We've enjoyed a hiatus in rising gas prices the last few weeks thanks to President Biden depleting our emergency reserves to falsely deflate the price of gas at the pumps.
But the honeymoon is about to end soon and gas will go right back to where it was before the emergency measures were taken.
"Significantly cheaper overall" as compared to 2021, maybe. But nowhere near as affordable as it was under Trump.
The national average for regular gas, a metric closely watched by Wall Street, Main Street and even the White House, is expected to drop to $3.49 a gallon in 2023, down roughly 50 cents from the average this year, according to GasBuddy.
Yes, that's right the GOOD NEWS is that gas is going to be $3.50 on average! That's the good news!
In 2019, the last pre-Covid year under Trump, the gas average was $2.60. Places in the US had gas regularly under $2.
Even now, when prices have been artificially deflated by Biden, prices are still over $3/gallon nationally.
Then there's the bad news.
The bad news is GasBuddy expects the national average to climb from $3.10 a gallon today to a range of $3.52 to $4.05 in May as Americans hit the roads.
"2023 is not going to be a cakewalk for motorists. It could be expensive," Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, told CNN. "The national average could breach $4 a gallon as early as May – and that's something that could last through much of the summer driving season."
Gas prices typically rise heading into the summer as Americans hit the road more during the warmer weather. In addition to the pick-up in demand, refiners switch over to summer-grade gasoline, which is designed to improve air quality and costs more to produce.
The GasBuddy forecast calls for the daily national average to top out at as high as $4.25 a gallon in August before dropping towards $3 a gallon by the end of the year.
Just in time for summer vacation, gas prices are going to rocket back above this year's average.
Or, you know, we could start pumping more of our own gas and opening pipelines.
Just a thought.
