I just filled up my tank this morning and it didn't even cost $40! Sad to think I'm this excited about $1.99 a gallon when just five short years ago $1.50 a gallon was considered high.
I negotiated a contract for courier service six or seven years ago that included a fuel surcharge if the price of gasoline rose above $1.60 a gallon. At the time, gas was already $1.40 a gallon and it was taking a huge bite out of the driver's earnings. We believed $1.60 a gallon would make the work unprofitable for the drivers and would cause our business to go under. As you know, prices did hit that $1.60 benchmark.
I left that company in the fall of 2003. I have no idea what changes have taken place since, but they are still in business. Fuel surcharges could not have continued forever. They were probably forced to raise prices, passing the cost of higher gasoline on to their customers. Without some sort of solution, the drivers would have quit or starved because these weren't well-paid people to begin with.
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