more on that, but first, the reverberations to your corner gas station. you probably know gas prices are up. you may be surprised by how much. three weeks ago we were paying $3.18 a gallon, today the national average is $3.51 a gallon. the second biggest price jump ever. higher prices are on the way. christine romans is part of the cnn money team. good morning to you. good morning, randi. this is not just the uncertainty in libya, but the uncertainty in the entire region? that is right. an a global economy that is recovering. the world s factories have been revving up and people are consuming more oil. the demand wasn t up in the u.s. it was up elsewhere. when you look at gas prices in the u.s., two week, really an
prices in the nation averaging $3.89. montana has the lowest at $3.18. defense secretary robert gates visiting afghanistan today. he arrived this morning and was greeted by moeshg s top commander there, general david petraeus. addressing the troops, gates became a bit emotional. you all keep me up at night. i think a lot about the people out here and what you re having to put up with and the conditions you live in and the sacrifices you make. gates also met with hamid karzai. he apologized again for civilian casualties. karzai says he accepts the apology after previously stating an apology wasn t going to be enough. hundreds of people attended the funeral of wes leonard, the high school basketball player who died shortly after scoring the winning basket last week.
billings, montana, the best deal in the country, on average $3.18. you cannot talk about gas without this, without talking about oil. i ve hauled out my barrel for two at the top. today 42 gallons of west texas intermediate, which is the crude oil that we buy is selling for more than $100. you can see over the course of the last month or so the increase in the price of oil. it s gone up more than 19% in one month. there s no particular mathing ick to understanding oil prices. thef go up for two reasons demand and speculation. the entire world produces about 84 million barrels of oil per day. guess what? we use all of it. here in the united states, in fact, we re only 5% of the population of the world lives we use 25% of the oil that the world produces every day. in fact, 10% of that 84 million barrels that the world produces and uses every day, 10% of the oil consumed in the world, is
nation s capital, 8:30 in madison, wisconsin. more demonstrations expected over the budget plan. governor scott walker wants to remove most collective bargaining rights for public workers. our correspondent in madison says some teachers will be going back to work. if you filled your car up in the last few days you know the price for a gallon of gas has risen five corrects. nationwide the average price for regular is now $3.18. up 55 cents from more than a year ago. british prime minister david cameron arrived in egypt for talks with the interim leaders. the egyptian military has been in charge since president hosni mubarak was forced to resign february 11. it is the first visit of the head of state to egypt since mubarak s departure.
largest oil reserves in the world. cnn s lisa sylvester is joining us once again. the fuel prices are already going up, lisa. could the libyan situation make matters so much worse? reporter: it absolutely could. you know, consider this, wolf. crude oil futures are up more than $5 a barrel today, and this is the largest one-day rise in two years. talk about feeling the pinch at the pump. gas prices have jumped a whopping 49 cents a gallon since september. that s tough for those logging time on the road. it s a 30-gallon tank, so at $3 a gallon, that s $90. i m worried about it because the economy is not doing too good. a lot of people struggling reporter: average price for a gallon of gasoline in the united states is $3.18, according to the lundberg survey. in san francisco, gas is $3.54 a gallon. st. louis, $2.99, atlanta, $3.11