It’s never been more expensive in the U.S. to fill up the tank and take one last summer trip over the Labor Day weekend.
The average price of regular gas was $4.14 a gallon heading into the holiday and a penny higher on Labor Day itself, nearly a dollar higher than last year and well above the Labor Day weekend record of $3.82 from 2012, according to the AAA motor club.
Gas prices have never topped $4 per gallon on Labor Day, AAA noted. The national average for regular gas prices is still well below the record of $5.02 a gallon set in June 2022.
At the same time, diesel hit a national average of $5.85 a gallon on Friday, a record, then was another nickel higher on Monday, AAA reported.
Trucks and other freight delivery systems use a lot of diesel, and that increased transportation cost is being passed on to consumers, whether at the grocery store or through package delivery services.
Prices shot up after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran in February and haven’t settled down since. Crude oil traffic through the key Strait of Hormuz has plunged, and Iran has refused to reopen the waterway.
“Everything points to the Iran War and the Strait of Hormuz,” said Tom Seng, a professor of energy finance at Texas Christian University.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright offered few specifics on when the nation’s drivers might see relief at the gas pump, acknowledging that prices are higher now than Labor Day 2025.
“Yes, they’re higher today, but we’re doing everything we can to push them down,” Wright said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.”
Gas prices typically drop as the summer driving season ends and refineries turn to making a less expensive winter blend.
But Seng said there are other factors this year even beyond the volatile situation in the Middle East that make future prices unpredictable. U.S. refineries are working at 98% capacity, many in the unusually harsh Texas heat. If there are problems there or a hurricane knocks some systems offline, prices will struggle to drop.
And it’s not just a Middle East problem. Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian refineries are squeezing diesel supplies. Chinese refiners are seeing declining outputs as well, said Matthew Metzgar, a clinical professor of economics at UNC Charlotte.
“There’s just less gasoline coming out of those refineries,” Metzgar said.
Wright, the energy secretary, said the Trump administration was taking steps to increase production and that the markets forecast lower prices in coming months.
“If you look at the futures prices, if you wanted to buy today in bulk gasoline for two months out in November, it’s about 35 cents cheaper than it is today. So the marketplace thinks gasoline prices are going to move meaningfully lower,” he said.
Geopolitically, though, there is little a driver can do to lower gas prices.
Still, using price apps can help save a little money, especially on long trips where gas by the interstate could be 10 to 15 cents per gallon more expensive than at stations a short drive down the road, Metzgar said.
Although inflation has cooled from its post-pandemic highs, high fuel costs are squeezing consumers and businesses alike. Since the start of the Iran war, higher gas and diesel prices have cost Americans more than $741 per household, according to a tracker from Brown University.
