Falling US Demand for Oil

Bloomberg.com: U.S. Retail Gasoline Falls to $3.85 a Gallon. From the article:

"Gasoline prices retreated along with inventories, which have fallen 3.6 percent since July 18 to 209.2 million barrels, the Energy Department said August 6."

"U.S. gasoline demand fell a 15th consecutive week, as motorists cope with high fuel prices by driving less..."

Congratulations, America. You have done it -- you've managed to drive down prices by driving less. Now that the prices have reached a more reasonable level, you may resume wasting gas again.


On a related note, there are more and more articles being written now about the demographic inversion of American cities [poligazette.com] -- the more affluent parts of society used to move as far away from cities as possible, but in some cities, the general trend is for them to move back in (gentrification). Is this a real movement, or are we just setting ourselves up for another housing boom/bust cycle?

And on another related note, prices for new and used SUVs have been decimated, because no one wants to buy them [nytimes.com].

Image of traffic from respres' Flickr photostream [flickr.com].