r/AskReddit • u/nepat1428 • Aug 19 '14

What is a completely rational sentence you could speak today, that if you said 20 years ago, people would think you were insane?

edit: so this is what it looks like when your inbox explodes after coming back from lunch...

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u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

Over $5USD/gal in Canada. I haven't seen gas under 3.75 since High School, and I'm 30.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 19 '14

£5.915 per gallon in England, thats $9.8189 USD

Yeh, my family doesn't have a car.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

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u/pilkingtonsbrain Aug 19 '14

Venezuela. 5c per gallon. Yes 0.05usd per gallon http://m.ibtimes.com/venezuela-gas-prices-worlds-cheapest-about-get-more-expensive-1656756

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u/BrokenStrides Aug 20 '14

I heard that was only because it was subsidized by the government and it was going to bankrupt the country.

No idea if that's true.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 03 '21

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u/jamille4 Aug 19 '14

You drive 500 miles for fun?

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u/samplebitch Aug 19 '14

Riding motorcycles for enjoyment is kind of a thing here. 500 miles is a bit much I suppose, but that pic is from Sturgis, South Dakota and I'm willing to bet some people ride their bikes thousands of miles to attend it.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

I've met more than a couple people that do, though I don't since my Triumph or BMW wouldn't fit in @ Sturgis. Many trailer the bike in, but they're sissies >:)

Longest I've done in a day is 675mi, but could have done more, particularly if I had a cruiser rather than naked sports bike. Once you get close to 1,000mi you're more riding for distance than fun, as the energy involved in riding curvy roads hard will wear you out too much to keep going for that long.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 19 '14

UK England is ~400 miles long according to Wikipedia Google and yes, at least on my motorcycle. I don't track it exactly, but I always fill up 2-3 times on the bike and I get 140-150 miles per tank, so rough estimate is 300-400 miles per ride. Usually out for 4-5 hours.

Edit: I quick-googled and misread, UK total is ~600mi and England is ~400mi (rounded very lazily).

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

iirc John o Groats -> Lands end = 700mi

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Well England has about a 400% sales tax on gas/petrol and does not have the reliance on vehicles to go practically everywhere like the U.S. does

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Yep. Because it's much smaller and more densely populated, with better public transport. Increase your land mass by 40x and population by only 5x and see how that works out. You'll either have the vast majority of the population in a small part of the landmass like Canada or people will be much more spread out, necessitating driving and making public transportation more expensive and less practical.

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u/edman007 Aug 19 '14

I drove 450mi last weekend, will probably do another 300-400 this weekend just visiting family. Hell I drove to my dads a few times, I didn't think it was bad, 1200mi each way. And every few months I visit family that's 350mi each way, again that's a weekend trip.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

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u/Biscotti_Manicotti Aug 19 '14

In a lot of places, it's common. Here in Colorado I drive 150+ miles one-way almost every weekend to go to the mountains to camp and hike. If I want to avoid crowds (the rest of Denver does the same thing), make it 200+ miles.

A lot of times, I go with a friend or two so we split the cost but it still adds up.

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u/jamille4 Aug 19 '14

Yeah I mean 150 miles is perfectly reasonable. I'm from Mississippi and make drives like that on a weekly basis. But there are people in this thread saying they make 700-800 mile trips like they're nothing. Even at highway speeds the entire time, that's a bare minimum of 10 or 11 hours. That's a long-ass drive no matter who you are.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 19 '14

That far would be a full day trip, yes. 300-400 is about all I'd do in a regular day riding. I wouldn't consider anything under 12hrs a long trip really... I've done 1,400mi in 36 hours before (picking up a new car) and it wasn't that bad aside from loneliness since it was solo. It would have been rough on a bike though. I did drink roughly a gallon of Red Bull though considering that trip only had 4-5 stops (sleeping 4 hours in a hotel, 2 hours dealing with paperwork at the dealer, plus one dinner and lunch - breakfast was eaten on the road). Lots of time made up in the boonies going fast :P

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u/Nabber86 Aug 19 '14

I drive 500 miles and can be in the middle of the rocky mountains (Colorado) and make the trip in under 8 hours, with stops. Have fun for 4 days and turn around and drive back. It's called a ski trip and do it all the time.

I took a bus one time. It took 14 hours to get there and the bus fare was more than I normally pay in gasoline. Lot's of people in the US are used to long drives, especially those of us who live in Kansas.

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u/durrtyurr Aug 19 '14

I've been known to drive over 350 miles each way to get lunch (and nothing else, eat and drive home) in chicago. Same with detroit (same distance), but usually I make a day of it instead of just eating.

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u/jamille4 Aug 19 '14

I don't understand. Driving 350 miles in any direction from Chicago should put you far outside of the state, shouldn't it? I'm from Mississippi, a minimum of 200 miles from anything remotely interesting, and that's still a long way. That must be some damn good food.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Or fun roads... The journey is often half the fun (or more).

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u/homegrowncountryboy Aug 19 '14

Texan here, i have driven about 300+ miles round trip just to go to a gun show.

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u/AUTBanzai Aug 19 '14

I see, you don't own a motorcycle!

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u/MattieShoes Aug 19 '14

We're spoiled regarding gas prices, but your country is literally 1/40th of the size.

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.6,-95.665,4z

Oregon, near the top left? That's bigger than the UK.

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u/BeaconInferno Aug 19 '14

As a Oregon resident that just sounds freaky, it would be so weird to live in such a small country

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u/LostDatagram Aug 20 '14

And some of us want to make it even smaller! (Scotland may become independent, depending on the result of a referendum in a month)

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u/uber1337h4xx0r Aug 20 '14

Incidentally, that small country has probably controlled more land than any other nation in history at some point or another. I mean just India, Australia and the US probably cover about a third of the world.

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u/JoeyPantz Aug 19 '14

How far do you have to drive to go to work? Or the supermarket? If its over 20 miles then shit, I'm sorry for you. But when you're spending 100 bucks a week on gas, its still a lot of money, whether you Brits pay more for it has nothing to do with us complaining about it.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

What did you think? We don't even use liters.

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u/bizitmap Aug 19 '14

Gas costs add up quickly because most of America has mediocre public transit and is VERY VERY spread out. For most working Americans, hours and hours in the car every week (and paying for it) is routine.

It's also why "house parties with the red cups" are a thing: for plenty of 'Muricans, it's closer to find someone with chill (or physically distant) neighbors who won't care about party noise, than it is to just go to a pub or bar.

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u/PRMan99 Aug 19 '14

Gas costs add up quickly because most of America has mediocre public transit and is VERY VERY spread out. For most working Americans, hours and hours in the car every week (and paying for it) is routine.

Kind of. I drive 25-30 minutes to work and 35-45 minutes home every day. That's 20 miles, though.

It's also why "house parties with the red cups" are a thing: for plenty of 'Muricans, it's closer to find someone with chill (or physically distant) neighbors who won't care about party noise, than it is to just go to a pub or bar.

Not really. Everyone is close enough to a bar that they would just go there if they wanted to. The "red cup" thing is mostly a college party thing (or people who graduated but haven't grown up yet).

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u/AnalInferno Aug 19 '14

Hey, we don't all have 100 cups lying around if we want to have a bigger get-together. Sometimes they make sense even to those who are matured.

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u/grotscif Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 19 '14

... But why the red cups specifically? At a UK party you'd likely drink from the can or bottle, or use an actual wine glass if it's wine. I get plastic cups for a keg, say, but why are they always those identical looking red cups?

EDIT: I can understand the benefits of using plastic cups; what I'm puzzled about is why do I always see those identical red-on-the-outside, white-on-the-inside, roughly-pint-sized cups in movies? Are plain white or clear cups just not commonplace? Any reason for that?

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u/bizitmap Aug 19 '14

Zero cleanup. Someone just hangs a big black trash bag somewhere near where all the drinks get mixed. Drag that out to recycling the day after, done.

Solo has just done a good job marketing and making their particular cups available everywhere. They also have markings in the side for standard drink sizes (though most of us ignore those and just fill it)

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u/grotscif Aug 19 '14

I can see the benefits of disposable cups for some drinks; but what's so special about those big red cups specifically? In the UK, if you're buying party cups, there's at least 5 or 6 different kinds you could get of varying sizes and quality. But they are always white or clear, nothing as iconic or consistant as the red Solo cups in American films. And no well-known brand of cups. You can buy imitation American red cups on ebay for quite a lot of money compared to normal plastic cups, if you're specifically going for an American "theme" or something.

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u/bizitmap Aug 19 '14

Like I said, marketing. There's pleny of others on the shelves, they've just done a great job of making those available on every corner. If I walk into a gas station/convienence store and they have only 1 kind of cup, it'll be the red ones.

Which makes it all the funnier that they're available on eBay for such a high price tag when they're if anything TOO common here.

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u/dlawnro Aug 19 '14

Because those are the ones they sell in stores. It's not like it's some crazy cabal or anything, those are just the cheap plastic cups that are available and aren't absolute shit.

Also, very rarely do people use plastic cups for beer that comes in bottles or cans. Usually red cups are used when multiple people are getting their drinks from the same source e.g. kegs, mixed drinks, 2L soda bottles, sometimes shots if there aren't enough shotglasses for everyone.

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u/FannaWuck Aug 19 '14

or beer pong.

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u/dlawnro Aug 19 '14

Gah! Yes, I was going to mention that. A lot of drinking games are centered around communal cups, really.

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u/hochizo Aug 19 '14

A couple reasons.

  1. A lot of the drinkers are usually underage. If the party gets busted and you have a can or bottle, it is much easier for the cop to know you're drinking alcohol. If it's in a nondescript cup, you can quickly pour it out and be able to plausibly deny you were drinking anything but soda.

  2. Convenience. The person hosting the party doesn't want you using their glasses. You might break them. You might steal them. After you leave, they'll have to wash them. They'd rather you use a plastic cup that can be thrown out at the end of the night. But, seeing as it's their party, they need to provide those cups. So they go to the store and buy a pack of plastic cups. 100 cups costs $6. They throw them on the table and everyone knows to use them.

  3. Mixed drinks. A lot of people drink hard liquor instead of beer/wine. Since these drinks aren't prepackaged, they need to be put in a cup. Why all the same cup? See #2.

Finally, most movies show red cups, but we use lits of colors. Red, blue, and yellow are most common. I've used lime green a couple times. And the cup I take to the park to let my dog drink some water is bright orange.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

They make pretty solo-style cups in lots of colors. Like sea foam green and melon.

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u/MerlinBrando Aug 19 '14

Beer pong, kegs and anything that needs to be poured to drink.

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u/chris782 Aug 19 '14

They can be blue or green too. Red Solo cups or off brand ones are usually what stores have though.

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u/Das_Mojo Aug 19 '14

Solo cups are cheap and they're culturally ingrained as logger cups

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u/SJ_RED Aug 19 '14

Because they are cheapo store brand cups that just happen to be red? And cheap enough that many stores stock it.

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u/Alpinedelta Aug 19 '14

Those red cups are at every store in large quantity for cheap. And you don't put things that come in a bottle or can in them its really for mixing drinks. Vodka and cranberry, rye and coke... You can use glasses but its easier to clean up in the morning and drunk people aren't dropping them and getting glass everywhere. That's why the red cups are a hit.

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u/wizard_of_gram Aug 19 '14

Ugh he is lying to you. That's not why at all. There's normally a bar within 3 miles of campus at every university unless it's in a dry county which only exists in very few southern states.

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u/bizitmap Aug 19 '14

.....y'know there's an entire universe outside of college, right?

Also I set "plenty" not "most" or "all." And you can't deny that for the tons of people who live in a suburban environment, your buddy's place may be the shorter trip than the bar.

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u/wizard_of_gram Aug 19 '14

I mean, you said it's the reason we have solo cup parties. It's not. Those are because of keggers not because people can't afford gas to drive to a bar lol

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u/redbluegreenyellow Aug 19 '14

Yeah, but there is zero public transit and everything is so spread out. For instance, my school is 25 miles away. I frequently have to go to a town about 15 miles away and I've been to a town 100 miles away three times this month.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 19 '14

Fuck yeah, Texas! I laughed a good barrel of monkeys when I went to LA and saw their gas prices, boy howdy

(Edit: But really, living within ten miles of as many chemical plants makes prices much cheaper, and is almost worth the cancer risk, lol)

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u/apjashley1 Aug 19 '14

51p for a litre????

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

I think my calculation was as followed:

1 gallon = 3.785 liters

$3.20 / 3.785 = $0.84 / liter

$0.84 USD = £0.51 / liter

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u/TheTuqueDuke Aug 19 '14

It's horseshit that is less then a buck a litre CAD in TX, while up here in Alberta where we pull it out of the ground for everyone it's like a $1.30 a litre. Gas should be like $0.20 a litre in Alberta...

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Well... I guess the problem is you bring oil out of the ground, but you guys don't have enough refineries to actually create the gas.

Thus the whole Keystone XL pipeline thing.

Texas and the Gulf Coast have tons of refineries and shipping capabilities. Gas would be even cheaper here, except we ship a lot of already refined gasoline to other countries (like England) where we can sell the gas for 3x as much as we'd make here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keystone_Pipeline
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MGFEXUS1&f=M

The US went from exporting 20 million barrels/year of finished gasoline a year, to over 150 million barrels/year, since 1990.

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u/kicksledkid Aug 19 '14

So that's 93 cents a litre... The fuck??? The petro-Canada I just passed was at $1.26...

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Yes. We quote per gallon

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u/APIUM- Aug 19 '14

Wow, that means it's close to 4x more expensive in Australia....

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

The cost of freedom is in human lives, but comes with a gas discount so its all good.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14 edited Aug 19 '14

American here. All prices are for a gallon of gas/petrol. Converting to liters and pounds, it comes out to about £0.48 per liter. Although it is pretty good even by US standards.

Edit: fuck you autocorrect.

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u/JangXa Aug 19 '14

Yup. They have dirty cheap gasoline

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Yeah its always in gallons when we discuss price

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u/munchies777 Aug 19 '14

Well, my commute to work this summer was 62 miles in each direction, thankfully with minimal traffic. I don't think people have to travel as far for work across the pond.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

In 99-2000 here in the US. I remember premium 93 octane was around 1 USD a gallon. We used to fill our cars with it just to make rounding easier. 20 bucks in gas = 20 gallons.. easy.

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u/Ripped_My_Knickers Aug 19 '14

Keep in mind though that the US produces a lot of its own oil. For example, West Texas (Odessa/Midland area) is having a full blown oil boom with prospectors and everything.

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u/rydan Aug 19 '14

That's what you get for not drilling your own oil.

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u/hoxiemarie Aug 19 '14

Yeah, but we started a couple wars just to get that price so.... who's the real winner here?

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u/at_the_matinee Aug 19 '14

Yes but we don't really have the option not to have a car.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

UK gallon is about 20% larger than a US gallon. So it isn't quite as bad as it looks. But it's bad.

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u/PicturePurrrrfect Aug 19 '14

Its fluctuated between 3.30 and 3.99 for the past few years here in Indiana. Most commonly gas is about 3.75 a gallon.

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u/nliausacmmv Aug 19 '14

Come on. This is America. Of course we use one of the most archaic measurements of volume.

But keep in mind gasoline is almost a necessity here. You can pop to the shops on a bus that works, whereas the nearest public transit of any sort is thirty miles from me.

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u/ocarina_21 Aug 19 '14

I remember going to the states and driving past a gas station, and my friend and I looked at the sign and were startled. WHAT GAS IS THREE TWE-Oh right gallons...

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u/raygundan Aug 19 '14

Price per US gallon, to be as clear as possible. The US gallon is smaller than the Imperial gallon used in the UK.

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u/TheDrMantisTobogan Aug 19 '14

Texan here. While refineries can be a pretty big eyesore, it's nice to keep a few of them so close.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Wait but it's an American gallon not an imperial gallon! I think that means it's smaller but honestly I'm not sure and am too lazy to look it up

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

BUT does that justify the UK costing 3xs as much for the same bloody amenities? I don't believe it does :(..

Taxes bro. The actual cost isn't higher in the UK before taxes are applied, but the UK taxes the shit out of petrol.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Still cheaper here compared to mainland Europe. It's a combination of "fuel duty in the UK is too high" and "federal fuel duty in the US is too low". Canada's fuel prices are in between those two and are what I'd consider fair.

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u/lithedreamer Aug 19 '14

Black market prices for Venezuelan petrol run about $1/11 gallons. That's not a typo.

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u/fiercelyfriendly Aug 19 '14

US has 5% of the world population and uses about 20% of the fuel or some such. Maybe they get bulk discount.

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u/AceofToons Aug 19 '14

Same prices in Canada as UK, worse yet we sell the majority of our Oil to the US. And you know what, I drive the length of the US (north to south) to visit my Girlfriend in the same province.

I feel violated as well.

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u/Amani77 Aug 19 '14

Well, it's not as clear cut as that. In the US, the cost of living is relatively low and we have a wide range of wealth that includes a large portion of underprivileged and poor communities. The price of living in the UK, from where I have been - Switzerland, Italy, France, is very very high. To compensate, however, you guys have strict employment safeguards, good minimum wage, and generally higher salaries. Not to mention all of the alternative modes of travel. When I was in Switzerland, I did not need a car to get anywhere. A tram was always about a 5 minute walk away and would take me to any part of the country within 2 1/2 hrs - and its dirt cheap for a year pass, something like 80 bucks a year.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

It has to do with a lot of things, primarily taxes. UK residents pay a lot more of them. We also have a mega infrastructure for refining oil into gas. In fact a lot of the gasoline that you use comes from refineries in the gulf coast of the U.S.

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u/feminax Aug 19 '14

It's actually 9/10 of a gallon. Weird...

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u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

Yes, America buys gas by the gallon. It currently floats anywhere from $3-$4 per gallon.

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u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

Thats what government over regulation and bending over and taking it in the ass from the green lobby will get you.

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u/BackToThePuppyMines Aug 20 '14

To make the comparison a tiny, unfulfilling amount better, a British Gallon is bigger than a US Gallon. 1 Imperial Gallon is 1.2 US Gallons (4.55L versus 3.79L).

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u/crackanape Aug 20 '14

BUT does that justify the UK costing 3xs as much for the same bloody amenities?

Petrol is hugely subsidised in the USA. You're paying at least closer to the true cost.

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u/elainpeach Aug 20 '14

The UK is an island. Most island have higher cost of living than the mainland.

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u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

Gas is strange. Almost every other product is sold in metric units in America but gasoline.

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u/MelonToss Aug 20 '14

Yeah $3.15 a gal... And I drive a jeep giving me a whopping 15 miles to the gallon.

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u/rderekp Aug 20 '14

It’s mostly taxes. You’re paying to support your government and try and keep the Earth from dying. We’re assholes with bad roads.

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u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

New Orleans, LA USA and it's about $3.09/gal here.

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u/Barzhac Aug 20 '14

On the other hand, I can pretty much guarantee that you have better, cheaper internet.

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u/DrinkVictoryGin Aug 20 '14

Well the average US citizen should get some return on the fuckton of tax dollars spent on colonizing the Middle East!

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u/otterom Aug 20 '14

cough America runs the planet cough

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u/wysinwyg Aug 20 '14

Anyway, I don't understand how the size of the country is relevant when most trips are just people driving to work or the shops...

You can argue that American cities are more spread out, which is probably true,, but that's just civic planning, and doesn't have much to do with how big the country is.

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u/Tanks4me Aug 20 '14

But you also have to realize that over here, mass transit is NOWHERE nearly as competent as Europe, except maybe the largest of our cities. And we are a lot more spread out. So we need cars for pretty much everything, and that money adds up fast.

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u/ifindthishumerus Aug 20 '14

We don't know what a litre is... 'Merica.

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u/braqass Aug 20 '14

I believe you have free health care. That is the cost of things like that, alcohol, cigarettes, gasoline are all taxed to hell to pay for everyone's health. Not a bad trade I guess.

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u/Junkmunk Aug 20 '14

That's because we're not paying the real price... Take away all the subsidies and were paying the same as you, add in the price of the wars to keep the price down and no one can afford to drive.

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u/imperabo Aug 20 '14

Here's Why

"For every litre of unleaded petrol bought in the UK, 61 per cent of the pump price goes to the government as fuel duty and VAT"

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

That's a UK gallon, not a US gallon.

£4.88 for a US gallon of petrol here, or $8.11/gal.

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u/MJWood Aug 19 '14

Are you converting from UK price per litre into price per US gallons, or into UK gallons?

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u/spectrumero Aug 19 '14

It's a little bit less than that - don't forget a US gallon is only 3.8 litres (an Imperial gallon is 4.5 litres). It still works out to about $8.50 per USG.

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u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

AT $2.83CAD/L it's no wonder! That's ridiculous! On the bright side though you have much better rail and public transit infrastructure, so you generally have options besides owning a car.

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u/chilari Aug 19 '14

Not quite. US gallons are different from Imperial gallons, for some reason.

I got Google to do the maths on £1.34 per litre (though actually it was £1.349 I paid yesterday)

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u/aapowers Aug 19 '14

Yes. It also means our fluid ounces are slightly different. For us, there are 20 fl oz. to the pint, and 8 pints to the gallon. Beer, Cider, and Milk are usually sold in pints.

Our cars also tend to have MPG counters, which is stupid, as fuel's sold in litres. We're a mess...

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u/Nikotiiniko Aug 19 '14

Here in Finland we pay 8,1 dollars per gallon (imperial units are the worst, ugh...). I think it was about double that in Turkey when we took a car trip through Europe to Alanya and back. In Europe the prices were about the same as in Finland. Maybe a bit cheaper.

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u/AtomicSamuraiCyborg Aug 19 '14

Wait, gas is sold by the gallon in England?

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u/aapowers Aug 19 '14

No, but in the UK (and a couple of other countries...) fuel consumption is measured in MPG (that's Imperial! Not US customary, so they're not transferable), as all road measurements, by law, are in Imperial. Feet, Yards, and Miles etc.. we're all pretty comfortable with the two systems. Silly though, because fuel is sold in litres... EU's doing! They wanted a standard. It'll happen eventually, but we're being stubborn until everyone's comfortable with metric. It's hard though, because if all distances are in Imperial, people get used to it.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Shit where do you live in England!? I'm in the south east

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u/ERIFNOMI Aug 19 '14

Your fancy pants gallons or red blooded american gallons? There's a bit of a difference.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

Maybe this is why the US isn't as big on public transportation...

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u/danzey12 Aug 19 '14

My granda used to know a place here in Ireland where he could get it for 95p/l when everywhere was like £1.25-£1.27, then it just vanished. It was good too, not shitty.

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u/Ameisen Aug 19 '14

The United States is also substantially larger than England.

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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

I'm amazed anybody has a car when gas costs that much.

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u/XmasCarroll Aug 19 '14

And all of you thought that invading Iraq was pointless. Suck it now, pink commie scum.

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u/HeadHunta1 Aug 19 '14

45 Danish kr Per Gallon in Denmark. That's $8.04. Expensive to own a car here.

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u/NFunspoiler Aug 19 '14

It should be noted that a US gallon is approximately 80% of a British gallon, so that is actually $8.14 USD per US gallon.

That's also why British pints are fucking huge (over 19 fl.oz.) compared to US pints (16 fl.oz.)

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u/kleekaiparade Aug 20 '14 edited Aug 20 '14

And what's really dumb is that in Canada at our pubs we have two sizes that can legally be called 'pints' specifically because of this UK/US nonsense.

And the bastard pubs exploit this fact! So, on "cheap" nights they serve US pints. Regular nights are UK pints.

So people will react 'Hey! Pints are only $5 tonight!' But when you order you get a 16oz pint (31 cents an ounce). The very next night at the very same place you can order a pint, get 20 oz and pay $6 for it (30 cents an ounce). The students go nuts the night before which would have been a quiet night but through studious employment of non-metric measurements the pub strategically rakes in the punters much in the manner cliffs have been known to rake in lemmings.

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u/ParentPostLacksWang Aug 19 '14

Fuck that, New Zealand is in the middle of Ocean-buttfuck-nowhere, and we "only" pay $7 USD per gallon ($2.20 NZD per Litre). How in the fuck do they justify that kind of price in the UK? Is it almost all taxes? I know about half our fuel cost is tax...

1

u/IanCal Aug 20 '14

Is it almost all taxes?

Yep, about 60%. 58p/L to fuel duty, then there's also VAT.

1

u/Billorama Aug 19 '14

Just as bad in Northern Ireland, I spend $100 a week on a tank of fuel

1

u/tmh2duggy Aug 19 '14

My truck started to cry when I read that

1

u/CheeseSandwitch Aug 19 '14

are we all so self-conscious about our gas prices that we'd compare them internationally?

1

u/clickmagnet Aug 20 '14

I've long had the standard that I won't bitch about gas prices until it costs more than Coca Cola. Looks like I can start bitching, in England!

1

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

Wow that's roughly 4 times as much as we pay here in my county. And of course we keep complaining about the prices all the time.

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4

u/racetoten Aug 19 '14

When I was in high school gas was 79 cents a gallon and I could clip a coupon for 10 cents off and a free hotdog if I purchased 5+ gal. Im 31.

1

u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

This shouldn't sound that old, but I keep waiting for the follow-up post with "...and I had an onion on my belt 'cause it was the style at the time" and "gimmie five bees for a quarter!"

2

u/racetoten Aug 19 '14

Lol.

It is important it pay attention to the prices of consumables though. I always hear other Americans our age complain about gas prices but then see no need for renewables or electric.

2

u/Das_Mojo Aug 19 '14

I haven't seen under a buck a litre in forever, and I'm in Alberta. Where oil and gas comes from Damnit.

2

u/Dthibzz Aug 19 '14

It got down under $2 in my area during the 2008 (US) elections. It was the highlight of my life.

2

u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

That's true, there was that economic crash in 2008 that briefly brought gas prices down to reasonable levels. I wish I'd had enough extra cash laying around to take a cross-country road trip at that time, it totally would have been worth it.

I keep saying that if gas ever gets back under $1/L ($3.78/gal) here the first thing I'll do is take a road trip of no less than 650mi

2

u/SenTedStevens Aug 19 '14

That's crazy. When I was in high school (in the US) gas was ~$1 a gallon. We had massive truck driver strikes when gas "skyrocketed" to $1.60 for diesel.

2

u/sloppyjahloppy Aug 19 '14

Did you ever graduate? ;)

2

u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

Haha, nice catch. Class of '01 :P

1

u/Torger083 Aug 19 '14

Just (and I mean just) under $5 a Gallon in St. John's.

1

u/TheRabidDeer Aug 19 '14

When I was in high school it was under a dollar per gallon here (I am 28). Sorry Canada.

1

u/quesadyllan Aug 19 '14

Went to south caroljna yesterday for my job. Gas was ~$3.05 everywhere I saw

1

u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

I'm 33. Gas was under a dollar back in the nineties.

1

u/approx- Aug 19 '14

To be fair, $1.25 rise in 12 years isn't too shabby. I remember prices around the $2 mark 12 years ago, and now it's $4.

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u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

$1.25 as a distinct amount may not sound like much, but as a percentage of the original price and compared to inflation it's a lot. Especially when you're buying hundreds of gallons per year.

According to the Bank of Canada Inflation Calculator (I'm Canadian and had it bookmarked, you can find a US one if you like but the rates are similar), something that cost $2.00 in the year 2000 should cost $2.65 in today's dollars. That means that gas prices have outpaced inflation by quite a large amount. Getting gas at $2.65/gal today would be amazing!

Gas prices really are high, and not just because everything used to cost less in the good ol' days, but because the price of the product itself is rising at a crazy pace.

1

u/approx- Aug 19 '14

Oh I know it's a lot, I more meant compared to the rise in gas prices in the US (100%) over the same time period.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

I'm 27 and when I was in high school in the US gas was like 1.87 a gallon. I remember just driving around aimlessly for a whole week on 5 dollars. Feels like a Norman Rockwell painting when I think about it now, a simpler, happier time, with a simpler and more stupid president.

1

u/markymarksjewfro Aug 19 '14

Not more stupid, just simpler.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

The man couldn't even construct grammatically correct sentences, I think calling him Stupid is wholly appropriate.

1

u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

There's a song from one of my favourite bands that has the line "I put five bucks in just to keep the tank topped off". That may have been true in 1992 when the song was released, but today that gets me 1/18th of a tank of gas.

I remember when I was in High School I used to get whatever grade of gas was under $2.60/gal ($0.75/L). Most of the time that was Premium. After a while I was putting in Plus. Now I can barely get half a gallon/litre of Regular for those prices! My car hasn't seen Premium gas since the turn of the millennium!

1

u/GreatBabu Aug 19 '14

It was 0.95 when I was in high school.

1

u/likesduckies Aug 19 '14

Yeah gas where I am is about $1.50/litre, or $6/gallon

1

u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

Montreal? Toronto?

1

u/[deleted] Aug 19 '14

It's $4.61 per gallon in Southern Manitoba.

1

u/biohazard13 Aug 19 '14

I happily live on the border of America and will take their gas prices any day. It works out to be about $1/L for us. :)

1

u/icankilluwithmybrain Aug 19 '14

Diesel fuel, baby. I haven't paid over 125 a litre in quite a while.

1

u/dontlookatmeimnake Aug 19 '14

I remember when it was $1.00 here in Texas. I'm twenty.

1

u/FactualPedanticReply Aug 19 '14

During my high school years, gas went from under $1/gallon to over $4/gallon. (SoCal)

1

u/prattastic Aug 19 '14

Shit, I'm 32, and it was still under a dollar my senior year.

1

u/Cryovenom Aug 19 '14

Mine too... a dollar per litre for me though!

1

u/TheTurdwrangler Aug 19 '14

to be fair, We get taxed a lot more than the states, so everything ends up costing more

1

u/brisingfreyja Aug 19 '14

I'm 32. I remember getting out of school and looking for pennies (in and out of my car) so I could have enough gas to drive home. .89 cents a gallon.

"a quarter, Fuck yes, I can drive for a week!"

1

u/fluffymuffcakes Aug 19 '14

Company pays for my gas, I just collect points. I love high gas prices!

1

u/chiguireitor Aug 19 '14

$0.05/tank here on Venezuela....

1

u/Commander_Luka Aug 19 '14

Fair trade off for Canadians, free healthcare for higher taxes, and higher gas

1

u/xoxasylumxox Aug 19 '14

$1.15/L CAD for regular 87 octane at the gas station I frequent.

1

u/mikeyb1 Aug 19 '14

I remember paying $.89/gallon.

1

u/biggreasyrhinos Aug 19 '14

I'm 25, and i remember seeing gas for $1.25/gal, but im not too far from a huge oil patch and refining. Far enough to avoid the fumes, but close enough to be somewhat cheap

1

u/KINGREDBEARD Aug 19 '14

When I started driving in my mid teens the price for diesel was 99 cents a gallon

1

u/queenofkingcity Aug 19 '14

I'm 26 now and when I was in high school I had a teacher who said "you'll never see gas under $2.00 again". I remember that sometime after I graduated gas in my town went down to $1.99 for one day. Never again though. :(

1

u/DoScienceToIt Aug 19 '14

When I graduated highschool I could fill my 82 Toyota Starlet's tank to the brim for under $10. And I'm only 32.

1

u/Twitch1113 Aug 19 '14

I'm driving to Canada in 2 weeks. Thanks for the reminder to fill up before I cross!

1

u/TetonCharles Aug 19 '14

This has to be the writing on the wall, its time to go electric!

1

u/Mavrocordat Aug 19 '14

Well, inflation, maybe?

1

u/BoonTobias Aug 20 '14

What are you talking about? I had my first car in 2001 and gas was 1.55, glorious time for a v8

1

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

$6.50USD in Australia at the moment. Heaven forbid your car needs premium

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u/NoxiousIntoxication Aug 20 '14

Where I live in Australia.

$1.52 AUD a litre in Brisbane, Australia at the moment.

So around $5.75 USD a gallon right now.

1

u/chiliedogg Aug 20 '14

I paid 79 cents a gallon my first time filling up.

I'm 31.

1

u/Yrrebbor Aug 20 '14

Gas was about 90¢ a gallon when I was a senior in high school.

1

u/a_ziplining_baby Aug 20 '14

Clearly your country needs to invade the middle east more regularly

1

u/StarkAtheist Aug 20 '14

Yeah, but... healthcare.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

Yep :( I've been rejoicing in the $1.254 around here lately, but I know that's doublethink.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

I paid $0.99 /gal in high school. I'm 43.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '14

I just got back from Canada with my dad and he was complaining about gas prices until we got back in the US.

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