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At what point are gas prices "too high?"?

There is great commentary by people who say gas prices are "too high." But what determines what "too high" is? Too high for me to feel good about buying gas? Because we need gasoline to get to work or vacation or the kids to activities?

If enough people are willing to pay $5 per gallon for gas, why shouldn't the oil companies charge that for their product? Who decides what is "too much" profit for an oil company?

15 Answers

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  • lenny
    Lv 7
    1 decade ago
    Favorite Answer

    "Too high" is the price at which I will seek an alternative. For all the whining and complaining people are doing about gas prices, I still see most of the vehicles on the road are oversized gas guzzlers.

  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    When you consider that just a couple of short years ago gas prices were around $1.50 a gallon, $3.00 is definitely too high.

    How much is too high? Considering that gas is a commodity upon which our economy relies, any increase greater than the rate of inflation has a negative impact on the consumer, and therefore is too high. So... even if you assume a pretty high inflation rate and assume that $1.50 a gallon was on the low side a couple of years ago, anything over $2.00 a gallon is too high.

    The fact that the gas producers have made record profits over the past two years underscores the notion that current prices have less to do with market forces than they have to do with squeezing the American consumer.

  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    Gas prices become too high when that trickle down effect starts eating in to other things we do. Restaurants are already seeing a decline in business, my guess is that 20 or so dollars is being spent on fuel to drive our cars, heat our food and water.

    I notice as the elections get closer, amazingly gas prices are going down. No one wants high gas prices to be on the nations mind when choosing a government.

    I live around a lot of older people who are retired. They can't afford to heat their houses and have any thing extra. Sometimes it comes to medication and food or heat.

    Gas prices are too high when the oil companies are having record profits.

    Middle income people may have to cut back on driving a bit, or shut off the cable, maybe not eat out as much. Lower income people have to tougher choices, food or heat? Medication or hot showers?

    I might be more sympathetic towards the prices if the oil companies were not getting so much profits on the backs of everyone else.

  • 1 decade ago

    "Too high" is purely a political perspective. Isn't $3.00/gallon what the left-wingers wanted? I remember Algore telling us he would add a $0.50/gal gas tax if elected in order to force people to drive less "to protect the environment". Now that we hit it and most of us are still driving, it must give him nightmares!

    As long as the dems are out of power gas will be "too high" because it places an unnecessary "burden" on the "poor". They didn't seem to worry about that when the thought of looting the "poor" to fill the Treasury came up.

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  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    To high is when 1 gallon of gas cost the same a an hours work from someone making minimum wage

  • 1 decade ago

    Once I heard that this was all part of Bush's "New Order" in which he would be able to segrigate the rich from the poor. The rich won't complain about the gas but for all of us that have to walk to work, downsize our vehicles and budget/ sacrifice from every paycheck just to accomadate the rising prices of gas then it has become "too high" for us that can't afford to live anymore.

  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    They're too high when people can't even afford to drive to and from work because it costs too much. Then maybe someone will step up to the plate and do something about it.

  • 1 decade ago

    Since I can remember when it was 19 cents per gallon, ANYTHING over that is TOO high.

  • 1 decade ago

    $1.00 /gallon (US) is the absolute limit that prices should be.

    the U.S. is sitting on over a trillion...that's 1,000,000,000,000 barrels of oil inside the continental U.S. There is no shortage of petro, just an excess of greed.

    The stuff should not have ever risen over $0.499/gal

  • 1 decade ago

    I remember when gas was 99 cents!! I say anything over $1.50 is too much.

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