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Virginia Bee & Cat's avatar

"Each of these independent businesses is responsible for setting the local retail price of gasoline."

That isn't true. Back in the day when I was young and had a life I worked for several companies that shall remain nameless. This is how local prices are set - Every morning before coming in, either the manager or the assistant store manager would check the prices of their two closest competitors. They sent their prices to the store's home office. A few minutes later home office sent back the prices the fuels needed to be that day. The amount was always a penny more or a penny less or the same price as the other stores. The other stores did the same thing and checked their competition with the same results.

It also impacted how much profit a store could make per gallon of fuel sold. You didn't know how much your fuel order would cost from day to day. It usually worked out that the store sold fuel for the same price at the pump that it paid to get the fuel. A store made money on the things it sold besides fuel. Soda, beer, chips and tobacco were the money makers. And anything sold in the store had to come from approved vendors who had to charge what their home office said to. This was not the case with small private stores that didn't advertise what brand of gas they had. They could do some black market fuel purchases and beat their competition. If they did it too often their store or the tanks themselves began to have "problems".

It is all a rip off. When prices started to go up ALL the fuel vendors had to agree on it. No one could go rogue. A manager I had once tried an experiment. She raised her gas prices by ten cents. Her excuse was a simple typo. The very next shipment of fuel that came in was priced ten cents higher to make up for the store gain. It's all rigged and has been for at least the last 40 years.

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JollyRogerMexico's avatar

I'll ask the frau for a pair of copper pot stills for my birthday.

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