Being older means being able to remember the interesting things in life- John and Yoko, “Pet Sounds”, and “Stairway to Heaven” along with sit ins, Kent State and life-size David Cassidy posters. It means remembering being able to drive a 1970 Impala with a small block engine that could single handedly take a out telephone pole with a barely visible dent and that 13 people could actually fit in one. (It was okay, I was the driver). The speedometer went up to 140 mph.
It means being able to remember the gas shortages of the 1970s, gas lines and the introduction of driving the double nickle, otherwise known as super slo mo or 55 mph. Being green became popular, in regards to gas usage and vehicle size, not Kermit the frog, and especially if you really wanted to burn things up-with the pinto and a Presidency.
Gas prices went up after OPEC called for an embargo in response to the U.S. supplying the Israeli military during the Yom Kippur war in 1973.
In combination with other world events outside of the U.S., double digit inflation began and home interest rates rose to between 13-18 percent by the 1980s. For the first time in times of peace, gas lines were common and there was a steady rise in the price of gas.
We didn’t like it, but the price of gas made sense.
Listed below are the prices of gasoline over the 17 years.
Prices of Gas (U.S. Energy Information Administration)
$1.24 — April, 1995
$2.65 — Aug., 2005
$3.10 — Dec., 2007
$4.14 — June, 2008/ Stock market crash begins and the Dow Jones Industrial Average drops to a low of 6,626.94 on March 6, 2009
$1.67 — Dec., 2008
$2.85 — Mar., 2010
$3.15 — Jan., 2011
$3.88 —  Apr., 2012
$3.44 — Current
Why is it that every time the economy is on the brink of destruction in the last ten years, the price the consumer pays for gas changes virtually instantaneously, across all brands?
In 1982, with the assistance of then President Ronald Reagan, AT&T and the baby bells, were broken up in an antitrust suit.
Maybe it’s time for President Obama to break up some of the big oil producers, and while he’s at it, banks such as JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

Karen La Pierre