You have to view the whole gas expenditure as a fraction of your income. back home, I used to pay a significant fraction of my monthly income towards petrol (gas). And I used to be traveling much less. I am sure that is what everyone outside America does. I don't mean oil supplying nations. But America, in spite of fulfilling quite a bit of its oil need by the way of importing, had oil prices artificially low, like Enzo said. That is why there seems to be so much hue and cry over oil prices now.