"The price at the pump was more than $4 a gallon in Vista, Calif., when Scott Hissem recently embarked on a trip to Texas [...] Gasoline cost just $2 and change. The gap has Mr. Hissem considering a move to escape California's high cost of living."
Texans have noticed that people arrive from California, and then start voting to turn Texas into California. There seems to be no awareness of the connection between policy and the cost of living.
This is California gas price break down for August 2019 [1]:
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Aug 26
Branded Unbranded
Distribution Costs, Marketing Costs and Profits $0.410 $0.650
Crude Oil Costs $1.430 $1.430
Refinery Cost and Profit $0.850 $0.610
State Underground Storage Tank Fee $0.020 $0.020
State and Local Tax $0.076 $0.076
State Excise Tax $0.473 $0.473
Federal Excise Tax $0.184 $0.184
Retail Prices $3.440 $3.440
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Total State tax: 0.02 + 0.076 + 0.473 = 0.569
California high gas price might have more things to do with location, affordability, and demand than what people are willing to attribute to it.
The breakdown shows that California does have high gas tax, but it's not $2 high. Even within the Bay Area, I can see $1 price swing between the rich neighborhoods and other neighborhoods. Driving from SF to LA, and you can also see the price swing through different town. Some parts in LA county often have higher than $5/gallon. I'm guilty on multiple occasions when I just pull up to the closest gas stations and fill up without checking if I can save a bit more somewhere else. When half of your town earns at least $250K a year, the gas stations can jack up the price without being afraid of losing customers.
Rent and real estate prices influencing gas prices are also a large part due to the CA/SF gov...
Texas builds way more buildings and makes much better use of space. Not to mention the additional costs of running the business and employing people, which are also added to all of their supply chains. It adds up.
I remember moving to SF and being shocked I was getting taxed the same rate as living in Toronto, but that doesnt include health care or nearly as much benefits as Canada. Canada gets a lot of heat from Americans for being 'socialist' but there's plenty of counter examples, Toronto builds 100x more buildings than SF, our corporate tax is way lower than US, our ratio of economic immigrants:family migration is significantly higher, our banks/governments have been more fiscally conservative, etc. Plus Canada ranks higher on economic freedom index than America (8th vs 17th): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_Economic_Freedom
I hope this perception that the US is a market economy starts to change. A state-by-state distinction is much better. California is always the leading example of this change and the best signal of where the US is heading, as other US states seem to copy California for some reason.
> Texas builds way more buildings and makes much better use of space.
Only if you think being able to walk/bicycle places is undesirable. Just thinking about all those gated suburbs separated from each other by 6 lane roads and medians makes me shudder.
I wasn't claiming the $2 was gas tax. Policy is more than just the gas tax.
Policy drives up "Distribution Costs". If it is hard to operate a fuel tanker trucking company in California, the cost of distribution will be higher. Truckers are regulated, trucks are regulated, tankers are specifically regulated, flammable liquid is even more regulated, there are normal business taxes to be paid, there are random fees to operate, and so much more. Policy makes the cost go up.
It is similar with "Marketing Costs". Simply operating a business in a highly regulated state is difficult. The ad agency will cost more, the places to advertise will charge more, and so on.
Refinery costs are much higher. California demands a special unique California formulation of gasoline. Even with California being a large state, this is a low-volume product. It's also a premium product. Actually running any sort of refinery under California law looks like a nightmare, and I'm sort of surprised that it is still a viable business in the state.
In the rich neighborhoods, the cost of land and property tax for a gas station is high. That ends up in the price.
California demands a special unique California formulation of gasoline
Two special CA-specific formulations: winter and summer.
Winter gas adds oxygenates, supposedly reducing certain emissions by 10%. However, it has 10% less energy per unit volume, so you burn 10% more of it. Net effect: more expensive with no real world benefit.
Best of all, they blame additional local price rises twice a year on the changeover. It's quite a racket.
> California high gas price might have more things to do with location, affordability, and demand than what people are willing to attribute to it.
Not buying this. It'd been widely reported that California has different requirements for fuel than most of the rest of the states, so, there's probably a bit extra that goes into refinery costs in addition to your calculation.
There is quite a bit more refinery costs. But it's not just the cost to produce it, it's the fact that producing California has requires special plant configurations. So even a surplus of gas in Texas may not affect CA supply. There are sometimes shortages of the CA approved gas, thus causing price spikes.
> Texans have noticed that people arrive from California, and then start voting to turn Texas into California. There seems to be no awareness of the connection between policy and the cost of living.
Is that actually true? They are a self selecting group, not a random sample, and probably conservative if they hold views that would cause them to leave a liberal state.
> and probably conservative if they hold views that would cause them to leave a liberal state.
People move out of California because of affordability more than ideology, just like people move to California more for economic opportunity than ideology. (It's true that the realization of ideology through policy affects both affordability and economic opportunity, but people moving because of the conditions on either of those dimensions are often not motivated by ideology.
This is why I want to move to TX and help support the reason why Texas is good. All of these stories about CA people moving there worries me though. Not sure what a good plan B is that's not in a southern state with a backwards economy.
It seems very on topic and relevant to the discussion. The preceding posts were:
Unfortunately, the effects of consumption aren’t contained to where (and when) one consumes
That’s why we need to enforce borders
So pointing out that the emissions (one side effect of unlimited consumption) aren't stopped by border control or a wall seems to be completely on topic.
...says a guy from a country that basically created the Mexican cartels out of thin air via the War on (some) Drugs.
Which "most lucrative market on earth" do you suppose they service?
You should really do a bit of additional research on:
The Monroe Doctrine. Henry Kissinger, Salvador Allende & Pinochet. United Fruit & Guatemala, and the list goes on...
We are ONE singular species and the climate crisis ain't the elephants or squirrels fault my friend.
Then there's this thing called a global market, but I defer to your urge to hide under the covers and suck your thumb instead of engaging with the real world.
Consumption drives a lot of valuable things. Like tax revenue, or research of semiconductor lithography processes which are later used to build medical devices and most other things. If someone consumes, someone on the other hand necessarily produces.
The other large driver to many of those things is war. I’d rather have consumption.
> Texans have noticed that people arrive from California, and then start voting to turn Texas into California
Its only a matter of time before people just ignore the idea from 13 east coast colonies trying to avoid population centers driving policy unilaterally and continent wide.
One ideology lives in sparsely populated counties and only barely has consensus in even those counties (usually just slightly more than 50%). Whereas the other ideology simply does have the numbers and if a tiny fraction of them could stand living in the middle of nowhere for 18 months they could vote the entire country their way forever.
Texans have noticed that people arrive from California, and then start voting to turn Texas into California. There seems to be no awareness of the connection between policy and the cost of living.