Energy Expenses

In 1959, US household energy spending was 7.3% of after-tax income. It then steadily declined, and outside the 1973 and 1980 Arab oil shocks when it peaked at 9.5%, it bottomed at 4% in 2002. At the height of the last commodity boom it hit 7%. Then came the Housing Bust and it steadily fell to an all-time low of 3.3% in 5/20; it’s now 3.8%! Energy’s increasingly small potatoes.