Summer Gas Prices Lower & Diesel Goes Up

Summer Gas Prices Lower & Diesel Goes Up plus Food Forethought. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report. Diesel fuel is costing farmers more right now and prices could climb a bit more this year. Neil Gampson an economist with the Energy Information Administration. GAMPSON: We do have diesel prices up. Diesel prices last year were $2.46 per gallon, this year we're saying that diesel prices will be $3.05 per gallon on average so that's about a 50-cent per gallon increase year over year. But even though the old saying that diesel will follow gasoline may be wrong this year. Gas prices are poised to fall as Memorial Day approaches, a welcome change for motorists who have gotten used to seeing increases cut into their summer vacation money. Experts who had been predicting a national average of more than $3 per gallon by Memorial Day now say prices have likely peaked just beneath that threshold. Rising supplies and concerns about the global economy have helped send wholesale gasoline prices plummeting by 25 cents a gallon since last week and one expert says that gasoline supplies are about as good as they've ever been going into the summer driving season. By summer, the nationwide average could be below last summer's peak of around $2.70 a gallon. Economists say the coming drop in energy costs will not have a significant impact on overall consumer spending or economic growth. Now with today's Food Forethought, here's Lacy Gray. It reads like a bad practical joke. Bad as it was, a joke it wasn't, when an elementary school principal in Texas decided to give a week's detention to a third grader last week for possessing the most notorious and dangerous of items, a Jolly Rancher, a piece of candy. In his defense the principal claims he was merely following state law that restricts junk food in schools. You're right, that is no defense for something as ludicrous as this. One would like to think that the state law was not intended to be used in such a way and that those in the position to enforce the law would have a better handle on what constitutes fair disciplinary action. But this is what can happen when state and federal laws are issued to control what Americans put in their mouths. Too little, too late, because the third grader had already served her time, the Texas Agriculture Department informed the school that the "crime" of possessing one piece of candy "would not be considered a violation of the state or federal nutrition program." With food activists from California to New York pushing for federal regulating of what we as consumers eat this may have just given us a peek into our not so distant and unpleasant future. Thanks Lacy. That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.