Joe Biden lies about gas prices, claiming they fell after he took office

Joe Biden lies about gas prices, claiming they fell after he took office

Today, Joe Biden said, “The most common price of gas in America is $3.39. Down from over $5 when I took office.” The average price of gas when Joe Biden took office was actually $2.39. Moreover, the average price of gas today is $3.76, not $3.39.

Biden also claimed that the “price of inflation is down.” In reality, “The annual inflation rate for the United States is 8.2% for the 12 months ended September 2022 after rising 8.3% previously, according to U.S. Labor Department data published Oct. 13.” Prices have gone up at least 12% during Biden’s presidency, with the the Consumer Price Index rising from 261.52 when Biden took office to 296.171 by last month.

Some things are down under Biden, like the stock market. The S&P 500 index, the stock index covering the broadest cross-section of the economy, is down from 3852 when Biden took office, to 3807 today — and that’s before taking into account the 12% in inflation that has occurred during the Biden presidency. After adjusting for inflation, the S&P 500 is down over 13%. The stock index with the largest number of companies — the NASDAQ index, which includes 3700 companies — has fallen from 13,197 to 10,793. That’s a fall of more than 18%. Factoring in inflation, the NASDAQ is down 28%.

Some stock prices fell like a stone today. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, lost nearly a quarter of its value today. Shares of Amazon fell more than 12% this evening in after-hours trading.

It’s not just stocks that are losing value. So are bonds. High inflation is making them worth less. Interest rates on municipal bonds are often under 3%, much lower than the current inflation rate of over 8 percent.

Since people’s retirement accounts usually contain stocks, bonds, or stock mutual funds, dropping stock and bond values have left many Americans’ 401(k)s and retirement accounts smaller in real terms than when Biden took office.

While prices are going up, people’s savings are shrinking. Most people’s savings accounts are earning interest rates of less than 1%, which fails to keep pace with an inflation rate of over 8%. Effectively, people’s savings accounts are losing over 7% of their value each year.

Biden’s policies caused inflation, according to economists like Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary, Larry Summers, and Obama advisor Steven Rattner. As Rattner noted in the New York Times, Biden has spent “an unprecedented amount” of taxpayer money, which resulted in “too much money chasing too few goods.” Jason Furman, chairman of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, called Biden’s spending “reckless” and said it was fueling an “inflationary fire that is already burning.”

Home sales have been falling for months. Car sales have declined steeply since May 2021. But not gas prices. Gas prices are still way up over where they were when Biden took office.

Biden made gas prices rise faster by curbing oil production, making oil more scarce. On taking office, Biden issued a slew of executive actions suspending oil and gas leases.

As the Heritage Foundation observes, Biden earlier took many steps to reduce the supply of oil and gas, which will keep energy prices high and harm industries that rely on inexpensive energy:

At first, Mr. Biden patted himself on the back for his plans to restrict oil and natural gas-based energy. Now that gasoline prices are really taking off, however, he denies that he has slowed domestic oil drilling.

But he has…..On Mr. Biden’s first day in office, he issued an executive order directing the Secretary of the Interior to put a …. moratorium on the Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Leasing Program. That program directs the Bureau of Land Management to lease certain lands in Alaska for oil and gas extraction.

A few days later, he issued another order “pausing” oil and gas leases on all public lands and waters.

According to the Bureau, Alaska’s Coastal Plain is “some of the most highly prospective land on Alaska’s North Slope.” It contains billions of barrels of oil and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas. It is a king’s ransom of energy wealth, and the law requires that the administration make it available for extraction….The result: Mr. Biden has unlawfully trapped much of America’s vast energy reserves behind a wall of bureaucratic red tape, leaving them unavailable now that the country needs them.

Hans Bader

Hans Bader

Hans Bader practices law in Washington, D.C. After studying economics and history at the University of Virginia and law at Harvard, he practiced civil-rights, international-trade, and constitutional law. He also once worked in the Education Department. Hans writes for CNSNews.com and has appeared on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal.” Contact him at hfb138@yahoo.com

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