Gas prices traditionally fall 20 cents a gallon or so after Labor Day. This year, they are up 30 cents a gallon or more. We should be looking at gas prices around $2.50 a gallon right now, but instead we're at $3 plus and rising sharply as crude oil has crossed $91 a barrel heading up.
If this is the start of Yet Another Commodity Speculation Bubble, we'll be back in the same mess we were in 2007 when crude hit $147 a barrel, and gas prices topped $4 a gallon (I remember paying $4.25 a gallon in July 2007.)
The difference this time around is that now we have nearly 10% unemployment as opposed to the 5% we had in 2007, which means whatever recovery we do have will get smothered in oil and set on fire.
Yet another indication that the vaunted "just around the corner" recovery of 2011 is simply not going to materialize.
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