Reality Index
Reality Index

Energy · Single item chart

Gasoline.

Regular unleaded · per gallon · US average retail · all available data

A gallon of gasoline vs. official inflation, 1940–2025
Indexed: 1950 = 100 · What consumers actually paid (retail) compared to overall CPI-U All Items
Gasoline, retail price (EIA 1950–2023; BLS Average Price 2024–2025) CPI-U All Items (BLS, 1947+)

Reading the chart. The retail dollar series is from the EIA Monthly Energy Review Table 9.4 (1950–2023), extended through 2025 with BLS Average Price data (APU000074714) to match the Reality Index transport bucket — the 1980→2025 segment lands at 2.62×. The CPI subindex has gaps in the early 1950s and mid-1960s where BLS did not publish the series consistently.