Thursday, October 02, 2003

AT BEST, A MIXED BLESSING

For those of you who don't live in the military community in Europe, instead of buying our gasoline at, say, German prices (a little over $4.00 per gallon) we buy our gasoline through a program run by the Army and Air Force Exchange (AAFES).

As gasoline prices have been volatile the last two years, there has been much debate about how AAFES' prices stack up to the back-home prices.

Right now we are paying about $1.74 per gallon (47 cents per liter).

According to the Stars & Stripes: Gas prices in Europe are not going up Wednesday, and will remain at September prices, according to officials from the Army and Air Force Exchange service.

The public will be given advance notice of any increases in the future, said AAFES spokeswoman Lt. Col. Debra Pressley...

For example, when gas prices increased by 9 cents a gallon in September, AAFES told consumers on Aug. 29, three days before the price change.

OK - that is good, as far as it goes...but is seems to completely ignore this story:

Retail gas prices slid more than 10 cents per gallon over the past two weeks, the biggest drop in two years, an analyst said Sunday.

The average price for a gallon of self-serve gas nationwide, including all grades and taxes, was about $1.65 on Friday, according to the Lundberg Survey of 8,000 stations.

That was a decrease of 10.23 cents per gallon since the last Lundberg Survey was taken Sept. 12.

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