Forbes…Stop your whining. At $3.50 a gallon, fuel makes up just 29% of the total cost of driving. The U.S. Department of Transportation figures that insurance, license, registration, taxes, depreciation and finance charges on the average car come to about $5,600 a year. Enough gas to drive 15,000 miles will set you back just $2,300. I know that’s a lot for many people — but the average family could offset most of that fuel bill by cutting off its cable TV (you can stream the good stuff over Netflix anyways)
Indeed it’s incredible, considering the international sanctions squeezing Iran’s exports, that oil is still as cheap as it is. Yes, gasoline is still cheap in America, thanks to combination frugal driving trends spurred by the Great Recession paired with remarkable growth in domestic supplies.
Gasoline usage has dropped significantly. From 9.29 million barrels per day in 2007 to 8.2 million barrels per day last week (that’s from 390 million gallons a day to 344 million gallons), a plunge of 12%. What’s more, about half of that demand reduction took place in the past year.
We’re driving somewhat fewer miles too — about 100 million miles fewer last year than in 2007. Granted that’s only a 2% reduction in miles, or roughly a half-mile less for each of the 210 million licensed drivers in the U.S.
What’s more, thanks to universal use of techniques like hydraulic fracturing, America’s domestic production of crude oil is on the rise. Since hitting a low in 2008, drillers are pumping 18% higher volumes, totalling 5.8 million bpd. The U.S. now supplies more than half of its petroleum needs from domestic fields.
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