Bet that gas price law seems stupid now!

KSTP.com - Gas hits $4 a gallon mark:

"Crude oil prices dropped a bit Monday, after leaping to a one-day record of almost $11 per barrel on Friday. Prices at the pump are expected to keep climbing through the summer and the American Automobile Association said the average price of regular gas has now reached $4 a gallon for the first time."

MN has a law that puts a floor on how much places can charge for gasoline ... yes a floor not a ceiling. They can charge whatever mark up they want, but they have to keep it over 2% of what they paid for it....so don't ever expect a sale on gas in MN.

The law was set as a good intention - it was to prevent big company stations (such as SuperAmerica or Holiday) from putting their prices so low that they would drive out the 'mom & pop' stations .... only people have been finding that it has actually killed the 'little guy' because everyone still got the better deal from the big guys.

So prices have gone down per barrel -- then why the heck did gas prices go up 20cents from just yesterday??? I know it doesn't seem like much, but we buy $100 gas gift cards from our church (who gets a donation back) and it used to be good for a couple of fill ups. We have a 27 gallon tank .... we can't even fill the tank on that $100 anymore.

Normally we go to the cabin every weekend in the summer, but we have actually wound up going every other weekend so far due to scouting events. But, that may have to get set aside as well because of these prices.

If we go up then we will have to fill the tank twice a week -- that's $800/month just for gas!!!

I seem to recall when I was growing up my dad saving all his reciepts for gas and using them on his taxes .... I'm not sure if that was because he was taking it as a business expense as a salesman or if he was getting a tax break from the state.

I know that there was a time when you could get sales tax back on your tax returns but they took that away in the 80's when they realized how much money they were giving back.

Yes ... the state actually gave money BACK.