Gas/oil Embargo stories? I think many of us remember that time period.

[captain queeg]

I was pretty soon after I got my drivers license, or at least had a car. I remember the lines, I think we had some kind of alternate days scheme. Of course back then a dollar would get you 3 gallons, enough to mess around for a night. With time we started
Getting some work arounds, like a little rural farm store that apparently didn’t have to obey the restrictions.

[elleng]

1. Was soon after I got my car!

Fortunately rarely NEEDED to drive (at the time,) could walk to work (along Constitution AVE) and grocery store.

[RussellCattle]

2. We lived inside the D.C. Beltway and Big Oil wanted the maximum pressure on congress, so gas was really hard....

.....to get. Long lines, short hours, alternate days based on your plate number, five gallon maximum sales, auto parts stores reporting increased sales of siphon hoses and locking gas caps. We managed a tank full of gas to go to Ohio for the holidays and there were no lines or restrictions.

[Auggie]

3. I remember. To those of us who didn't have to drive long distances it wasn't a big deal.

It required planning and breaking the rules on occasion (topping off the tank early), but I was never caught short. I was a teenager too.

[pat_k]

4. I was too young for the '73 embargo, but in '79 Los Angeles. . .

. . .we had rationing. You could get gas on even or odd days depending on the last number of your plate. Early, it was bad with people getting in line needlessly to "top off." I think there was a way to get an exemption, but perhaps it was just that commercial vehicles were exempt. It wasn't long before lines were almost non-existent as panic subsided and people figured out frequency and best times.

I lived in NJ in 2012. After Sandy there were shortages and rationing was implemented for awhile.

Perhaps because of my experience with rationing as a young driver I am always aware of how much gas I have. I know folks who seem oblivious until the "idiot light" goes on. When someone tells a story about running out of gas, as if this is something that just "happens" every once in awhile, I just don't get it.

[captain queeg]

7. I haven't run out of gas in a very long time, but when I was young it happened a few.

One time I was heading to work in the morning. I knew I had plenty of gas so wasn’t watching. It happened in a pretty bad place. I figured out later someone had siphoned me. That was not unheard of back then.

[ProfessorGAC]

5. I Had Just Started Driving

I don't, however, remember 3 gallons for a buck. I remember gas being low 50s per gallon.
About three years later, when gas went over $1, the pumps didn't have the prices beyond 99.9 cents.
So, they changed a gear in the pump to read HALF-GALLONS.
Then the price would be $0.549 per, but that was really $1.098/gallon.
It was a year or 2 later when they started to put in the pumps with the gas discharge displays, and it went back to per gallon.

[haele]

8. I remember my father driving through the industrial areas for .25 a gallon

(where the cheap gas was) and telling my mom we're going to have to start living with .32 a gallon and we wouldn't be able to go to Dicks for burgers and shakes that evening because we had to fill up for the week. Early 1972 and I was being a whiny 12 year old. I think that was the last time I whined like that....
He worked his way through a bachelor's degree working at full service gas stations as the evening mechanic/pump jockey since I was a baby; he could always find the least expensive gas in the city or town we lived in.

Haele

[ProfessorGAC]

9. Taxes Differ By State

Maybe our taxes were higher.
I know that during "gas wars" in our town, we might see 19 cent gas when I was 7th or 8 grade, but I think 28 or 29 was normal for us in the late 60s.

[GPV]

6. I remember news stories and long lines at the pump as a small fry.

[mucholderthandirt]

10. We used to pass a couple of gas stations on the school bus going home. People mad and yelling at each other.

My father was so upset, because the day they started the odd/even was the opposite of what his license plate was. He was almost out of gas, but hadn't had the money to gas up before the change. I remember how worried he was about getting to work. We were horribly poor, no extra money, sometimes nothing to eat. Barely any clothes, worn-out shoes. That whole gas embargo just made things so much harder.

When Trump and his ilk say the stupid things they do, I remember how hard it was for us, and even today people are barely hanging on. This stuff really affects the poor. Forget the working poor, no one cares about them, either. Let's give Jeff Bezos another tax break! That will make it all better.

Kamala Harris isn't going to solve all the problems, but she's damned sure not going to make things worse! If for nothing else, poor people need to realize she's our only hope for saving this country. We need Dems to retake the House, have a huge majority in the Senate, and Kamala and Tim on top of things.