Recently, the GOOD website printed up GOOD Sheet #4, a nice graph of where the money given to gas stations goes. (GOOD defies description, but it's pretty good. Check it out.) Hard-copies of the sheet are available at Starbucks, but interested viewers can find an online copy here.

It's worth checking out: in a clear, easy-to-read manner, GOOD shows how the profit on gas is distributed and outlines the major factors that drive price. What it doesn't cover, however, is the ways that oil-producing companies actually use this money. Unfortunately, this is also the most important aspect of the oil market.

Oil is, perhaps, the most effective tool for wealth consolidation in the history of the world. Whether through technological innovation, conflict, or the luck of the draw, certain areas and people have ended up with large amounts of crude petroleum at their disposal.

When they were first introduced, the only hybrid cars on the market were Toyotas and Hondas -- small, practical cars that were admittedly a little funny-looking. These vehicles were much more about economy than style. Luxury automakers were slow to jump on the hybrid bandwagon, as their target customers have not generally been too concerned with the cost of fuel.

Times have changed, though, and rising fuel costs are affecting even the wealthiest sectors of the population. Environmental concerns are growing, too, and hybrid cars are in very high demand. In June 2009, Mercedes will begin selling its first hybrid -- a large car that balances fuel economy with sexiness.

At 30 miles per gallon, the new model will approximately double the mileage of the non-hybrid luxury S-class sedan, but it's still no 60mpg Prius. Mercedes execs argue that this large car is more practical for their customers, with plenty of space to pack for vacations. There's no official price tag just yet, but Mercedes Marketing Director Klaus Maier estimates a premium of less than €10,000, or $14,000. That would put the total price in the neighborhood of $100,000 - $160,000, depending on options.

Despite the massive force that was Gustav, New Orleans avoided the brunt much better than expected, which is good news for the economy. Well, better news, anyway. Storms of this size by definition have an impact on the economy.

Even though damages to homes, infrastructure and energy production won't be known until later this week, several sources have already shifted their economic forecasts toward the positive.

Consumers across the board will be glad to hear that natural gas futures have already dropped slightly, as well as gasoline prices and the cost for natural gas in the month of October.

Gas prices have been dropping lately, but nevertheless, the dollar amount at the pump is still...what's the word I'm looking for... oh, yes, insane. Evil is another good word.

So when the spokesperson for Pump and Save contacted me, vowing that its average user saves over $175 per year at the pump, I knew I'd be writing some sort of post for WalletPop. So here it is: Check out PumpandSave.com, a web site that offers numerous tips and tools on how to save gas -- like price-saving maps and gas usage calculators. But by far, its reason for being is that you can compare the best of the best of the cash-back and rewards-based gas cards.

If you're in the market for a gas card, this is a really sharp site. They have a lot of gas cards listed here, on the home page, so that you can compare one from the other, since not all rewards are created equally.

As I often note when mentioning one of these saving money sites, I'm not endorsing it. Beyond just looking around, I haven't used PumpandSave.com, and in fact, I don't even have a gas card and am not currently planning on getting one. But as an objective bystander, it looks interesting, and like it's worth spending some time on, especially if you've been considering getting a gas card, or if you are just really frazzled by the price at the pump and want some gas-saving ideas.

Geoff Williams is a freelance journalist, author and--not that anyone asked--the owner of a 1994 Saturn that fortunately has pretty decent gas mileage.

When I was learning how to drive, I was taught that air-conditioning was this enormous drag on gas mileage. I might as well be towing around an anvil behind the car. If I wanted better gas mileage I had to use the wind from the window.

Now it turns out that's not quite right. An air conditioner can up cut 2 mpg, according to American Petroleum Institute. But that's not nearly as much as the drag from your window will cut it. You're better off putting on the air at highway speeds, says the American Aftermarket Suppliers Association. According the the AAA, keeping windows closed at highway speeds can cut your fuel usage by 10%. But in stop and go traffic, you should keep your windows down and the air off.

Not everyone completely agrees. Edmunds did a study and found that on at least one pick-up, the Toyota Tundra, using the windows instead of the air improved gas mileage by nearly 10%. They chalked up the difference to the peculiarities of pick-up aerodynamics.

So, the old debate of windows or air can still be fought in car seats across the country. It sounds like the most economical solution is what people do just to enjoy the breeze but keep their hair from getting messed up: windows down at slow speeds, air conditioning on the highway.

We've all become a lot more interested in the secret science of what determines gas prices. The Cincinnati Enquirer just painstakingly analyzed price data from 716 gas stations in May and June using the Oil Price Information Service. Their most peculiar and potentially useful finding was that gas is cheapest on Tuesdays.

Over the whole period among all those stations, gas was an average three cents a gallon cheaper on Tuesdays than Wednesdays, and once it jumped 16 cents overnight. The Enquirer found that Wednesday was the day stations raised prices for the upcoming weekend, and that they lowered it just after the weekend.

The Enquirer says gas mavens have known this all along, though it was certainly news to me. If gas stations are expecting to even out their demand with pricing, will it work if people don't understand the weekly cycle? The story says: "Experts say gas always has been cheapest midweek, when demand is lowest. But the exact cheapest day is likely to change at any moment, without notice...." So, if we all start buying on Tuesdays, the cheapest day will move.

Also read

States with the best deal on gas

Tech help finding the best gas deals

Even though Fuelly seems to have too many vowels to be a web 2.0 application it has hit the ground running and provides users with a cool new way to track fuel usage. I had previously written about Fuel Frog, which lets you track your gas usage online at each fill up and it does a great job, but Fuelly really raised the bar. Fuelly has added a social aspect to tracking gas mileage by letting you compare your MPG with others driving your car and also with your friends and family to see who is getting the best mileage.

If you can get your friends to start using Fuelly then you'll have more of an incentive to track your gas mileage and be fuel efficient since we all seem to enjoy a little competition. You may find out some interesting stats about your friend's fuel usage while using Fuelly. While I have a fuel efficient car, I tend to drive like I'm trying to put out a fire somewhere while my friends with bigger vehicles are known to drive more like a 90 year old out for a Sunday drive. I can't wait to see who is getting more for their money.

I'm going to take Fuelly for a spin today when I fill up my car, I have fallen behind in my usage of Fuel Frog partly because I am lazy and partly because I couldn't remember the format for tracking it by text message. The competitive angle of Fuelly may be just what I need to stick with tracking my fuel cost and usage better and figuring out how to best budget for my gas needs. No matter how you track your gas consumption doing so is an easy way to empower yourself to watch your finances.



Hat tip to Lifehacker.

Over the past four years, the price of gas has almost tripled and, even if hybrids and fuel cells and ethanol all accelerate their production and begin bearing fruit, worldwide demand will probably keep the cost of gas at somewhere near its current price. At least, that's the concept behind MyGallons.com and GasBankUSA, two companies that allow members to lock in today's gas prices for future fill ups.

Basically, it works like this: MyGallons and GasBank both charge customers a yearly membership fee. At MyGallons, it ranges between $29.95 and $39.95, while GasBank charges $19.95. Members can then purchase gas at the current rate. Their gallons are recorded on a debit card, and they can withdraw gas from their accounts at a later date. Of the two, GasBank is a better bet right now, as MyGallons has yet to set up a national network for its card.

This system has a few dangers: if gas prices drop, as they're likely to do when the summer gas spike is over, then customers will be stuck with a card full of $4.20 per gallon gas. On the other hand, filling up a prepaid card in February might be a pretty good idea, as it could help consumers lock in their summer vacation gas at cheaper winter prices. Similarly, loading up before the Thanksgiving/Christmas rush might be wise.

Of course, in the long run, gas prices are likely to continue rising, so saving money by prepaying may just be a matter of taking a very long view. It's not too hard to imagine some kid finding Grandpa's old gas card twenty years in the future and using it to buy AT&T. In the meantime, it might be a good way to save some money on your weekly fill-ups!

Bruce Watson is a freelance writer, blogger, and all-around cheapskate. He's starting to seriously think about that gas card/AT&T takeover idea...

In the grand scheme of things, I have to admit that "Bruce" isn't a bad name. Although there were some unfortunate "Bruce the Moose" and "Goosey Brucie" moments in the schoolyard when I was a little kid, I feel like I got off relatively unscathed. Besides, even in my worst moments, I could take comfort in the fact that my father, Bruce W. Watson Sr., had managed to survive having the name for several decades.

Still, I can commiserate with the future "Dixon and Willoughby Partin." This as-yet-unborn infant will undoubtedly suffer a truly extraordinary amount of ribbing when it comes time for him to begin school. On the first day of class every year, as the teacher calls out the roll, she'll come to Dixon and Willoughby Parton and stare at the poor, blushing kid sitting in the third row as he tells her to call him "Bud."

At recess, the other kids will gather around and ask him how he got his bizarre moniker. Was he named for one of his dad's war buddies? Could his name have come from his grandfathers or a pair of uncles who died in driving accidents? Maybe he's named after an exotic handgun, the Dixon and Willoughby nine millimeter...

And poor Dixon and Willoughby, if he's an honest kid, will have to admit that his name came from a contest. He'll tell his classmates how his father called in to an Orlando radio program and offered to let the on-air personalities name his unborn child in return for a $100 gas card. The deejays, Dixon and Willoughby, recognizing a good deal, agreed, and the rest is history.

While this certainly beats turning tricks for gas, it's more than a little disturbing. Among the many questions that it raises, one will probably keep me up into the early hours, tossing and turning:

What rhymes with "Dixon and Willoughby"?

Bruce the Moose is a freelance writer, blogger, and all-around cheapskate. "Nixon and Billowy"? "Vixen and Pillowmeat"? "Blitzen and...

Often times getting the best deal on groceries involves making several trips to different stores in order to get the lowest prices on everything you need. However there is an easy way to avoid the hassle of going to multiple stores; price match your groceries! While many stores seem to have so many catches that the poster advertising price matches looks like someone's last will and testament, my local grocery stores will price match just about any item they have in stock. The deal gets even better when you factor in the gas and time savings that you gain from going to one store instead of four!

The simplest way to begin your price matching plan is to grab a copy of your local paper with the week's shopping circulars, be sure to grab the coupons while you're in there since you can tack those on after the Before you go through the trouble of arranging your price matching make sure the store you intend to go to does price match; in my area Wal-mart and Meijer both match local prices. Once you find out which store have the cheapest prices be sure to note the store and the amount on your shopping list. If you plan to price match numerous of items and don't want the clerk or your fellow shoppers to put a piece of celery in your back you should also mark the pages in the ads in order to speed up the whole process.

It's really that simple to save money on grocery shopping by price matching. The only real catch that you will run into is that you can't price match store brands. Depending on the store this may also include meat and produce departments since the price match is intended to offer the same price for the exact same item. Since we do most of our shopping based on what is on sale we don't do a whole lot of price matching but in my college days I didn't dare venture into a Wal-mart without an ad for Meijer!

In an effort to fund ever-increasing fiscal irresponsibility, the Florida Lottery announced that, in addition to the regular cash prizes, people who buy its "Summer Cash" tickets can also win one of 40 gas for-a-lifetime prize or 400 gas for-a-year prizes. The promotion started on June 30th and will continue through August 26th.

Seeing that this is a great way to increase sales, California State Senator Dean Flore, a Democrat, sent a letter to the California Lottery urging that the state run a similar marketing campaign. I'm tempted to send a letter to the Democratic Party demanding that it disown Flore, but that's another story.

Here's what's so messed up about the idea: it's designed to appeal to people desperately seeking relief from high gas prices and, mostly likely, that's not going to be the people earning $500,000 per year. Imagine the single mother who can barely afford to provide for her children stopping to fill up her tank on the way work: she's never bought a Lottery ticket in her life, but how could she help being lured in by the promise of free gas?

It's disgraceful that any state would exploit its most vulnerable citizens like this, especially in the name of education, which the lottery is used to fund. Students should be able to go to class without the knowledge that their history textbook was paid for with the blood of the desperate working-class.

If you drive, then chances are that you, like almost everybody else, have been looking for little techniques to reduce your gas consumption. In their quest to save money, airlines have begun doing the same. While tricks like charging for the first checked bag and hiring extra carry-on inspectors have captured the public's interest, a less-obvious technique is also paying major dividends: Planes are flying slower.

Recently, two European airlines, EasyJet Plc (Europe's second-largest discount airline) and BMI, have asked their pilots to fly slower to reduce gas intake. In the case of easyJet, this has come in the form of a missive asking for a 2% reduction in flying speeds, while BMI has asked for a 3 mph drop.

It's worth noting that both of these airlines are discount carriers. EasyJet, in fact, seems to be following the pay-as-you-go, charge a fee for everything model that American Airlines has been flirting with. In this context, it's easy to understand how the company might be searching for ways to eke out every single penny.

On this side of the Atlantic, several airlines, including Southwest, United, JetBlue, and Northwest have been experimenting with the technique, and have found that it can save hundreds of dollars per flight. Southwest, in fact, expects to save $42 million this year by flying just a little bit slower. While this extends the length of each flight, the difference is negligible, generally lasting only a few minutes.

Now if they could only find a way to transfer that savings back into free checked baggage!

Bruce Watson is a freelance writer, blogger, and all-around cheapskate. He recently opened his own airline. Although they have yet to fly a single plane, they've already cut costs by firing ten pilots and eliminating most of their flights!

When I started driving, my first car was a huge, mid-eighties station wagon. Although it contained a lot of steel (which my parents liked) and could carry a lot of my friends (which I liked), the behemoth also sucked down a lot of gas, which was sometimes hard to cover on the money that I made from my after school job. To combat the fuel drain, I quickly picked up a few tricks, like drafting and coasting.

Drafting was all well and good, but it tended to terrify the other drivers. My preferred money-saving method was coasting. Rather than use a lot of gas to speed up and then use my brake to slow down, I tried, as often as possible, to get gravity to do my work. In Northern Virginia, where I lived, this became pretty interesting, as there were a lot of small hills. However, by carefully calibrating my acceleration, I was able to use the natural topography to save fuel. My favorite route was through the middle of town, where two major highways met. There was a wide valley in the area and, if I could time the lights properly, I was able to go about a mile or so without hitting the gas. Of course, there were times when my refusal to hit the brakes was sorely tested, and I still have bad dreams about some of my close calls. On the other hand, I did eke out between 20 and 30 mpg in Northern Virginia city driving, which is damn near miraculous.

Recently, as the cost of gas has soared, my old tricks have really come back into fashion. Whereas I used to refer to my little gas-saving tricks as "driving like a stupid, cheap teenager," current practitioners prefer the snappier-sounding "hypermiling." Personally, I think hypermiling sounds like the way you drive when you've got a full bladder and the next rest stop is ten exits away, but I guess it conveys the supercool exxxtreme notion of intensely saving gas. At any rate, in addition to "drafting," which involves driving insanely close to the person in front of you, and "coasting," which involves never hitting the gas, hypermilers also superinflate their tires to reduce road resistance and some even turn off their engines while coasting, a process that they call "pulse and glide." By following these methods, they often eke out astounding mpgs from their cars, sometimes exceeding the actual sticker values that car lots advertise!

When I went to book a rental car for a family vacation up to the Adirondacks yesterday, I was surprised to find SUVs renting for less than small cars.

Last week ABC News had a story about how rental agencies were pressuring customers to take the SUVs off their lots. At an Avis in Manhattan, the midsize SUV is the cheapest vehicle available ($421 a week), followed by the standard SUV ($451), then the compact ($501). Oddly the biggest gas-guzzler, the full-sized SUV, is still the most expensive at $854 a week.

In other words, rental car prices have become even more irrational. That means if you're smart you may be able to get yourself a deal. I don't know the exact model they're offering (how many cylinders, etc.), but I could still take a guess at what the cost would be. A midsize SUV at Avis is the Pontiac Vibe, which according to carseek gets 26 mpg in the city and 33 mpg on the highway. That's pretty good mileage. The Vibe actually resembles your common station wagon. In fact, I bet Pontiac gets around to rebranding it that sometime soon.

The mid-sized SUV is a Chevy Trailblazer. We're moving into real SUV territory here. It only gets 16 mpg city / 22 mpg highway. The full-sized SUV is a GMC Acadia, which gets 17 mpg/city -- 26 mpg/highway.

Back to that compact car -- how does that do on gas? Avis uses a Chevy Cobalt. It only gets about 22/33. So, the Vibe SUV gets better mileage than the compact.

Inspired by two other Walletpop bloggers who wrote; Mad about gas prices? Light your car on fire! and Mad about gas prices? Go to a dunking booth, I thought I'd weigh in on the subject with my idea. If you're mad about gas prices, stop mowing your lawn!

Although your local municipality might take exception to your sparing the blade, in addition to making a passive gas pricing protest, not cutting your lawn could save you a bundle of money. Consumer Reports states that lawn maintenance costs about $700 per acre, per year. Your grass roots protest might put some green back in your pocket.

If sowing your seeds of discontent puts furrows into the brows of your neighbors, when your grass gets too long you could just get a goat. Although they smell bad, attract flies, and have little regard for what vegetation they eat or don't eat, I can tell you personally that goats manicure a lawn very nicely. The biggest problem with goats though, is that they tend to roam if not well fenced. Be prepared to replace your neighbor's rhododendrons often. Hence the reason our household is now goat-less.