelerations, driving only the speed limit (we know, we know…), and so on. It’s not much, but every little bit helps, right?
🔥Bottom line: A lot of this stuff is bigger than any one person, but each person can have an impact on the policies that impact things like gas prices by voting accordingly. But in the meantime it’s going to be painful for a while. Our Paychecks aren’t going to like it…
What do you think needs to be done to bring gas prices back down?
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