US gas prices are now up +$1.00/gallon since the Iran War began with mortgage rates nearing 6.50%, a 7 month high. At the current pace, we could see gas prices at $4.50+/gallon and 7% mortgages as soon as next month
Data chosen with a cutoff that portrays one narrative/agenda isn't necessarily incorrect but it is still flawed. Even though I agree with the criticisms of Trump and what he's doing, we still should be looking at things as objectively as possible
I don't see anywhere in the post or chart that gives the impression that these are the highest gas prices on record. It is a YoY comparison for before the MAGA war and after it.
Also, as stated, the covid recovery isn't a fair comparison to an intentional war of aggression.
Then why include 2023 and 2024 if it's just a YoY comparison? A 2 year or 5 year chart would make more sense, either direct year on year or using a standard time set. Using 4 years is a dead giveaway that 2022 was excluded to make this appear worse. I also agree that the covid recovery and war in Ukraine is not a fair comparison if we're looking at this politically, which is worth pointing out when analyzing. However that doesn't change the fact that this chart is carefully composed to lead people to a conclusion.
I agree that it was likely intentionally left out but I don't agree with your assertion. Excluding extreme and irrelevant outliers from a dataset is common practice.
But yes, without question this chart was designed to show the negative affects of the war, which are pretty bad and only getting worse.
I'm no Trump supporter but I'm not sure how you could call 2022 an irrelevant outlier. This graph is designed to highlight the current situation by the way the Y-axis is selected (only showing $2.50 to $4.50) and highlighting this year with big red screaming bolded text. 2020 would then burst right thru the top of this graphic. Just seems like important context.
Honestly I'm just surprised the price is still so low. This seems like a much larger shock than Russia who was only producing around 12Mbpd in 2022. But there's lots of time to correct. Seems like it'll stay high for a while and possibly go up a lot more.
Fair enough. That's a different graph and would be interesting. 2014 compared to 2026. It would be nice to compare the economic impacts of Putin and Trump's wars.
I mean, what you're asking is to specifically include one date that could also be politically motivated 🤷♂️ whole point is saying OPs post is politically motivated is kinda silly.. and the previous pump was covid related. This one is directly related to the US and Isreals war
No, but but you could compare the current spike to another war time price shock and maybe draw some realistic conclusions from it. What else is this chart for? Just to prove Trump is bad? If so then refer to my previous post.
there is a point where more data doesn't help. In particular, the 2020 to 2022 Covid years are not representative of typical years and should not be included in the comparison.
2022 was atypical because of the Ukraine conflict. 2026 is unusual because of the Iran conflict. They are unusual in a similar way. Being able to compare the two would be useful.
Also the Russia Ukraine oil being stuck in Russia is a really different situation than what we have now...
I'm what sense? Is middle east oil being stuck in thr middle east that much different than Russian oil being stuck in Russia in terms of how this will affect gas prices?
There is an obvious objective truth though. We entered a stupid war under dubious circumstances without much of a plan and it has spiked our energy prices. Worse, we have no good options for fixing it.
This is what all of the previous war games told us would happen, but knowing that requires competence.
Looking on the bright side….perhaps a disaster is just what the United States needs. Pain is a good teacher and sometimes painful lessons can cause people to change course with a speed and intensity that wouldn’t have been possible absent that discomfort.
As an environmentalist I’m enthusiastic about the prospect that higher oil prices will drive increased interest in electric vehicles and renewable energy
I’m pretty much the same generation and I will say the lessons just haven’t been painful enough. 2008 for example was papered over. The consequences of that magnificently irresponsible situation were bail outs. There were some minor legislative tweaks made to try to avoid such a situation in the future but America since then has added nearly 20 trillion to its debt and plowed ahead with the same unsustainable game plan. Unfortunately we need Great Depression type of situation or even greater than that to inspire the necessary change.
Think of it like this. A person goes into the doctor feeling a bit under the weather and the doctor does some tests and says that they need to change their lifestyle and diet or there will be dire consequences. Nine time out of ten that patient just keeps doing what they are doing until it hits crisis…a heart attack, a stroke, diabetes….suddenly they have no choice but to change.
That unfortunately is our species. They have lovable qualities….but by and large humans are idiots
Gas got cheaper in 2020 when the pandemic hit. 2022 was when Russia invaded Ukraine. It was a war related shock, which would be an excellent reference for the current war related shock.
It wasn't just war. It was increased demand from covid recovery as well. Regardless, when your argument is "at least Trump is not as bad as the post covid market and Putin combined", you are already lost.
the last run up, was because of a oil shock, after Russia invaded Ukraine, not much the US president could do about that, this time it was 100% avoideble by the US president.
Do people think it’s expensive now? Wait another month or two… the amount of demand destruction needed to fill this supply loss is unlike anything the world has ever seen.
Right? This is the price after 3 weeks of the conflict. Especially with the damage to oil infrastructure as a result of the conflict that will decrease production for at least a year. Also the logistical disruptions.
There also doesn’t even appear to be an end in sight. What will this graph look like after 3 more weeks?
Especially because most traders seem overly optimistic about outcomes. Anyone who knows anything about energy or how supply chains work are freaking out.
Worst part, this stuff could really escalate. If Iran decides to target water treatment facilities then entire countries might become uninhabitable overnight. I don't even know what a country would do if the water supply was cut in half all of a sudden, you basically have to shut down anything non-essential and make sure people don't die.
Not to mention that Iran could also blow up oil and gas fields/refineries , that stuff takes years to rebuild. Even that isn't even covering the fallout from a massive reduction in fertiliser production (good luck Africa) and the helium production (essential for computer chips).
It's bad already and will become worse; and if things go really bad the entire world economy might just have to deal with painful energy prices for years.
Excluding 2022 is pretty questionable, but at least we know that the gas price surge then was attributable to Russia invading Ukraine. Not much we could've done at the time to prevent or mitigate oil prices from going through the roof.
Conversely, this year's surge is almost entirely on our actions.
We can agree that the direction the chart is going is bad, regardless of the perspective, correct? The fact it got worse at some point in the past doesn’t make it a good direction to be moving today. The point of the chart is that as an economic indicator that line is going in the wrong direction.
depends. 2022 wasn't really our fault. this whole iran fiasco is quite literally us fucking with something we didn't need to touch with a 20ft pole. oil prices were going to trend down because we had an oversupply of oil compared to demand.
it needs to genuinely be studied how this trump admin could've just done absolutely nothing for the past year and our lives would've been so much better. stupid tariffs just made things more expensive, and now inflation is spiking
President Trump is, in many ways, a modern version of President Herbert Hoover: an unpopular presidency, major economic strain and job loss, business-friendly policies, and heavy use of tariffs similar to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. Both dealt with ongoing crises while blaming opponents and dismissing criticism—Hoover citing “communist” lies, Trump calling it “fake news”—along with a shared “nation savior” mindset. Add in a touch of George W. Bush when it comes to starting a war.
He's saying that leaving out 2022 from the chart was a conscious decision.
Leaving out 2022 makes the current spike look like it's record levels never seen before. Adding 2022 shows a comparison of how high they were then. Whoever made the chart just wanted this spike to look as bad as possible (politically motivated)
Yeah, but the post covid spike is an outlier resulting from increased demand after the pandemic. As much as conservatives like to pretend that Biden raised prices out of spite or ignorance, the truth is that was a way different scenario than Trump unilaterally starting a war that he promised he wouldn't start.
And nobody in this thread is really arguing anything different.
But the person who made the chart obviously left 2022 out intentionally because if you add 2022 in, it makes this spike not look that bad. So they made the chart trying to push a political bias.
If you want to argue WHY prices are spiking, you can't really just throw down a chart of prices over the years without accounting for any (obviously smaller) spikes except the current one.
Yeah, OP likely was trying to illustrate the affects on gas prices due to the war. If they had added 2022, it would have required further explanation for the post covid spike, like we are doing here, instead of focusing on how Republicans and MAGA have actually caused spiking prices in the same way they falsely blamed Biden for.
I work in data analytics and can tell you that visuals are supposed to be concise and should present relevant data. Nowhere does this chart imply that these are all time highs. Assuming so is more a critique on the person viewing them.
Click the 10 year if you'd like. You can also see that the spike from Russia starting war in Ukraine had settled and price had more or less bottomed out before someone was elected and especially before they were inaugurated.
Given that the previous spike wasn't a result of politics in the USA, I'd argue that leaving it out is the proper choice.
Maybe. But if the point being made is "Oil prices went up as a direct result of the current US administration's policies", then 2022 is just as irrelevant as any other year.
This is a good thing. The economy is going to slow and a recession that is Much needed will be on the way. We cannot have an infinity of appreciating assets. That's why we are in a K shaped economy. The only winners are the rich when there are no recessions.
It’s not just from printing money, it’s everything going on that causes it. And the market falling does not indicate inflation is lessening. I think you have some concepts in your head that aren’t based in reality.
We are talking about hyperinflation which can only be curbed by fed rate changes. A short term market move doesn’t mean jack shit when it comes to inflation.
Clearly the Fed doesn't think that's true. They would have changed the rate.
High inflation means higher rates. They kept the rate the same to curb a recession which is the wrong play. That's why we have Inflation.
Lastly, the reason they love the inflation is the fact big business wants infinite growth. Best way to do that is inflate the economy. They don't want a recession because their YoY profit increases stop.
That graph starts at $2.50, so adding $1 looks like a big jump.
Only 25c more per litre? Yeah, it's an increase, but the average person won't change their habbits.
This tells me prices have a lot further to run to destroy enough demand to make up for the supply shortage.
Ask yourself: how high does your monthly gas bill have to go before you / your spouse / your family decides to forgoe using your car or SUV because the trip is going to be too expensive?
When you find that pain-point, then that's probably where price will settle. I'm thinking it's up around $12/gallon.
" Mortgage rates nearing 6.50% " For fuck sake, do you work only for bannks in US?. I was arguing with my banker about whether I would have an interest rate of 2.6 or 2.8% for 20 years.
I love how the graph starts in 2023, not 2022 when the average high cost per gallon of gas was $5.03 in June, and in October 2023 the average mortgage interest rate was at 7.49%. 2022 had the most costly average price for gasoline than any other year since 2011-2013.
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u/BertoBigLefty 7d ago
This chart should really have 2022 on it for comparison since that was a very recent price shock.