Bay Area Utility, Gasoline Prices Sky High

BAY AREA — It's not just housing prices that suck Bay Area family budgets dry every month, but other necessities like utilities and gasoline that far exceed the national average and, in some cases, are the highest in the nation.

In April - electricity was 56.3 percent more than the national average at 21.1 cents per kilowatt hour and natural gas was about $1.62 per therm, or 57.1 percent above the average for the rest of the country according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

And then there's gasoline, which was the most expensive in the country for the month of April. The average of just under $4 a gallon in the San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward area was 38 percent more than the $2.89 national average. Out of the 23 metropolitan areas surveyed by the bureau, only Los Angeles and San Diego were close to the $4 mark and the only non-Western city that was above $3 per gallon was Chicago, where the average price was $3.07.

BLS economist Todd Johnson pointed to the cause, "California gas is chemically different than that of the rest of the country because of air pollution controls and such." That's been the case for years, but Johnson notes an uptick, adding, "It's inching up to the point where it looks more alarming than it has in the past."

>>Related: San Francisco May Buy PG&E's Assets

The BLS defines the San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward metropolitan area as consisting of Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco and San Mateo counties.

— Patch editor Bea Karnes and Bay City News contributed to this story

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