Inflation and Gasoline Prices

When I was a kid my dad liked to reminisce about "The good old days". He nearly always concluded his stories with a pithy comment that, "The good old days, weren't...Good."

He was fond of saying that back in the depression we could buy a bushel of corn for a quarter. When we said that the corn was cheap he would laugh and reply, "No it wasn't. Nobody had a quarter. Now everybody does."

Dad was a rabid union man who was constantly talking about the need to improve the working conditions and pay of blue collar people. But he also understood that inflation was the cruelest tax of all for it secretly robbed poor and middle class families of their hard earned pay. It is not possible to compare the price of corn from my childhood with today's price unless we also look at inflation.

Gasoline prices today are about the same as they were when I began to drive in the 1950's.

There's also the question of affordability. Adjusted for inflation, gasoline prices today are roughly where they were in the 1950s -- but per-capita real income then was no more than half of what it is today. Which means that for a typical driver 50 years ago, gasoline was really twice as expensive, in terms of the bite it took out of his budget, as it is now. (Jeff Jacoby)


We in America are very fortunate to live in such a rich nation. The folks in Europe pay a lot more for gas than we do and it is all because of taxes to the governments that do not want the people to drive.

So, enjoy your automobiles and trucks and SUV's. Gas is cheap.