New Jersey and Oregon: better gas station safety?

[EdelweissPirate]

Corry El is right: the attendant’s paycheck comes from somewhere. Specifically, it comes from higher gas prices. In fact, I’d argue that the OR/WA numbers constitute a convenient natural experiment to show how the effect mandatory attendants have on the price of gasoline.

Gas stations make surprisingly little from selling gasoline. $0.10/gallon is the typical difference[sup]1[/sup] between what the station pays for gasoline and what consumers pay for it. At today’s US national average of $2.81/gallon, that’s a whopping 3.6% markup. That’s before the station has paid for any of its overhead. In essence, gas stations break even on gas and make their profit on convenience store sales.

Corry El pointed out that Oregon’s gas taxes are $0.15/gallon lower than those in Washington, but GESancMan volunteered that gas is about the same price on both sides of the border. Since overhead and distribution costs are very similar between these two adjacent cities, the Portland, OR stations keep an extra $0.15/gallon that the Vancouver, WA stations send to the state.

Does the presence of an attendant raise the price of gas by about $0.15/gallon? Maybe; let’s figure it out:

If, on a busy-ish day, the Oregon attendant fills up an average of 10 cars per hour with an average of 12 gallons of gasoline per car, that means the Oregon station’s extra $0.15/gallon works out to about $18 per hour:

10 cars * 12 gallons * $0.15 = $18.00

That’s roughly what it costs to employ an attendant in Oregon, who typically makes about $11/hour. Payroll taxes, benefits and training add significantly to the station’s cost for that attendant. Add in slow days and some reduced convenience store revenue (since even cash customers don’t have to pay inside) and $18/hr sounds about right.

So I’d argue that Oregon gas prices are about $0.15 higher than they’d be without mandatory attendants. One can quibble with my numbers, but the cost is unlikely to be less than $0.10/gallon. Hidden costs are still costs.

[sup]1[/sup] The linked article may be from 2008, but gas prices then happened to be about what they are now. What’s more, the economics of gas station operation haven’t shifted radically in the intervening decade…gas margins are still razor thin.

[EdelweissPirate]

@Corry_El

This dead horse might have been beaten sufficiently I think.

No. I can beat it more.

And I did just that in my post above.

[Ruken]

I am highly in favor of beating dead horses. Beating live ones is mean.

[Qadgop_the_Mercotan]

@engineer_comp_geek

Or if you really want to confuse them, bring in a 1950s era car that had the gas cap hidden behind the rear tail light. Know anyone with an old Bel Air they’d let you borrow?

My mom had that car! I remember so well how she loved to confuse the gas station attendants.

[GESancMan]

@Corry_El

WA’s gas tax is ~$0.15 higher than OR’s.

We might or might be able to find reliable non-political references on the cost of mandating full service gas. But there’s no way it’s zero. You need more people. You have to pay those people. And there’s no plausible reason to think such a mandate simply and permanently makes it less profitable to run a gas station in one state than another, at least not far from the borders of relatively large states, where there’s no direct competition from stations not subject to the mandate.

I wasn’t saying any of this is wrong. I was pointing out that the price to the consumer is the same in Oregon as in Washington. It “costs no more” from the customer’s point of view, which I think is all race_to_the_bottom was saying.

[Corry_El]

@GESancMan

I wasn’t saying any of this is wrong. I was pointing out that the price to the consumer is the same in Oregon as in Washington. It “costs no more” from the customer’s point of view, which I think is all race_to_the_bottom was saying.

‘The consumer might mistakenly believe it doesn’t cost more’ is all you can actually say. And without specifying mistakenly, which neither of you did, it’s natural to be confused whether you realize it costs you. The first poster I’m 90% sure thinks it really doesn’t.

Note nobody said ‘the retail price must be higher in states that mandate full serve than states which don’t’…because obviously it wouldn’t be the case if the full serve state has a lower enough gas tax. But it still costs you the consumer/taxpayer in OR, by way of other taxes OR has to collect from you or services it can’t provide you that WA’s extra gas tax pays for for its residents. Because part of your (and ours in NJ) gas spending is being diverted to the extra cost of mandated full serve gas which everyone else in the country somehow does without with no apparent problem.

[susan]

At my urban Oregon gas stations, there are far more than 10 cars/attendant per hour. More like 3-4 in 5 minutes.

[TimeWinder]

@Corry_El

…mandating full serve must raise costs at least somewhat, and it’s ridiculous to claim it’s nothing.

Unless the mandatory attendants lower the cost in other ways: less vandalism, fewer drive-offs, higher volume of vehicles/hour, or a half dozen other things I can think of.

[Tired_and_Cranky]

@TimeWinder

Unless the mandatory attendants lower the cost in other ways: less vandalism, fewer drive-offs, higher volume of vehicles/hour, or a half dozen other things I can think of.

These are all theoretically valid reasons to suggest that attendants might lower gas stations’ other costs or increase their revenue to more than offset the cost of their labor but, if they were true, gas stations would already employ attendants even where it wasn’t mandated. Instead, there are almost no full serve stations anywhere other than where the law requires them. Every gas station operator has reached the conclusion that these offsetting benefits aren’t enough to make additional gas station attendants worth it.

Looking at your suggestions individually:

• I’ve never heard that vandalism is a meaningful expense for gas stations and I don’t know how big a vandalism deterrent the pump jockey is.
• Drive-offs have been solved by requiring prepayment or credit card authorization.
• On the New Jersey Turnpike at least, there is a much lower flow of customers per hour because customers have to wait for the attendant to start pumping gas and then, after the pump has clunked off, wait again for the attendant to take the nozzle out of the car and return the credit card or change. The wait is so long I rarely buy gas when driving through New Jersey even if it would save me a few bucks.