Consider This from NPR - Oil Prices Are Up and American Workers Are Feeling the Pinch

Episode Date: March 26, 2026

Anytime tensions are high in the Middle East, oil prices can be expected to spike.  So a war in the region is pretty much guaranteed to mean higher prices at the pump. And that is particularly painful for anyone whose living depends on what it costs to fill up. Host Scott Detrow speaks with NPR’s economics correspondent Scott Horsley about how the U.S. economy is faring, almost a month since the U.S. and Israel launched the first strikes against Iran. Plus, we hear from American business owners whose companies are already being impacted by higher fuel prices – a long-haul trucker based in Ohio, and a pair of brothers who run a lobster distribution operation from Long Island, New York. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.  Email us at [e-mail]. This episode was produced by Mia Venkat, with audio engineering by Hannah Gluvna. It was edited by William Troop, Rafael Nam, and Maureen Pao. NPR correspondent Bill Chappell contributed to the reporting in this episode. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

I'm popping in the car starting up right now. Food delivery driver Lee Dahl gets his day started on Detroit's West Side. He opens up the Uber Eats app to an offer. $7 for a total of 12 miles and estimated 34 minutes. You really can't make that happen. So he turns it down. Then he gets another request, this time at a Popeyes that's nine miles away. I can make $16, do it in 35, 40 minutes.

I'm starting out of the gate good. Dahl uses a spreadsheet to meticulously track how much he makes delivering and how much he spends on gas. The math has been looking different recently due to the war the U.S. and Israel started against Iran. I'm really trying to keep my mileage down because a key metric for me having an older car is dollars per mile. One fifth of the world's oil supply used to move through the Strait of Hormuz. And now, because of the ongoing conflict, tanker traffic through the straight has come to a near standstill. And without that oil reaching the market, fuel costs are spiking everywhere, including for a gallon of gas where Dahl fills up. Everything's getting up around $4 in this particular area.

The cost adds up. Dahl has had to change his delivery strategy. He is getting pickier and pickier about the orders he takes. I will take shorter orders that don't pay as much. just take off the wear and tear and the gas. It may sound counterintuitive, and in the past for me, it was. I would take the best paying thing. Dahl is 65. He gets some income through Social Security,

but says he needs the food delivery money to supplement that. I'm working at a poverty level. I don't have leverage in terms of a different career. And last year, I put over $7,000 in repairs and maintenance into my vehicle. Consider this. Oil prices have shot up since the U.S. and Israel started a war in the Middle East. How are American workers and businesses being affected? From NPR, I'm Scott Detrow. It's Consider This from NPR. Oil prices rose again today as the U.S. war with Iran continues

to disrupt global energy supplies. The world benchmark for oil is trading above $100 a barrel and gasoline prices in the U.S. have jumped to an average of just under $4 a gallon. These are some of the most visible effects of the war so far. But there's likely to be broader economic fallout. In a moment, we will hear from some people whose jobs are already showing the strain of these higher fuel prices. First, though, we will get an overview from NPR's Scott Horsley. Mr. Horsley. Thanks for joining us. Good to be with you. Iran has allowed just a few vessels to transit the trade of her moves, but energy traffic in that area is just largely cut off. So what is that doing to prices? We've seen some big swings in prices over the last week as oil traders try to assess

how long this might go on. Prices fell early in the week after President Trump hinted at a possible settlement. But that relief turned out to be short-lived, and today oil prices are back up again, although not as high as they had been. Brent Crude, as you mentioned, is just over $100 a barrel. At the gas pump, prices have jumped about $1 a gallon since the war. began, diesel prices are up even more, about $1.60 a gallon, and all of this reflects a genuine supply crunch, not only for oil, but also for natural gas and fertilizer, as those shipments in the Middle East have really been disrupted by the war. And these are all things that factor into the prices of so many other things. Like, what's the best way to think about the broader impact of all

of this on the U.S. economy? Well, it's not good. The more money people have to spend on gas, the less they have to spend on everything else that they want to buy. And the rise in diesel prices is ultimately going to mean higher cost for everything that has to be trucked around the country or travels by train, which is pretty much everything. Even before the war started, inflation had been inching up and economic growth had been slowing down and the war is likely to make both those headwinds worse. How much is hard to say. As Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said last week, nobody knows. A lot is going to depend on how long this goes on. But the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development projects this will push U.S. inflation.

back above 4% this year, not nearly as high as we saw in 2022, but not the direction anyone wants to see at a time when people are already frustrated about the cost of living. You know, wartime inflation will make it harder for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates. And Freddie Max said today, mortgage rates, which had briefly dipped below 6% are now back up around 6.4%. So that's not going to help with the sluggish housing market. So that is the big picture economic view. And Scott, I want you to stick with me for a few minutes because I want to hear how this is playing out throughout the economy, how it's affecting people's jobs. And I want to start with the view of someone who is watching this from the

wheel of a tractor trailer. Owning a truck, fuel is your biggest cost. It was pretty much a sicker shock when you were paying $3.89 a gallon or whatever, and you come out a weekend later, and it's almost $5. Trucking at the penny business. My dad taught me that, he said, you take care of the penny, son. The dollars would take care of themselves. That's Monty Weiderhold, who owns a small truck fleet in Ohio called B. L. Reaver Transport. He's been trucking for almost 50 years. His fleet moves products around the Midwest. The long hauls averaged 300 miles. Small business truckers. We make up about 96% of the fleets in the United States. So it makes it hard for the little guys to make the adjustments that the big guys can do because we don't

roughly have the leverage. Weederhold says his company is always looking for ways to keep the cost down. We've always tried to eliminate idling instead of leaving the truck idle for 10 minutes or whatever while you're checking in if you shut the truck off. Maybe drive a little bit slower. Those little things like that can help you save some money. He says he has faced a lot of highs and a lot of lows in his five decades in the trucking business and feels like he can probably get through this moment, but he is worried about what will happen if gas prices get much higher and stay there. I heard the other day out in Connecticut, there was a truck stop that was charging $8.31 cents a gallon for fuel. If that fuel goes to that level of stage in for the extended

period of time, our economy, our country is going to be in a real hurt, I think. We had a hold feels like no matter what business you are in, increases in energy costs will trickle down to everyone. We're all consumers. So in the end, we're all going to pay for this. We're all going to feel it. Justin Medeara agrees that everybody's going to feel the hit if oil prices stay high. And at the same time, though, he is confident it won't get to that. I'm very confident that the business acumen of someone like Donald Trump is well aware of this, and he's not going to let this get prolonged. Justin and his brother Travis Medeara are fourth generation lobster fishermen.

They are the owners of lobster boys, a lobster wholesale business based on Long Island. Their company has an e-commerce website that sells lobsters domestically and internationally, sourcing their lobsters directly from Canadian fishermen. Fuel plays a role in all parts of their business. Travis says the fisherman he talks to are concerned about fuel costs. These guys, you know, they're buying 1,000 gallons, probably like minimum to, you know, fuel in their boat. So it's a lot when it all adds up. And then there's the cost of distribution.

All our lobsters come down from Canada, down to our U.S. facility on long haul trucks, whether it's our internal truck or an outside trucker, you know, company that we hired. So the cost of that, they've tried to raise our rates. Our fuel rates have gone up. And then, you know, jet fuel if we're using outside airlines. Another important factor for the company, Lobsters aren't necessarily a need. So demand could go down if families don't have the extra money to treat themselves to lobster in the coming months.

Because this happens in our industry. It's a seasonal business. So it's a double whammy on a product like ours. Justin and Travis Medea say they're going to have to eat the cost themselves if fuel prices don't go down. But they do feel confident that this is a short-term issue. Unless this is somehow over the next couple weeks not resolved in a significant way that the traffic. through the Strait of Hormuz is opened up, then we're just going to maintain normal operations and eat the cost. Everyone's going to eat it, including FedEx, including us, including the fishermen,

because we all believe that this is short term. Scott Horsley, you've been listening to this. The thing I want to eat right now is lobster, but let's push past that. And you're hearing some confidence there that the economic pain of this war won't necessarily stick around very long. How realistic is that view? Well, let's hope the lobster boys are right. I will say the U.S. economies withstood a lot of shocks in recent years and has generally held up better than a lot of forecasters might have expected. We do have some things going for us. For one, the overall economy is much more energy efficient than it once was. You know, the average family spends

only about 2% of its budget on gasoline. We were spending about two and a half times that share back in 1979 at the time of the Iranian Revolution. That said, the longer fuel prices stay elevated, the more we're going to feel those ripple effects on the cost of everything else. Let's say there is an agreement. The war ends this week. Right? How long would it take for prices to start to come down? You know, energy prices tend to go up quickly when supplies are disrupted and then take their time in coming down. Even when the Strait of Hormuz is reopened to normal traffic, it's going to take time to repair some of the damaged infrastructure, to reopen wells that have been shut in. We heard Justin Medeara say he's confident the president's business acumen will lead him to end this war quickly.

Certainly Trump would seem to have every incentive to do so to help his own political standing. But, you know, the Iranians also have a say. So while it was the president's choice to start this war, it may not be entirely up to him to decide when it ends. That is NPR Scott Horsley. Scott, do you want to give your home address for the lobster delivery? Or should we do that later? I'll start the butter. This episode was produced by Mia Venkat with audio engineering by Hannah Glovna. It was edited by William Troop, Raphael Nomm, and Maureen Pau.

NPR's correspondent Bill Chappell contributed to the reporting in this episode. Our executive producer is Sammy Yannigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Scott Detrow.