Of Gasoline And Price (Gouging?)

Not long ago, I opined about gas prices, finding little variation generally, but sometimes notable differences at stations close to each other carrying the same brand name fuel.

Gas prices and flucuations are always blamed on local laws, supply and demand, bulk costs, station lease and other overhead - - anything and everything but unfair pricing, let alone gouging.

Consumers feel otherwise, often.

So here's another curious example.

I was recently in one of the more upper-income Maryland suburbs of Washington, DC, where all commercial properties are expensive, and, in my lifetime experience having been born and raised in DC, and a frequent visitor, where most cost-of-living items are higher than those in Milwaukee.

Anyway: I could stand at one service station and see several other stations and their prices.

Factoring in the Maryland gas tax - - eight cents per gallon less than Wisconsin's - - here were the station prices for regular unleaded:

"W" Brand (No, not our President's): $3.679
Getty: $3.709
Citgo: $3.829
Sunoco: $3.959
Shell: $3.959

And as I drove around the area, those brand names prices continued to vary by several more cents-per-gallon.

Ask yourself, ye Milwaukeeans: when have you seen that much variation at stations close to each other?