That number made me think.
When I was a child, growing up on a lake outside Conway, Ark., my parents always stopped for gas at the same bait shop/filling station, and the price of gas in those days was so stable that the sign out front never changed. In my mind's eye, I can still see it.
The price was 34.9 cents — for years and years and years.And now the price of a gallon has gone up by that amount in less than two weeks' time.
Yeah, I know, 34 cents sounds really good to people who are paying anywhere from $3.18 to $3.86 per gallon (that's the current range cited by CNNMoney.com).
Remember — minimum wage was about a buck and a half in those days. Even so, though, it seems to me that folks had a pretty good deal when I was a child.
Let's say we're talking about filling up vehicles with tanks that can carry 15 gallons. Compare paying about $5 to fill that tank from a gross weekly income of about $60 — to paying about $50 to fill that tank from whatever the average gross weekly income is today (for those fortunate enough to be working and not looking for work).
Gas prices today are about 10 times what they were when I was a child — so, for things to be comparable numerically, I suppose, one's weekly gross income should be about 10 times that minimum wage figure from four decades ago — or about $600 a week.
That sounds like a lot of money — and it is. There were quite a few people who were making at least that much before the recession — but if you've been out of work for a couple of years and your unemployment benefits have run out, you'd probably settle for half that today and be thankful for it.
You wouldn't have much buying power, but you'd probably be able to keep food on your table and a roof over your head.
I long ago got used to the idea that the prices I pay for everything as an adult are higher than the prices that were being charged when I was a child.
But do they have to be so much higher?
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