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Rising Gas Prices Cutting into Spending, Survey Finds

June 2, 2006

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More than half of Americans are driving less and cutting back on household spending because of rising gasoline prices according to a new poll by Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut.

By a wide margin, people responding to the poll view rising gasoline prices as a serious problem and the blame big oil companies.

As a result of gas prices, 56 percent of people polled say they have cut back significantly on how much they drive.

Gas prices are affecting low-income Americans the most with 67 percent of those making less than $30,000 driving less while only 34 percent with annual household income of more than $100,000 report less driving.

The independent Quinnipiac University poll also finds that 50 percent of Americans say they have cut back on household spending because of gas prices.

In deciding who gets the blame for rising gas prices 90 percent of Americans give oil companies "a great deal" or "some" of the blame; 82 percent blame oil-producing countries; 69 percent blame normal supply and demand pressures; 64 percent blame President George W. Bush; 52 percent blame Americans who drive gas-guzzlers.

Rising gas prices are a "very serious" or "somewhat serious" problem, 72 percent of the people responding say, with 28 percent who say "not too serious" or "not a problem at all."

"In varying degrees, depending on whether you're rich or poor, a Democrat or a Republican, a man or a woman, black or white, Americans are feeling the pain of rising gas prices, with most of us cutting back on our driving and half of us pinching pennies to fill the tank," said Maurice Carroll, Director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

"There's plenty of blame to go around, but more Americans think the worst villains in the explosion of gas prices are the oil companies," Carroll said.

"The oil-producing countries, President Bush, people who drive gas-guzzlers -- we think they're all at fault. But two-thirds of us shrug our shoulders and turn armchair economist; we blame normal supply-and-demand."

The Quinnipiac poll found that 47 percent of Republicans and 60 percent of Democrats saying they are driving less; 52 percent of white voters, compared to 69 percent of black and Hispanic voters; and 62 percent of women, compared to 49 percent of men.

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