Letters to the Editor: Gas is more expensive because it should be. Deal with it and drive a smaller car

To the editor: Your article on the “mystery” of gas price variations within California and throughout the country compares the cost of filling a tank in Los Angeles to filling a tank in Yuba County.

I am no fan of price fixing, but some of the reasons for price differentials seem all too obvious. Yuba County’s sales tax rate is at least 1.25 percentage points lower than the general rate in Los Angeles, and the cost of doing business in Yuba County is significantly lower, whether in the form of rents, services or labor.

Yuba County may not have six oil refineries like L.A. County, but it is not that far from the refineries near San Francisco.

As for branded versus unbranded gas stations, I pay significantly more for brand-name groceries than for the store label products. Drivers can avail themselves of non-branded gas but apparently have little desire to do so.

Drivers sensitive to the price of gas can purchase more fuel-efficient cars, forgoing the grossly oversized trucks and SUVs that seem to make up more and more of the vehicles on the road today.

George Jacobson, South Pasadena

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To the editor: There’s no mystery behind gas pricing. All one has to do is compare the prices of gas stations located at freeway offramps to those of stations of the same brand several blocks away.

It’s just greed and taking every opportunity to soak the customer who needs gas more urgently than the next driver.

Bill Waxman, Simi Valley

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To the editor: When the oil supply was threatened a few weeks ago, the price of gas immediately soared. Logic would then follow that now, with the price of oil plunging, gas prices should now fall rapidly over the next week.

Let’s watch.

Steven R. Odell, Huntington Beach