Sunday November 7, 2004
... the price of gas fell below the discount offered as an incentive to buy a car? Not likely, but - would you get the extra cash? Granted it would be odd to be paid to buy gas, but it would be a nice change.
This strange train of thought led me to wondering how gas prices across the border compare these days. So I investigated and found that the average price in Ontario is 82 ¢ per litre. The average US price: $2.00 per gallon which works out to about 53 ¢ per litre. And, no, I didn't do any exchange rate calculations because I wanted to compare the costs for residents, not visitors.
[ Update - entry made visible Nov 8 ]
0) { ?>Let me revise your calculation.
Today's Canadian Dollar is 83.5 cents now, and moving swiftly towards par DAILY.
That means that it costs roughly $1.20 CDN to buy one dollar US.
So a US gallon at $2.00 (which is conservative by the way) is $2.40 CDN. Divide by 3.78 L per gallon (this is another common mistake, US gallons are smaller than British gallons) and you get 63.5 cents per litre.
More realistically, border states and California prices are considerably MORE than $2.00.
At $2.50 per gallon, the difference closes considerably to the equivalent of 79.4 cents per litre. In my neighborhood it is 78.5 today.
I did the math properly, and got the information about the average US gas price from the AAA web site. Because when I live in the States I use US dollars to pay for things and when I live in Canada I use loonies, the exchange rate is irrelevant to me. 'Spending units' are what count. I would get more gas per unit across the border.
Posted by: janice at November 10, 2004 04:19 PM