Global economy plays role in local gas prices
Bernard Weinstein, an economist and associate director of SMU's Maguire Energy Institute, talks about what influences gasoline prices.
By Jeff Ayres
American motorists still pay more than $3 per gallon for gasoline, even as consumption and demand have dropped in the last five years — an irony not lost on Bernard Weinstein.
But the reason prices remain high, says the economist and associate director of Southern Methodist University’s Maguire Energy Institute, is because they’ve evolved from being driven merely by domestic supply and demand.
“That’s the question I always get: ‘Why are prices still so high?’ ” he said Monday after a wide-ranging discussion with the Rotary Club of Jackson on energy production and policy. “I have to remind people that oil is a global commodity.”
The price of a barrel of crude oil factors in to what people pay at the pump. While the U.S. is consuming less, fuel demand is growing in China, India and Brazil, keeping upward pressure on prices, Weinstein says.
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