Do you know what is currently cheaper than milk in the United States?
Well, I also could not have answered that question before Friday because, like everybody else, my attention was focused almost exclusively on twin scourges – one ravaging Barbados and the Caribbean, and the other a number of African countries, with its deadly tentacles stretching across the Atlantic to the United States as well as parts of Europe.
Chikungunya and Ebola blinded me to all other news at home and abroad until I was jolted by an Associated Press (AP) report, which read as follows:
“The sight is so surprising that Americans are sharing photos of it, along with all those cute Halloween costumes, sweeping vistas and special meals: The gas station sign with a price under $3 a gallon.
“The national average price of gasoline has fallen 33 cents in October, landing Friday at $3, according to Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst at the Oil Price Information Service, who said the average will fall under $3 by early Saturday morning (yesterday) for the first time in four years . . .
“Seasonal swings and other factors will likely send gas back over $3 sooner than drivers would like, but the US is on track for the lowest annual average since 2010 – and the 2015 average is expected to be lower even still.
“Trisha Pena of Hermitage, Tenn., recently paid $2.57 a gallon to fill up her Honda CRV. Like many around the country these days, she was so surprised and delighted by the price she took a photo and posted it on social media for her friends to see. ‘I can’t remember the last time it cost under $30 to put 10 or 11 gallons in my tank,’ she said in an interview. ‘A month ago it was in the $3.50 range, and that’s where it had been for a very long time.’ . . .
“Oil fell from $107 a barrel in June to near $81 because there’s a lot of supply and weak demand. US output has increased 70 per cent since 2008 and supplies from Iraq and Canada have also increased. At the same time, demand is weaker than expected because of a sluggish global economy.
“Gasoline is cheaper than milk again. In September, the national average price of milk was $3.73 per gallon. The annual average for milk is on track to be more expensive than the annual average for gasoline for the first time since 2011. The gap is even bigger for some bottled water lovers. A case of a dozen 1.5 litre bottles of Evian on Amazon.com costs $38.99, which makes for a price per gallon of $8.20.”
So can somebody, anybody at all, tell me why the price of gasoline in Barbados continues to skyrocket in the opposite direction with almost monthly announcements that start with Tom Adams’ “from midnight tonight”?
In case, like me, the measurements you were raised on were gills, pints and gallons and those like litres stress your brain, work with the fact that one US gallon of gas is 3.78 litres in Barbados.
I could be wrong but that’s about BDS$1.50 per litre. And how much are we currently paying per litre? Don’t ask me because I don’t know how much in a litre while the young gas station attendants don’t know how much in a gallon.
• Al Gilkes heads a public relations firm.