Gas in Jew Jersey

Driving back from NY the other day, I stopped at a Sunoco station on the NJ Turnpike. I did the normal out-of-state-tourist thing and started to unbuckle my seatbelt when I saw the attendant walk towards me. Fortunately, from deep in my memory, the recollection of New Jersey's archaic gas-pumping law bubbled up, so I didn't make a fool of myself by trying to get out of the car.

I had a rental car that I checked out with 3/4 tank of gas, so I wanted to return it with a three-quarter tank, of course. I did some quick math and determined I needed exactly 13.2 gallons to bring the car back to 3/4 plus enough to drive the 80 miles to Hertz.

The attendant walked up to my window, and I said, "Can you put 14 gallons in?" He looked at me for a second and then said, "No. Dollars." I gave an exasperated sigh (both because of the archaic law preventing me from easily doing what I needed to do, which was put exactly 13.2 gallons in as well as my perception of his questionable intelligence) and whipped out the calculator. I could have been mean and said $48.32, but I decided $50 would be easier for him to understand.

The next few minutes left me sitting there feeling mildly insulted by the New Jersey legislature. Why am I perfectly safe to pump my own gas in 48 other states? I've never blown myself up there (or seen anyone else blow themselves up, for that matter). Do I magically become inept upon crossing the New Jersey state line? In some way, I guess I should appreciate the "full service" aspect of the law--meaning I don't have to do it myself--but two things challenged that: it actually made it more difficult in this case, since I had to do extra mental gyrations to communicate to the attendant what I wanted (and spent an extra $1.68 in doing so), and on top of that, there is something that feels fundamentally un-American about not being allowed to do it yourself, like they're taking an essential liberty away from me or something.

Fast forward to today. I Googled some background on the New Jersey fuel-pumping law and came across this (older) article from USA Today. What's actually funny about the article is just how stupid it makes New Jersey residents and lawmakers look. Check out this quote:

"Bill Dressler, executive director of the New Jersey Gasoline Retailers Association and Allied Trades, says there are safety concerns. While attendants are trained, many motorists would be novices. 'It could be put in the wrong container, says Dressler, whose group represents about 2,200 of the state's 3,800 gas stations.

The wrong container? Seriously? Does he honestly believe that New Jersey residents are too stupid to find the big hole in the side of their cars where you stick the nozzle in?

Or this one:

"Even though [Amanda Darien is] going to have to work more this summer to pay her gas tab, she says, 'I just don't want to get out" of the car. She has been to other states, and when it came time to fill up, 'I didn't even know how.'"

Perhaps my statement above was premature. Maybe they really are too dumb to fill their own gas.

My favorite is this, though:

"Assemblyman Francis Bodine, a Republican, says that after stopping at self-service stations in the South recently, he found that gas in New Jersey was the same price or slightly cheaper. 'So I don't see any economic savings to having to pump your own gas,' he says. 'The flip side of it is ... there'd be some job losses.' Besides, he says, 'If I'm in a tux going to a black tie (event), I don't want to stop and handle a gas pump.'"

I'm not sure there's any further comment needed about that.

(I will clarify, though, his comment on gas prices--according to Jim Benton of the New Jersey Petroleum Council, New Jersey's gas taxes are the third lowest in the nation. "People don't realize that while New Jersey gasoline is typically cheap, it's not because of a full-service requirement, but because of our low motor-fuel tax," he says. "There's no reason to suggest that prices would not be in fact even cheaper" if stations went to self-service.)

I suppose I should just relax and let them pump my gas for me. At the very least, it gives me a few seconds to catch up on email, Facebook, or to Google the history of arcane laws. As long as the attendant can understand "$48.32, please."