Catching a break? Missouri sees lowest gas prices around

Let’s all hold our breaths and see if this holds up through the holiday weekend. Gasoline prices continue to slide, and Missouri, at least by some estimates, has the lowest prices in the nation.

The national average has fallen to $3.70 a gallon, more than a dime higher than what we’ve been paying around here recently. (St. Louis, at $3.37, is the lowest of any big city in the country.)

Traditionally, gas prices tend to rise around summer holidays and then tail off after Labor Day. But a funny thing has happened this year. Drivers can do three fundamental things to affect the demand for gasoline: Drive less, slow down and trade in the gas guzzler for something more fuel efficient, drive less and slow down. Drivers are doing the first and third, and that’s helped reduce the overall demand for gasoline.

Big picture: Anything less than $4 feels pretty good, but three years ago this week – as Labor Day neared and Hurricane Katrina was churning across the Gulf of Mexico, shutting down oil production there – gasoline hit a record $2.65 a gallon. It then spiked past $3 in the weeks after the storm, and some experts warned even then that $4 gas was on the horizon. With ups and down, the price has marched steadily in that direction ever it since.

It’s now to the point that both major-party candidates for governor in Missouri say they support more drilling for oil in our state. Who ever figured Missouri as part of the oil patch? Well, if it’s out there, go for it. Maybe by the time they find it, gas will only have hit a modest $6.