by Jack Lee
When crude was $83 a barrel last year gasoline was priced at $3.31 a gallon, I know because I just looked it up. So, why are we still paying over $4 gallon in California?
Here’s the answer I found. The high cost of CA gasoline is thanks mostly to our own State government. In 1996 Sacramento forced all refineries in California to produce specially formulated gasoline under new California Air Resources Board (CARB) regulations. In theory the new rules would reduce pollutants and at first we thought they it did. The cost v benefit ratio tilted in our favor, but as time passed new air quality research showed PTFE’s in gasoline were actually causing more pollution. This time it was to our ground water and the cost v benefit ratio was scaled back to zero. But, it didn’t stop there, lawmakers piled on new restrictions and the cost v benefit ratio went negative and that’s where we are today. According to a recent UC study CARB is taking about 1.5 billion dollars out of our State economy, and the benefit? Well, that’s a whole other story.
Under CARB our laws are so restrictive that we can’t even bring in gasoline from nearby states during a fuel crisis. This makes us like an island, isolated and totally dependent on just what we can produce inside CA.
That limitation has left us exposed to cost spikes should a refinery have a problem. Adding to our [CA Only] fuel cost is our high state gasoline tax.
We pay 35.5 cents per gallon and that makes our state gas tax the highest in the nation. We also pay 15.5 cents in other taxes per gallon. So there it is folks, our own State legislature brought us this $4 a gallon gasoline and to add insult to injury, we just re-elected most of these bums.
One last thought on this, the higher our pump price the more tax revenue Sacramento generates. That part is an indisputable fact and so is the fact that Sacramento is desperate for the tax revenue. Given this, does anyone believe that the democrats running (ruining) this state will be the slightest bit interested in helping us reduce pump prices, even if it could greatly help our sour economy? Nah, we’re basically screwed.
Every woman wants to have a ballet body. Many barre workouts claim to be based in dance movements, but Ballerobica is the only barre workout program that utilizes classical ballet technique and movements to give you the sculpted physique you have always dreamed of.