A Gas Station For Every 2,500 People

From the Census Bureau

Texas, California and Florida accounted for more than 20 percent of the nation’s 116,855 gas stations with paid employees in 2006, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That’s about one gas station per 2,500 people.

These economic numbers come from County Business Patterns: 2006, an annual report that contains data covering the more than 7.6 million businesses with paid employees at the national and state levels, and more than 3,100 counties. The report provides data on the number of establishments, number of employees, and quarterly and annual payroll for most of the 1,100 industries according to the North American Industry Classification System.

Gas stations employed more than 910,000 people, with a total annual payroll of $15 billion. At the county level, Los Angeles (1,723); Harris (Houston), Texas (1,397); and Cook (Chicago), Ill. (1,090); had the highest number of gas stations.

Nationally, the average annual payroll per gas station employee in 2006 was $16,449. Hawaii ($27,669), Connecticut ($21,927) and Alaska ($21,890) had the highest average annual payroll per employee in this industry. Among larger counties, Honolulu, Hawaii ($32,142), Troup, Ga. ($31,833), and Hunterdon, N.J. ($28,869), were among those that reported average annual payroll per employee higher than the national average.
Other key findings for all industries:

• Of the nearly 120 million employed by businesses with paid employees, more than one third were employed in three sectors: health care and social assistance, retail trade, and manufacturing.
• Three states accounted for one-fourth of all establishments with paid employees – California (878,128), Florida (517,069) and New York (515,950).
• Among counties with the most employees in 2006, New York had the highest average annual payroll per employee at $92,138. Santa Clara, Calif., was second at $76,234.
• Los Angeles County had the largest number of business establishments at 249,977, employing nearly 3.9 million. Cook County, Ill., had the second largest number of business establishments at 131,433, employing 2.4 million workers.
• A sampling of the 50 most populous counties in the United States shows average annual payrolls per employee of $59,220 in Fairfax, Va.; $50,398 in Harris, Texas; and $41,038 in Franklin, Ohio

I wonder what the gas-station per capita is for other developed countries. You would imagine that if fewer people drove, less gas stations would be necessary since there would be fewer cars to fill.

If gasoline prices continue to increase at their breakneck pace, you would expect that filling stations would be in less demand, the more marginal ones would be pushed out of business. I have started to notice some stations dusting off their old Cash Price - Credit Price signs that I remember as a child. This is in response to the surcharges that credit card companies charge gas merchants to use their service. The gas stations would pass these costs onto the consumer, hence the need for the two separate prices.

When gas prices are low, consumers are less sensitive to a change in price, and I imagine that everyone was charged the credit card price. Now that people are very sensitive to prices, in order to compete, gas merchants are going back to the two tier program, since it allows them to sell gas a few cents cheaper than the guy across the street.