Fifty Plus (50+) - How to cope with - and survive - escalating fuel prices

Threads are going in other discussion forums here about the price of gas and diesel. I'm interested, but beyond that, I'm wondering what you as a group of 50+ year old bicyclists are thinking. We've all been through the Arab oil embargo of 1973 and we've all experienced several recessions and some severe inflation.

But if fuel prices continue to increase, we all know from experience what comes next: INFLATION. After all, the price of fuel is built into the price and availability of most everything we as consumers buy: Food. Bicycle tires. Office supplies. You name it.

Some of you are retired and living on a fixed income. How will you cope?

A smart guy who I like and respect posted this in a real estate finance networking forum this morning. I think it's worth thinking about:

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Thanks to the crisis of the moment it's easy to loose situational awareness


Have not verified these
Asset Price 1/1/10 Price 2/22/11 % Change

Oil 82.75 94.64 14%

Gold 1,137 1,397 23%

Silver 16.81 33.05 97%

Wheat* 5.53 7.62 38%

Corn* 4.25 6.79 60%

Cattle 85.00 110 29%

Sugar** 26 31 19%

Tell me again how inflation is not a problem

Every time inflation hits they change the definition to keep the great unwashed in the dark. That is to say with their head up their a$$es.

I will cope by being lucky everything's paid off and accepting a lesser lifestyle. Or perhaps a winning lottery ticket............................

First, I try not to worry about it. IMO, worry makes you age faster!! :)

Second, I ride two wheels 5 days a week. Three days I ride the motorycle, and two days I ride the bicycle. The alternate week, it will be 3 days on the bicycle and 2 on the bike. In the meantime, my wife drives my gas guzzling F150...:cry:..

I live a half a block from where I work. I'd recommend it to anyone just starting out. It wasn't my plan to save gas when I bought the house; I just liked the house. But it has made a huge difference, both in the amount of money I spend on gas and the longevity of my vehicles. I have a shopping bike. I live a mile from my local shopping center. When I want to save money on gas or be green I ride my bike to go shopping. I can put about four bags of groceries in my Bob trailer.

My "shopping bike":
http://images3a.snapfish.com/232323232%7Ffp73395%3Enu%3D3385%3E584%3E435%3EWSNRCG%3D3374758%3B44345nu0mrj

I cut back on everything I don’t need and save up for bike parts. I don’t use credit and everything I have I own.

I wouldn't get too worked up over a commodity/fuel price spike, even if it is permanent. How much is the price increase of fuel or even wheat going to affect a loaf of bread? Not much. It looks dramatic and makes great headlines, but most of what we pay for is other people's time, not the raw materials they work with. Even a 25% increase in the price of gasoline does not change the cost of driving by double-digit percentages because most of the costs of driving are the fixed costs (unless your car was a gift).

One thing I do like about this spike as well as the one in 2008 is that the news is making a big deal about how expensive fuel is. That seems to cause people to drive less. Today I went on a 42 mile ride that I do regularly. I typically have 20-25 cars pass me on this ride. Today, only 10 cars passed me. If headlines about expensive fuel keep people from doing as much aimless driving, I'm all for it.

I am semi retired and do not live on a fixed income so that leaves me out. Oh, ya, paying back debts with inflation dollars is fun. Just bought a Big Cat 1200 pellet rifle with scope, might bring in some extra meat running around in the trees around here. Yum.

Living where I do the cost of fuel has a big effect on the price of goods since pretty much everything has to be shipped in. As far as fuel is concerned I don't need it. I either ride the bicycle or drive my electric car which is powered by my PV system. Mostly it is my wife that drives the car. No need for heating fuel either or air conditioning either.

I live a half a block from where I work. I'd recommend it to anyone just starting out. It wasn't my plan to save gas when I bought the house; I just liked the house. But it has made a huge difference, both in the amount of money I spend on gas and the longevity of my vehicles. I have a shopping bike. I live a mile from my local shopping center. When I want to save money on gas or be green I ride my bike to go shopping. I can put about four bags of groceries in my Bob trailer.

My "shopping bike":
http://images3a.snapfish.com/232323232%7Ffp73395%3Enu%3D3385%3E584%3E435%3EWSNRCG%3D3374758%3B44345nu0mrj

NICE RIG. I like it! The very first question that pops into my mind is, how on earth do you secure it so it doesn't get stolen while you're busy shopping???

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibsnBpzBT-4

Cycling is my primary form of transportation, so increase fuel prices will only give me more room on the roads.:thumb:

Reading Bike Forums is how I learned gas prices are going up.


Paul

The gas prices DO hit me, simply because I have extended family living with me, and they have three autos in my driveway. My sister is game for the bike, but seems to fall a bit short because her hub is, at his core, a wuss. Talks tough about what he can tolerate, do without, make do with, but he's the most wasteful consumer I've ever met! (He buys things for his, or sometimes her, use, with the idea that it can be pawned if money gets tight! WTFF?!?)

When the rising gas prices affect groceries and general needs for life, I have to dig deeper and re-shuffle my budget; his disability check is a joke, she's returning to school for career training (spent years as the primary caretaker for his ailing mother, also under my roof, until she passed), and I'm the primary breadwinner. I haven't owned an auto since fall of '04, and have no desire to change that status. But, unlike what he SAYS, I can make do....

It just grates on me to have to tell the kids "No" on their wants and such because he won't grab his ears and pull til he hears the POP. (And civil conversation about it is impossible; he's "61 years old, about the be 62!", and still thinks he can whup ass on anybody. I need more reason to get violent, but I'm told that's a symptom of bi-polar disorder....)

This is how one of my friends (age 65) solved his mpg problem.

Gas prices in town here are C$1.229 per liter that works out to about US$ 4.533 per US gallon, just think of the screaming you'll hear when it reaches that in your town. We are lower than the average price in the greater Vancouver area so we have a price increase to look forwad to.

As a retired person on a fixed income, there is really nothing I can do. I depend exclusively on my car to get me into town, to shop for food and anything else for that matter, and to take me to the places I want to go. I love to travel, to camp, to hike, to ski, to fish, to kayak and to bicycle. Only the latter activity does not depend completely on my driving anywhere. so I just pay the higher gas prices. When it gets to the point that it begins to tear into my monthly expenses, I'll just have to cut down on the driving or on some other expense. I drive fuel efficient cars, but I live in Montana and my drives to the places of my outdoor activities are usually between fifty and a hundred miles one way. Nothing is close here in the Big Sky State even though the mountains are right outside my window. I'm hoping that inflation will increase only gradually and that I'll grow too old to do all things that I love to do by the time I can't afford to do them. But the cycling is good right here in town, as is the walking so I can always increase the frequency with which I do them.

Fuel prices don't have much of an effect on me directly, since I rarely drive and don't own a car. I do have two motorcycles that I'm thinking of selling because I really can't afford to maintain them properly anymore. The indirect effects of higher fuel costs are scary. I don't expect to ever be able to retire, and consider myself lucky that my profession is such that I could work freelance from anywhere with a good internet connection, and can continue to work as long as I can still see. About the only strategy I have is to avoid debt and avoid owning much (especially to avoid owning a house) so that I can easily move somewhere cheaper, and grow some of my own food.

The cost of living continues to go up and will ,no doubt, go up dramatically as the dollar continues to lose value. Fuel cost is folded into the prices of everything else in the distribution chain. Since I'm now fully retired I no longer require an auto as much as in the past. However, I enjoy hiking in New Hampshire and skiing and drive to locations where I can pursue those activities. My best guess is that I drive about half what I drove when fully employed. I'm finding I enjoy riding the bike all over town which includes shopping. I'll likely get some sort of cart or large panniers for this purpose and for bike tours in N. Hampshire of up to, say, 3 to 4 days.

This would fix everything for us all:

http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-clarity/

I'm on the waiting list, but I need to be in southern Calif. when they call my name. And I'm not so sure I want to spend full time in California.

Buy stock in your favorite major oil company. You'll profit accordingly.

I am sorry to say but it will not fix everything for all people. The idea of an electric car is great but the implementation is another thing. Consumer reports did a test on the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf and found out they did not live up to their hype. What does a person do who needs something to haul large or heavy items? I own a Prius that is driven quite often but also own a SUV to haul my camper and other large loads that need moved.

As I said the electric car is a fantastic development but it is not the fix for everyone.

If what was reported on the news is correct the current price spike is based on speculation, not oil shortage. What little decrease in oil supplies is caused by the problem in Libya is being more than made up for by Saudi Arabia increasing production. So, just what is going on?

Of course there will be very few people on the planet who are not affected by increased energy prices. They will be reflected in everything we buy or do.

The real question is, again assuming reports are correct, what are the big investment houses and banks going to do with the big bonuses they will derive from all this?

If what was reported on the news is correct the current price spike is based on speculation, not oil shortage...



Maybe, but we are getting close to a real limit. I have yet to see any credible estimates of global oil delivery much in excess of 92 million barrels/day. Demand seems to be rising towards 90 MB/day. When you have a relatively inelastic supply limit that demand bumps up against, you will have price spikes. In fact, with so much of the world addicted to oil use, the spikes to come will likely be quite large. Will speculators play a role? Sure, but they won't be the cause.

Look at it this way, if you could sell a barrel for $110 today, but you expect that by next week the price will be $120, why would you sell it now? The expectation of higher prices could well drive a price spike like Enron engineered for electrical power in CA in 2000-2001 where suppliers keep the supply low enough to maintain ever-increasing prices.

Fasten your toe-straps, we may be in for a wild ride.

It is a bit off this topic, but, yes, over the long haul there is a probability energy prices will increase dramatically. Note I said "energy", not "oil".

The primary driver is thought to be increasing world population coupled with desire to live at higher comfort levels than many do today. According to the people who count such things the planet population will soon reach 7 Billion people. Just sustaining them at subsistence levels will be a very large drain on known supplies of water, fuel, etc. At the same time disposing of their waste is a daunting challenge even at subsistence living levels. Or course, one of the consequences of this network we are using is that people who are living in poor conditions now know better conditions exist and strive for them.

People planet wide are moving from rural areas to cities. From inner city and slum conditions to downtown, suburb and other developments that provide better and safer living conditions. All this takes energy. We are told there are plentiful supplies of natural gas and coal but they need processing and transporting from their sources to where the need is. This is costly. All those people need food which requires more energy. Again, more cost.

In short oil will probably go the way of whale oil for most things to be replaced by a blend of fuels and energy. But, population growth will probably move faster than new energy sources can be brought on line.

Quite a long post. But, I hope enough to give a sense of optimism. I don't think we are going to run out of energy. It will just be a bit different than today and more expensive. At the same time the artificially inflated prices like we are experiencing today will give fuel to social and political unrest like few have experienced. How that will play out is anyone's guess. But, bet the Golden Rule wins.

Water. The real problem. And no amount of money nor technology will change it.

I stopped driving a car and just ride the bike, use public transportation. Buying a bike trailer has turned out to be a very good investment. If I need to move something really big like furniture I rent a U-Haul truck. Enterprise has good weekend car rental deals for road trips, or I go with friends who still drive.

Around the house I try to do as much myself as possible, like fix my own leaks, mow my own lawn ( I'd like to do away with the lawn entirely at some point) and trim trees myself.

I hardly pay attention to gas prices since I started bike commuting 4 years ago. I've bike commuted over 13,000 miles since then, riding 3-4 days/week on average, and I've cut my driving mileage in half. Since the first of this year, I've filled up my pickup truck with gas once and cycled 1250 miles compared to about 500 miles driving. I also ride to the start of most group rides, which saves me at least 20 miles of driving every weekend.

I do what I have always done...adapt, improvise and overcome. ;)

Please refer me back to this post when you hear me complain about riding in the rain, sleet, snow and cold. :o

While this thread is focused on gas prices, what really matters is total cost of operating the vehicle. Praise to you for whom bicycle commuting is practical. For most it just isn't. Then it comes down to total cost because money spent on the vehicle is money that can't be spent somewhere else for something of a higher priority.

An example of being off focus is the guy who was telling me he got rid of his older pickup truck and bought a brand new diesel. "Why I can get 22mpg with the new one and only got 14mpg with the old one"; he said. Of course the new one cost a humongous amount of money where the old one was paid for. The new one required the use of construction materials where the old one was already built. Tiires for the new one are more expensive than those for the old one. And, the crowning fact, the 22mpg is only obtained empty at highway speeds. When using it in daily work life both the old and new have fuel economy withing a mpg of each other and diesel fuel costs a lot more than gas.

Don't fall to a shell game. It's a loser.

Truth is some of us can cut back more than others. I can cut back driving and taking vacations with my RV. I can shop by bike and I can by generic brands from the ultra-supermarkets. But the people delivering food to the ultra-supermarkets will charge more for the food they deliver. The people delivering hard goods to DIY stores will charge more for the hard goods so if you do your own repairs it still costs you more to live.

Threads are going in other discussion forums here about the price of gas and diesel. I'm interested, but beyond that, I'm wondering what you as a group of 50+ year old bicyclists are thinking. We've all been through the Arab oil embargo of 1973 and we've all experienced several recessions and some severe inflation.
Remember the gas prices in the summer of 2008 or 2009? Regular was over $4.00. Right now it's only $3.39 around here. What did everyone do then?


Some of you are retired and living on a fixed income. How will you cope?
We bought a small car for around town errands and short trips. Gets much better gas mileage (29/40) than our main vehicle (18/33).

Where it is going to hit me and I suspect most is not in the cost of fuel in the vehicle but in higher cost of everything else. That higher cost will probably translate into less product availability. Even though the airlines have increased their already good cash basis profits by reducing everything including flights they will reduce even more. Last summer it took over a month to get all the travelers stranded by the volcanoe to their destinations. Food that we are used to seeing in the supermarket will become more limited and more expensive. Not all of that is bad I guess since it will mean returning to more seasonally driven diets.

We so far have resisted replacing our 1995 car because it still does the job. But parts are becoming very hard to get. We may have to replace it merely because we can't get a replacement part. With higher fuel costs companies are not producing and shipping for the older cars like they once did.

For those of you in the US Midwest I can see you really hurting but using that hurt to get more reasonable and resource efficient transport like freight trains instead of an endless stream of 18-wheelers.

Well, I lived without fresh eggs, milk and fruit earlier in life and I can do it again. Maybe move again to a place where I can have a greenhouse and do some hydroponic farming?

I plan to continue what I have done since the oil embargo of 1973, live below my means. I don't think my bike is the answer to an ever shrinking pool of resources.

I plan to continue what I have done since the oil embargo of 1973, live below my means. I don't think my bike is the answer to an ever shrinking pool of resources.
I'm with you!
And for those that can, sketch into the future dwelling plans a shorter commute, or a home within easy reach of public transport... and while we're at it, try to get the guys in Washington to stop being given carte blanche for the military industrial /domestic espionage complex!

I don't want to live in a city. That is my biggest problem with transport.

@Latitude:

Just out of curiousity, what kind of 1995 car do you have that you are having trouble finding parts? I would think that you could keep just about any car of that vintage on the road for some time to come, unless you just had something completely oddball. For salvage parts, you can use car-part.com to find about anything you'd need, I would imagine. The reason I ask is that I've had some weird and or rare cars in my time, and you can always find parts, especially online. If you can find parts for a 1981 Peugeot 504 diesel wagon, you should be able to find parts for just about anything built in 1995.

By the way, an interesting chart on gas prices adjusted for inflation.

http://www.fintrend.com/inflation/images/charts/oil/gasoline_inflation_chart.htm

Considering how much oil we've pumped out of the ground and used since 1981 (or the 1930s), to be paying roughly the same today in real terms is absolutely amazing.

We are paying the price for doing nothing since the OAPEC oil embargo of 1973. Our refusal to change our lifestyle to something more sustainable for the past 38 years means we have to pay the price now.

@Latitude:

Just out of curiousity, what kind of 1995 car do you have that you are having trouble finding parts? I would think that you could keep just about any car of that vintage on the road for some time to come, unless you just had something completely oddball. For salvage parts, you can use car-part.com to find about anything you'd need, I would imagine. The reason I ask is that I've had some weird and or rare cars in my time, and you can always find parts, especially online. If you can find parts for a 1981 Peugeot 504 diesel wagon, you should be able to find parts for just about anything built in 1995.

By the way, an interesting chart on gas prices adjusted for inflation.

http://www.fintrend.com/inflation/images/charts/oil/gasoline_inflation_chart.htm

Considering how much oil we've pumped out of the ground and used since 1981 (or the 1930s), to be paying roughly the same today in real terms is absolutely amazing.

We think we've found a part and it is being mailed to us. It came from a junk yard in another state. That is fine if you have alternate transport. But, if a person travels or needs reliable daily transport parts have to be readily available. That means being in the usual parts store chain.

Actually, as I posted earlier according to BLS we are paying just a few cents per gallon more for gas now than back in 1973 (I just picked that date because I remember gas prices then). So, to me, also as I've stated before, focusing on gas prices is a mistake. Look at the total cost picture and all the other things that impact our lives. Actually, for me and I suspect for most others, even at today's prices gas is the cheapest part about owning a vehicle.