Madison Aument
For 91.9 KVCR News, I'm Madison Aument. This is Economics IE. Late last week, the American Automotive Association, or AAA, released a report on gas prices. The average price for a gallon of gas in San Bernardino County is $4.48 and in Riverside County, it's $4.42. I spoke to Gianella Ghiglino, who's a spokesperson for AAA about the cost of gasoline in the region. So I saw the report, and I just wanted to know how these gas prices are compared to gas prices about a month ago?
Gianella Ghiglino
So we are seeing that gas prices are slightly lower, a few cents lower than they were a month ago. We are nowhere near as high as they were this time a year ago, but they are kind of coming down. It is kind of initiating that the end of summer travel and entering fall and fall travel, these are going to be the stable prices are going to be a little lower than they were in the summer.
Madison Aument
Yeah. And why are we seeing this decrease in gas prices right now?
Gianella Ghiglino
The demand has decreased from summer, so a lot of people have already finished taking their road trip. They're not traveling farther distances. So we are seeing more just commuting inside their commuting spaces to work locally. And so all of that brings a demand down.
Madison Aument
This report, is it just Southern California, or is it the state?
Gianella Ghiglino
It is in southern and central California. So the cities we focus on are just southern and central California. However, the statewide average remains for everybody. And you talked about this a little bit, but you said the prices are lower, that they're significantly lower than they were this time last year.
Madison Aument
Why were they higher?
Gianella Ghiglino
They were higher for a multitude of reasons. So in 2022 we saw the peak. So in 2023 they were kind of coming down, but there were still many issues, like refinery issues, maintenance issues, that were not addressed. So we were seeing much higher, not the highest it's ever been, but definitely higher gas prices than we're seeing this year, where things have been more stable. I think last time we spoke around Memorial Day, you said that some of those refinery issues were getting fixed. So are we past those refinery issues? Yes, a lot of those issues have been addressed, and we actually had more of a surplus going into the summer.
Madison Aument
Do you expect these prices are going to continue to trend downward, or that they're kind of just going to stagnate for a while?
Gianella Ghiglino
It is possible that we can continue to climb down however. We can't say for sure, because these things can change weekly, daily. So we can't specifically say, however, the way things are looking, I can say that things are going to remain very steady.
Madison Aument
That was Gianella Ghiglino with AAA. Join us again next Monday for Economics IE. You can find this segment and others on our website, at kvcrnews.org/econie. Support for this segment comes from the Nowak family. For KVCR News, I'm Madison Aument.