The war in Iran is hammering Americans’ wallets at the gas pump and beyond as cities across the country feel the impact of what’s happening thousands of miles away in the Middle East.
Iran has all but shut down shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a vital maritime passage that typically sees around 20 percent of the world’s oil supply pass through it annually. With the Strait choked off, soaring oil prices have led to U.S. gas prices jumping 92 cents from one month ago, according to auto club AAA.
Four of the country’s five biggest cities have been hit harder than the national average over the past month:
- New York City: Up 82 cents per gallon
- Los Angeles/Long Beach: Up $1.09 per gallon
- Chicago metro area: Up $1.09 per gallon
- Houston: Up $1.04 per gallon
- Phoenix: Up $1.33 per gallon
Smaller cities are feeling the petroleum pinch, too. In Oklahoma, where gas is typically the cheapest in the nation, prices have increased 95 cents since the start of the war. Oklahoma City, the state’s biggest city, has seen its prices rise $1.02 from $2.23 a month ago to $3.25 on Thursday.
Oklahoma resident Jayden Parker expressed frustration over gas prices during an interview with Oklahoma City’s KOCO News 5 this past week.
“You can see here I’m paying $40 for half a tank,” Parker said. “I do about 1,000 miles a week, so I have certainly noticed that $3.29. I am pretty sure, like a month ago, [it] was like $2.09. Certainly, it makes you not want to go out anywhere. It makes you not want to work as much, but you’ve got to work to make money to pay for the gas.”
In Louisville, Kentucky, where gas costs an average of $1.15 more than it did a month ago, ElderServe, a local nonprofit that offers medical transportation for and meal deliveries to seniors, is dealing with the fallout of increased driving costs due to fuel prices.
“Any sort of change or spike in gas prices has a dramatic effect on our budget,” ElderServe CEO Timothy Findley told Louisville’s KOCO News 5 on Wednesday. “And of course, when our budget – which is already sort of that shoestring budget – comes under that level of pressure, we have to make changes, make cuts.”
A Pennsylvania resident who voted for Trump three times went as far as calling him a “worthless piece of s***” during an interview with NBC reporter Jon Allen on Tuesday.
The war’s impact reaches beyond gas prices, too. Grocery prices could increase in the coming months as farmers face fertilizer prices that are 40 percent higher year-on-year due to supply-chain slowdowns linked to the Strait of Hormuz.
America’s growing cost-of-living crisis stands in stark contrast to the Trump Administration’s claims in February that it “won” affordability. Comments from Vice President J.D. Vance on Wednesday seemed to contradict those claims, saying consumers are in for a “rough road ahead.”
Economic shockwaves pulsating from the Middle East have Americans frustrated about more than gas prices.
Some 67 percent of Americans disapprove of how Trump is handling cost of living, and 61 percent disapprove of how he’s handling the economy, according to a poll of 1,669 U.S. adults by Yahoo and polling firm YouGov.
Those frustrations could spell doom for the Republican Party in November’s midterm elections. More Americans believe Democrats would do a better job of handling cost of living compared to Republicans, a critical sentiment considering Americans listed cost of living as the most important issue when thinking about this year’s midterms, the Yahoo/YouGov poll revealed.
