Wednesday, March 18, 1998

Cheap gas brings spring joy to nation

By JAY AMBROSE

Scripps Howard News Service

Americans, now enjoying just about the cheapest gasoline in the country's history, at least when calculated in inflation-adjusted dollars, should thank more than their lucky stars. They should thank the Asian financial crisis, first and foremost, and also El Niño, whose misdeeds this year have been accompanied by a good one, mild winter weather in much of America.

Asia's economic problems, which may yet spur U.S. problems, have been a blessing on the energy front.

Because Asia has less to spend, it is demanding less gas, causing suppliers to reduce their prices everywhere in the world.

That circumstance has happened to coincide with another, a spring-like winter for many weeks in large stretches of the nation. Refiners here have had less reason than usual to refine fuel oil, leading them to refine more gasoline instead. The result has been large gas inventories, helping bring gas to less than a dollar a gallon at tens of thousands of pumps all over the country.

The beneficiaries are motorists, of course, but also the economy, which has been doing splendidly as is and now has that much more relief from inflation. Businesses that particularly rely on gasoline can particularly rejoice.

One warning has been that, if energy companies get badly wounded, other industrial sectors could eventually feel the pain, although there seems little reason to worry about the immediate future.

Despite all this good news, there has been some hand-wringing, chiefly from those fearful that cheap gas means more consumption and, thus, more pollution. The truth is, the environmentalists, to their great credit, have basically won their way already. America has made extraordinary progress on cleaning up auto emissions and also the air.

The best advice is not to worry, but to be grateful for the silver linings even in such ominous clouds as a monetary collapse in Asia and a mischievous ocean current.