Higher oil prices biting (In the US)

I read an interesting report recently that looked at the impact rising oil prices has had on the consumers in America.

One interesting piece of information was miles driven. The US Department of Transportation keeps statistics on miles driven and over the 25-year history of this data series, miles driven has increased. In 2007 miles driven fell for the first time in the 25-year history of the survey.

Recent information shows that SUV sales have plunged over the past few months, falling something like 24% year-on-year. Whilst bigger vehicles are not going away their resale price is being recapitalised lower to reflect higher fuel prices.

I suspect we will see the same trend develop here, and in fact it has been reported that traffic on the roads during the long week-end just passed was less than ‘normal’.