Gas Prices / Coin Collecting

Well, I recently found out that my wife will be going back to work. It was depending on whether or not they would allow her to work from home most of the time. Well, it seems her boss and her boss' boss both miss her a lot and are going to do everything they can to get her back. So, the coin budget is back on the books, baby!

the problem with your wife going back to work is the gov takes more money from you in taxes.looks like the bicicle will be used more to ride to the coin shop.need the execise any way.

The upside in all of this price rising is that coins that have been sitting in jars for many years are being forced back into circulation. Happy day for all of us "roll scroungers". I am seeing a lot of near pristine pennies from the 60's and 70's in rolls every day. When I started copper hoarding about 3 months ago I never intended to "collect" coins again but I am seeing so many great ones(even found a 1982 s proof penny in a roll)that I started picking out the best to hold onto for numismatic reasons. I think this trend will continue at least in pennies, nickels and dimes. So, smile, and keep on scrounging!

Lately I drive a lot less than I used to, but all my gas savings, now go towards food shopping. The cheapest gas I saw today was $3.67 per gallon. I cannot believe I call $3.67 a gallon, "cheap."

$3.62 in the metro MN yesterday, bumped up to $3.85 overnight. I'm sure we'll see $4 for the first time over the holiday weekend.

Seriously though, its 2008. Why havent we found something else to fuel our cars. And how can Venezuela have $0.15 gas and Africa be $9 a gal.....come on. This is just $%#^ up.

Gas in N.W Indiana is going at about $3.89 for Reg 87 octane to $4.19 for 91 octane. In Chicago it's well over $4.00 for regular. Diesel in running about $4.50 a gallon in the area. This is really becoming a burden for a lot of people. I hope things improve soon. We now live about 20 miles away from where my wife works. We just moved here about 2 years ago. Prior to this move we were driving 50 miles each way to work! Glad we moved!Mike

I make a pretty nice income, but am still helping my younger son through college and have to have the house paid off in seven more years so I can retire. I can guarantee you that gasoline at $4/gal. greatly affects my driving habits, as well as my discretionary spending.

Anyone who thinks this is a temporary thing needs to rethink the entire economic picture. The American economy is on the edge of a precipice. The Fed may save us, but may not. Inflation (something that many younger members of the board may not have fully experienced) is on the rise, regardless of what politicians and government officials may say. Food costs and energy costs (which hit all Americans, but especially working class Americans) are going up.

There are noted experts (T. Boone Pickens, billionaire oil man for one...CNBC, week of May 19, 2008)) who are now saying that Saudi Arabia does not have the oil reserves needed to boost production to meet continued demand from US, Europe, India, China, etc. The speculators are driving the price of oil to new heights beyond what supply and demand would normally dictate...so there is definitely a "bubble" in the market. Just how long that bubble will last remains to be seen. Please remember that we have the hurricane season coming soon. A major category 3, 4 or 5 hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico, and watch light sweet crude jump to $175+.

All of this will greatly affect the coin market and collectibles of all sorts. People will still find money for their vices (booze and tobacco)but eventually they will stop buying antiques, coins, etc., just as they will stop eating at upscale restaurants and return to eating at Applebee's, Hardee's or, heaven forbid, at home!

America needs a real energy policy...not the "roll back federal gas taxes for the summer" pseudo-policy promoted by McCain and Clinton.

The times they are a-changin'.

Gas in Houston is ~3.74 today...

There's a lot of misinformation in this thread regarding production.
The era of cheap oil is over but we are most definitely not running out.

As the price per barrel of oil increases, what's included in the term "oil reserve" changes. Just as a for instance, once crude hit the ~$80 mark - Petro Canada decided to add oil sands to its reserve total. The reason being that it costs them roughly $40 per barrel to produce out of oil sands. PRESTO Canadian oil reserves jumped from around 30 billion barrels to around 180 billion barrels.

Here's a HOLY COW number... 2,587,228,000,000 barrels... (2,500 giga barrels)
That's the amount of recoverable oil in the US from oil shale... And we haven't touched it... and we haven't added it to our "reserves". (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_shale_reserves).

Couple of other things... All wells (I say that but maybe not all... all the ones I've ever had a part in drilling at least) use water as a displacement material. Water at the depths we're talking about doesn't form steam but stays in liquid form.

ANWAR is a shell game being used to make the general population think that recoverable oil is in demand, thereby increasing the amount we'll pay for it. The amount of oil there is miniscule... As long as there's no need for us to drill in ANWAR I don't think we should. Regardless of what some of you might have heard an oil rig is a dirty nasty filthy place. I don't know what the depth is that they want to drill at in ANWAR but I'm going to guess it's around 15K feet. You should see the STUFF we pump down those holes in the drilling process.

The best thing about oil at this price is that hopefully it's forcing us to modify our habits. Oil demand actually decreased by 2% last month. That's an encouraging sign. $$$ being put into alternatives is increasing. That's a great sign too. Relying on cheap oil has placed our planet in peril but that's not a big enough motivator, the check book is.

Your resident Mud Engineer... (Yes that's a real job!)