Why Rural Americans’ Gas Struggles Should Matter to City-Dwellers

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


outofgas.jpg

A lot of the articles I read about the state of our economy include interviews with people like this woman, who in January found her rising costs so terrifying that she began sending her sheets and towels to a laundry service instead of a dry cleaner. They brim with pity for urbanites forced to abandon Starbucks and scale back weekly hair appointments, and suggest that readers consider such monastic choices as cooking for themselves and renting movies rather than going out.

But for our country’s rural poor, even video rentals are now a luxury that many cannot afford. Today’s New York Times reports that in rural areas across the country, and particularly in the deep South, people are spending over 13% of their income on gasoline—compared to an average of 4% nationwide. “These are people who have to decide between food and transportation,” says one fuel price analyst. From the story, which is worth quoting at length:

Anthony Clark, a farm worker from Tchula [Miss.], says he prays every night for lower gasoline prices. […] A trip from Tchula to the nearest sizable town about 15 minutes away can cost him $25 roundtrip—for the driving and the waiting. That is about 10 percent of what he makes in a week.

Taking a break under some cottonwood trees beside a drainage ditch filled with buzzing mosquitoes, Mr. Clark and members of his work crew spoke of the big and little changes that higher gas prices have brought. The extra dollars spent at the pump mean electric bills are going unpaid and macaroni is replacing meat at supper. Donations to church are being put off, and video rentals are now unaffordable.

Involuntary, personal lifestyle changes like Mr. Clark’s are affecting towns, too:

Local governments are leaving grass high along the roads and doing fewer road repairs to save on fuel costs. The Holmes County government has cut the work week to four days to give workers gasoline relief (keeping the same total of hours), and politicians are even considering replacing sanitation workers with prison inmates on some shifts to conserve money for fuel.

The story of the South should be a cautionary tale. Here in California, Governor Schwarzenegger’s budget proposal would hack close to $1.5 billion from public transportation beginning in July, despite the fact that gas prices are among the highest in the country and transit ridership is up significantly across the state. A paradigm shift is sorely needed—but in the meantime, maybe the hypermilers have the right idea.

UPDATE: The Times has an excellent map showing the varying impact of gas prices across the country. Prices in Holmes County, Miss. are actually among the nation’s lowest.

Photo used under a Creative Commons license from seanfraga.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate