Musson, Carl wrote:
>
> It has always baffled me why the area just north of the Florida border
> can have gas at .20 per gallon cheaper than 20 miles down the road.
> There is a few other pockets of lower prices between Fla & Illinois, but
> that was the biggest dif.
State taxes may have something to do with it, as well as distributors'
prices. In my area of southern New Mexico, we consistently pay higher
prices than elsewhere in the state or the region, even though the
nearest gas refinery is only 50 miles away, and New Mexico is an
oil-producing state (which ought to greatly minimize transportation
costs). All the gasoline sold in the county I live in is controlled by
only three suppliers. Two national distributors and one local. There
have been repeated attempts by the previous state attorney general to
investigate, but, thus far, the gasoline distributors are refusing to
surrender all their records, effectively thwarting attempts to determine
if there's price-fixing involved.
Perhaps the short answer to the discrepancy is that there is a
difference in state and local taxes, and that north of the FL border,
state consumer's agencies are looking more closely at gas distributors,
or that the distributors' volumes in the locale with the cheaper prices
allow more competitive pricing. Hard to say, exactly, what the real
reasons might be.
Cheers.
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