# Price of Gasoline, Now and Then, Here and There

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/price-of-gasoline-now-and-then-here-and-there/355705>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 6, 2006, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/price-of-gasoline-now-and-then-here-and-there/355705 "2006-05-06T22:16:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![threeorange](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@threeorange](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threeorange)\
**Post date:** [May 6, 2006, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/price-of-gasoline-now-and-then-here-and-there/355705/1 "2006-05-06T22:16:48Z")

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I apologize if this question has already been asked and answered before.

Is the nearly $3.00 per gallon that Americans are currently paying for gasoline still cheaper, when adjusted for inflation, than what people in Japan and other countries were paying thirty years ago? I can find no sites, but I can vaguely recall being shocked as a teen that, in parts of the world, people were paying the equivalent of $2.00 per gallon in the 1970s. Is my memory faulty?

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**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2006, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/price-of-gasoline-now-and-then-here-and-there/355705/2 "2006-05-07T02:03:54Z")

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Thirty years ago, the price of gasoline was more expensive in the U.S. than it is now and I’m sure it was even more expensive in other countries. I recall gas prices going over $1 a gallon in 1974-5 during that oil crisis. Pumps at that time couldn’t even be set to charge more than $1 and that’s when electronic pumps first started to show up. Before that the prices were set mechanically. According to the CPI calculator

[http://woodrow.mpls.frb.fed.us/research/data/us/calc/](http://woodrow.mpls.frb.fed.us/research/data/us/calc/)

$3 today is equivalent to 80 cents in 1975

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**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2006, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/price-of-gasoline-now-and-then-here-and-there/355705/3 "2006-05-07T02:18:58Z")

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The period from about [1986 to 2003](http://inflationdata.com/Inflation/images/charts/Oil/Gasoline_inflation_chart.htm) had the lowest inflation adjusted prices in the 20th century. The highest price ever for the U.S. in real terms was in 1980-81.

Gas prices in other countries are skewed because taxes are so high in them. A recent article (can’t remember where exactly) pointed out that taxes alone are higher than the equivalent of $3.00 per gallon in most western nations. It’s quite likely that some countries were paying the equivalent of $2.00 per gallon total in the 1970s.