I remember working at the gas station in my area in 1972 gas was 35 cents a gallon. Check out these stat's http://www.energy.ca.gov/gasoline/statistics/gasoline_cpi_adjusted.html
If any of you are old enough to remember Ronald Reagan was the cause of gas prices climbing. He was the person who de-regulated gas! Before that time gas was like any other utility such as Elect., natural gas, phone etc. The oil companies had to prove to the government why they needed to raise their price and then they were only allowed to raise a small percentage. Once de-regulated they can do what they want. That is why EXXON reported 350 billion 100 million dollar profits earnings last year!!
Write to your congress person demanding that gas be regulated again. We can not live without gas as we have been made dependent upon it. So the government needs to regulate it. But unles people complain to the representives nothing will get done. We will all just sit around talking about how it used to be!!!!