It Took Over 1,300 Days for the National Average to Drop Below $3

Missoula, MT (KGVO-AM News) - Montana gasoline prices have dropped 18 out of the past 19 weeks. Patrick De Haan is the head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy and he provided the current numbers.

“Average gasoline prices in Montana have fallen 6.3 cents per gallon in the last week, averaging $2.84 per gallon today,” De Haan said. “Prices in Montana are 21.1 cents per gallon lower than a month ago and stand 18.8 cents per gallon lower than a year ago.”

As of Tuesday morning, many stations in Missoula had their prices set to around $2.79 per gallon.

According to GasBuddy price reports, the cheapest station in Montana was priced at $2.66 per gallon yesterday while the most expensive was $3.39 per gallon.

Montana is currently ranked 34th in the U.S. when it comes to the average price of gas, which is two spots lower than last week.

“The national average price of gasoline has fallen 3.1 cents per gallon in the last week, averaging $2.97 per gallon today,” De Haan said. “The national average is down 8.7 cents per gallon from a month ago and stands 17.7 cents per gallon lower than a year ago. The national average price of diesel has declined 2.3 cents in the last week and stands at $3.491 per gallon.”

The national average has finally fallen below $3 per gallon, and De Haan said it couldn't come at a better time for motorists with the holidays upon us.

“One would need to count over 1,300 days since we've seen the national average this low, with the affordability of gasoline at its lowest non-COVID level since 2015," said Patrick De Haan. "With average gas prices in 35 states and nearly 110,000 stations below $3 per gallon, Americans are putting in just 5.44 minutes of work to buy a gallon, the fewest minutes of work needed (excluding the pandemic) since 2015, when Americans needed to do just 5.25 minutes of work to buy a gallon."

De Haan said we'll likely continue to see additional downward pressure on gas prices, with the national average potentially falling another 10 to 15 cents by Christmas.

LOOK: See how much gasoline cost the year you started driving

To find out more about how has the price of gas changed throughout the years, Stacker ran the numbers on the cost of a gallon of gasoline for each of the last 84 years. Using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (released in April 2020), we analyzed the average price for a gallon of unleaded regular gasoline from 1976 to 2020 along with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for unleaded regular gasoline from 1937 to 1976, including the absolute and inflation-adjusted prices for each year.

Read on to explore the cost of gas over time and rediscover just how much a gallon was when you first started driving.

Gallery Credit: Sophia Crisafulli