slatten49 wrote:
From William Weir...Author, Journalist, Minister
Briefly. Gas prices got as low as $1.87 in February 2016 under Obama, holding steady around $2.30 until Trump took office. From there they rose steadily until October 2018, reaching a peak of almost $3.00. As the economy continued to flounder under Trump (2018 saw the worst year for the stock market since the 2008 housing crisis; the Fed lowered interest rates in 2019 for the first time since Bush was President to try to prevent a recession), prices fell slightly, holding around $2.65 until the p******c.
Once Trump mishandled the p******c and the country began shutting down, demand for fuel dropped and prices fell, reaching $1.93 in April 2020—almost as low as a year before Trump took office. Trump then stated that low gas prices (during a financial crisis) was bad for America. He pushed OPEC into a two year deal to slash production to drive up prices. (This is probably the only thing in his failed Presidency that he successfully accomplished.) Gas prices began to rise immediately and continued to rise until Biden took office.
Once Biden reopened the country, people started driving normally again and the global oil shortage Trump created drove prices up even faster. Prices continued to climb until Trump’s OPEC deal ended in May 2022, peaking at just over $5.00 in June. Then normal production resumed and prices began to fall again. Currently prices are hovering around $3.00 a gallon, about where they were at the end of 2018—the last time the economy was considered reasonably stable under Trump.
So long story short, Trump’s failed economy did lead to gas prices dipping before reaching a record high because of his OPEC deal, but thanks in part to record high domestic oil production under Biden, gas prices are back in line with where they were before the “Trump Slump” despite global inflation driving prices up on almost everything else.
So let’s adjust the numbers for global inflation. The $2.30 under Obama in 2016 would be $2.97 in today’s dollars. That $3.00 under Trump in 2018 would be $3.71 in today’s dollars. The $2.65 we averaged in 2019 would be $3.22 in today’s dollars. So adjusting for inflation, gas prices now under Biden are lower than they were before the p******c under Trump, and only slightly higher than they were in the final year of Obama’s Presidency.
From William Weir...Author, Journalist, Minister b... (
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Drilling leases run 10 to 15 years. Biden has stopped most new leases and nobody wants to invest as long as he is pulling the plug on future drilling. As the current leases expire and there are none to replace them, it will all go to hell. Supply will shrink and we will be dependent upon OPEC for oil. Good for us? No. Not at all. If not fixed, the SWHTF in about 5 - 6 years. And without f****l f**ls, you can't charge those stupid Ev's.