Gas went up eleven cents last week and you noticed.
You mentioned it. You had an opinion about it. You might have driven further to save four dollars on a fill up.
Then you walked into a gas station and paid $2.29 for a 20 ounce bottle of water.
Run that number. There are 128 ounces in a gallon. $2.29 divided by 20, times 128.
That is $14.66 a gallon.
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You just bought a liquid at roughly four times the price of gasoline, in the same building, at the same counter, from the same cashier, and you did not blink.
And the really absurd part is what was happening ten feet away. There was a water fountain. It was free. It was the same water.
This is not a story about people being stupid. You are not stupid. I have paid $14 a gallon for water many times and I will do it again this week.
It is a story about the single most profitable trick in consumer goods, which is finding a product with almost no cost and selling it on something other than the product.
Because nobody in this business is selling you water.