{"id":556,"date":"2026-09-16T20:17:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T20:17:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/?p=556"},"modified":"2026-09-16T20:17:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T20:17:15","slug":"how-are-we-gonna-get-through-this-americans-face-tough-decisions-as-diesel-and-gas-prices-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/?p=556","title":{"rendered":"‘How are we gonna get through this?’ Americans face tough decisions as diesel and gas prices rise"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Gas prices are displayed at a gas station on Sept. 15, 2026, in Chicago, Illinois. Gas prices across the United States continue to rise as the war with Iran has disrupted the global flow of crude oil. (Scott Olson\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

(NEW YORK) — As\u00a0diesel and gas prices soar<\/span>\u00a0in the United States amid the war with Iran, Americans across the country are making tough decisions as they continue to cope with the heavy strain of inflation.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to manage your bills. You have to manage the food you bring in. You have to manage how you pay your bills \u2026 everything has to be budgeted,\u201d said Betsy Rosado, a 47-year-old mother who lives with her husband and five of their children in Spring Hill, Florida.<\/p>\n

Rosado said her business degree has helped her manage household finances. But for others, the budgeting agony \u201ccould bring somebody to the point of depression, and it could bring somebody to a mental collapse, especially when they have kids.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rosado said her toddler, who has significant developmental and respiratory issues, requires treatments multiple times a week. She has had to cut back on therapy sessions because of rising gas prices.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had to switch to, unfortunately, virtual therapies. And with my daughter with disabilities, we are stopping occupational therapies,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

As of Wednesday, the average price for a gallon of regular gasoline was $4.36, according to GasBuddy, up $1.42 since the U.S. war with Iran began on Feb. 28.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first thing that crosses your mind is, what is it going to be tomorrow? How are we gonna get through this, and then it’s the point of, do I need to move out of this state?\u201d Rosado said. \u201cYou feel stuck \u2026 the system is not \u2013 it’s not made for us to succeed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the cost of diesel has hit a record high at $6.30 a gallon, according to GasBuddy.<\/p>\n

Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy,\u00a0told ABC News on Wednesday<\/span>\u00a0that \u201ca lot of states are seeing pretty monumental jumps\u201d in both gas and diesel prices and \u201cthere’s really no signs of when this might start to slow down.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUntil something happens to deescalate these geopolitical tensions, prices will keep going higher,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Truck drivers, who are feeling the financial strain at the pump, and farmers, who rely on diesel to power up agricultural machinery, told ABC News that the rise in diesel costs has put a strain on their businesses and their livelihoods.<\/p>\n

Lewie Pugh, who has driven over 2 million miles for the past 25 years, is also the executive vice president of the Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA), which represents nearly 150,000 small business truckers.<\/p>\n

Pugh told ABC News that every $1 increase in diesel prices costs truckers approximately $400 more per tank. Some weeks have cost an extra $800 to fill up, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrucking has a very slim profit margin already. There’s just not a lot of profit in trucking. I’ve always said it was a penny saved business, not a penny made business,\u201d Pugh said. \u201cSo when you’re already constrained and something like this happens to this magnitude, you just can’t absorb it as a motor carrier. They just can’t. There’s no way \u2013 they’ll be out of business tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pugh said the higher prices truckers are paying are being passed down to the companies whose products are being shipped, causing the prices of everything from food to clothes to go up for Americans.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis has huge rippling effects in the supply chain and in the economy because trucking and truckers haul so much stuff,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For John Bartman, a fifth-generation farmer on his family\u2019s centuries-old farm in Marengo, Illinois, told ABC News that the rising costs of diesel has vastly impacted his agricultural production.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople are just very frustrated right now,\u201d Bartman said.<\/p>\n

Bartman, who grows soybeans, said Illinois is the No. 1 soybean producer in the nation, but skyrocketing prices in diesel and fertilizer have hindered his ability to grow the major crop.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe price of diesel today is over $6 a gallon, and we use 300 gallons of diesel a day. So now we’re talking $1,800 a day,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Additionally, he said that the cost of fertilizer was over $120 an acre this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just keeps on increasing all the time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Bartman lamented the economic conditions and expressed concern about how this will impact the next generation of farmers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s some people that think things are going to get better, but I’ve seen too many good young farmers who had a full-time job besides farming, who’ve just decided I can’t do this anymore,\u201d Bartman said. \u201cWe’re losing that next generation that’s coming into the business. So that is very destructive and very sad.\u201d<\/p>\n

ABC News’ Sabina Ghebremedhin contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gas prices are displayed at a gas station on Sept. 15, 2026, in Chicago, Illinois. Gas prices across the United States continue to rise as the war with Iran has disrupted the global flow of crude oil. (Scott Olson\/Getty Images) (NEW YORK) — As\u00a0diesel and gas prices soar\u00a0in the United States amid the war with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":637,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kcfj570am.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}