Fox News guest Grover Norquist: Record fall in gas prices is a bad thing
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From the August 10, 2022, edition of Fox News' America Reports
SANDRA SMITH (CO-ANCHOR): Let's bring in Grover Norquist now, president of – Grover, thank you for – you were one of the most renowned economists that we've ever talked to on this program. David Asman was very nervous about actually coming before you today. So he gave us his take last hour. Grover, you tell us, put the inflation in America chart up on the screen showing the eight and a half percent jump year over year in inflation, softer number than what was looking for. Some economists are looking at this chart and saying, you know, maybe these high prices are peaking out here. Maybe this is the end of this sky high inflation. Are you seeing any signs of that? Because even the Dow Jones Industrial Average right now, it's been up by 500 points today because there's some optimism out there that maybe inflation is peaking.
GROVER NORQUIST (GUEST): Okay. We ask yourself why. There are lots of things in inflation. Food is up. Rent is up. Real wages are down. What did sort of plateau or go down a bit was the price of gasoline. Why? Because 1.2 million barrels of oil a day less compared to last year. People are driving less, traveling less. That's not good news. That's bad news. People can't afford to. So they're doing less of it. And the demand for gasoline is down. This is the worst – the lowest level of gasoline consumption since the bottom of the pandemic back in 2020. So unless we want to go to traveling as much as we did in August during the pandemic, this is not a number that stays there. That's – it is down because people are driving less. They're driving last, one presumes, because prices are so high and they're not sure they can afford it. That is a reaction to the inflation. This is not something that is – this is not good news. This is bad news.
SMITH: Okay. You know, some will say we'll take well, we'll take it. This drop in gas prices, you can put that up on the screen. The national average, as you can see, it has been dipping. But you are making the same case that David Asman made last hour, that this is demand destruction. This is it. This isn't a sign that we're getting a hold of the problem and beefing up supply to bring down prices. This is people driving less and demand is going down because people are having to spend their dollars elsewhere. Groceries, rent, prices are going up.