Laughably – Biden Says Gas Companies Are Overcharging Americans at the Pump
CLAIM: Joe Biden on Tuesday claimed, without evidence, that gas companies are overcharging Americans at the pump by not passing on cost savings from lower wholesale gas prices to prices at the pump.
VERDICT: False.
Gas prices are not abnormally high relative to either wholesale gasoline prices or crude oil prices. In fact, the ratios of wholesale gas prices to retail prices and that crude oil to retail gas prices are both currently below their ten-year averages. That indicates that consumers at the gas pump are paying around what would be expected given the price of oil or the wholesale price of gasoline.
On Tuesday, the White House announced that the U.S. would release 50 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in an ploy to bring down the price of gas. The immediate market response was a jump in the price of gas by 3.3 percent to over $82 a barrel.
Biden also claimed, falsely, that Americans were being overcharged by gasoline companies that were not passing on cheaper wholesale prices.