Gas prices have gone up; why have your milk tea and underwear become more expensive?

Ask AI · How does rising oil prices quietly drive up your daily expenses?

Over the southwest of Asia, above the Strait of Hormuz, a butterfly called the oil crisis gently flutters its wings, quickly impacting every corner of the world. First, oil vehicle owners rush to refuel overnight, then business owners in various industries find that transportation costs are soaring. A series of price increases caused directly or indirectly by this have affected more ordinary people—down jackets, underwear, sanitary pads, bottled mineral water… even young people’s “grain” used for stress relief has become more expensive. Oil price hikes have impacts far greater than we imagine.

Text | Rao Tongyu, Yuan Yakun, Zhang Beijia

Editor | Li Huanhuan

Operations | Bu Niao

Oil prices rise, everything rises

Driving a tractor, a young man from Henan named Qiangzi heads out to help his employer plow the fields. The smoke of March’s international conflicts is thick, but for farmers, March simply marks the start of a year’s work. As temperatures warm, people gradually return to the land—plowing, leveling the soil, preparing for sowing around Qingming. No matter how tense the international situation or how high oil prices climb, the planting rhythm won’t wait.

Tractors consume diesel, and on the vast land, farmers are the first to notice changes in oil prices. Qiangzi calculated that before the new year, someone bought a ton of diesel for 5,500 yuan, with the price per liter over 4 yuan. When he refueled this month, the price had risen to 7,900 yuan per ton, which means the price per liter increased by 2 yuan.

Qiangzi had to negotiate the price with his employer. The cost per mu of land increased from 30 yuan to 35 yuan. Different farmers pay different prices for the rising oil costs. Among his employer’s farmers, some grow peanuts, vegetables, and spring corn, which only require four trips with the tractor; but if they grow medicinal herbs like yam or rhubarb, which need more fragmented and deeper soil, they have to plow more times, raising the cost per mu by another twenty or thirty yuan.

At this moment, changes in oil prices determine the cost of tillage; every cent increase in oil price adds to farmers’ unease. Recently, because her husband refueled too late, Gao, who grows rice in Qiqihar, Heilongjiang, has had several arguments with him. She worries that if grain prices aren’t high this year, “selling the land will definitely mean losing money.” In other words, the cost anxiety caused by rising oil prices will last until autumn.

Under the same blue sky, farmers are just one in ten million affected by oil price increases. As the foundation of industrial society, oil is almost the fuel for all transportation and industrial equipment. When it’s extracted from the ground, it’s just a dark, viscous liquid, but soon it flows into tall distillation towers built by humans. Inside, the temperature keeps rising, and the oil changes form, becoming different types of gasoline, kerosene, and diesel, which are continuously injected into cars, planes, and tractors.

▲ As oil prices rise, farmers are also affected. Photo / Visual China

During the process where the distillation tower’s temperature reaches 140°C, about 45% of the oil first becomes gasoline—which, as the most common refined product in daily life, has seen multiple recent price hikes, perhaps the most noticeable change for most people.

Gas stations are going crazy. Across the country, 110k gas stations have experienced days of unprecedented bustle, with cars queuing on the roads, waiting for refueling. Long lines of hours are normal; drivers complain about rushing to fill up before prices go up—“like queuing at Universal Studios, round after round.” On March 24, when oil prices broke through 9 yuan per liter, a staff member at a Jiangsu gas station worked a 14-hour shift alone, pumping over 80k yuan worth of fuel. By the end of her shift, her arms were too tired to lift, and her legs were trembling.

Everyone is racing against time. The day before the price hike, Chongqing motorcycle enthusiast Xiao Yu had already lost interest in work, sneaking out of his station to fill his tank at a nearby gas station during off-peak hours. To ease congestion, some stations introduced policies to delay the price increase by 23 hours. During the wait, some envied the station owners for “making a killing,” but in fact, such extraordinary busyness can hardly save all gas stations’ performance. Due to the impact of new energy vehicles, it’s estimated that by 2030, the 110k gas stations will decrease to 90k, with one in five disappearing.

With gasoline becoming more expensive, people have to economize. In Auckland, New Zealand, car owner Cai Cai feels that all drivers are deliberately maintaining distance, and many turn off their air conditioning to save fuel. Cai Cai herself avoids braking, instead easing off the accelerator early to control speed. Driving schools that can’t save fuel are even more straightforward: a few days ago, the largest driving school in Shenzhen announced a 200-yuan increase in registration fees, with some raising it by 500 yuan.

At thousands of meters above ground, people are also affected. As the distillation tower’s temperature continues to rise toward 180-250°C, more stable kerosene is refined to power aircraft. Over the past few weeks, several airlines, including Spring Airlines and Hong Kong Airlines, have announced adjustments to fuel surcharges. Yuzu, planning to travel to Australia in April, bought tickets early at a good price. Her biggest joy now is checking how much her ticket price has increased—she found it’s already gone up by 2,800 yuan and secretly celebrates having bought early. But most people aren’t as lucky. A friend working in Canada bought her return ticket two days late and paid an extra 2,000 yuan for a one-way flight.

▲ As oil prices rise, airline fuel surcharges also increase. Photo / Visual China

Another group is even more sensitive to rising oil prices. Like tractor drivers, truck drivers’ tanks are filled with diesel—refined at temperatures above 250°C. Truck fuel consumption is even larger. Based on current oil prices (in March, No. 0 diesel experienced two price hikes), a truck running 10,000 km a month with a fuel consumption of 38L per 100 km will see its monthly fuel cost increase by about 5,700 yuan. After hearing about the price hike, truck driver Xiao Ya searches for the lowest-priced gas stations along her route, but finds that from Jiangsu and Jiangxi to Guangdong, even the most promotional stations have no discounts.

In recent years, truck drivers’ days have been tough. Chen Ming from Anhui, who has been driving trucks for 16 years, used to earn 40,000 to 50,000 yuan a month; now, his monthly income is only over 10,000. Rising fuel and transportation costs are only part of the problem; the more critical reason is that third-party freight platforms are lowering their prices. He often runs routes from Jiangsu to Beijing, and a 17.5-meter-long truck’s freight per km has dropped from over 10 yuan to 8 yuan. To save money, many drivers choose not to take the highway, but only national roads, which extends working hours but saves tolls—exchanging time for money.

But drivers are more exhausted. Chen Ming says many truck driver stations are overcrowded, but their capacity is limited. When tired, he can only grit his teeth and keep driving. So far, rising oil prices haven’t increased his order prices; the extra costs are borne by the drivers themselves. By next year, Chen Ming’s truck will have run for 10 years, reaching retirement age. He plans to switch careers—new trucks cost over 500,000 yuan, and with debts, he has no spare money.

At the destination, those waiting to receive goods also feel the impact of oil price fluctuations. Peng Hao from Hebei, a cold drink distributor, has nine refrigerated trucks. Now, a small refrigerated truck running 300 km per trip costs about 130 yuan more in fuel. The larger the vehicle, the more fuel it consumes. Based on current prices, his annual fuel costs will increase by 36k yuan—equivalent to a worker’s annual salary. Another cold drink merchant, Jiang Yun, is considering switching to electric trucks to save on fuel, but new problems arise: in northern small towns, long transportation distances mean electric vehicles may not meet all her needs.

The impact on goods isn’t limited to cold drinks. Today, China’s truck drivers number over 38 million, and the people they serve are at least ten times that number—over 70% of freight in China is transported by road, and every day, the express deliveries, daily necessities like rice, flour, and oil all depend on truck drivers. If oil prices continue to rise, the anxiety of truck drivers may ripple along the long freight routes, quietly pushing up prices for everyone.

▲ Photo / “Life’s Road Is Unfamiliar”

Unexpected Chain Reactions

Some people have already noticed subtle changes in prices.

In Beijing, a young person buying breakfast found that their usual sesame seed cake had increased by 50 cents, and plastic bags were no longer free—an A4 sign posted in the shop read “Material costs have risen, thank you for understanding.” In Dali, Yunnan, vegetable suppliers are forced to buy more expensive plastic containers just to transport fresh spring vegetables to first-tier cities; similar things happen in India, where the bottled water giant Bisleri announced a price increase, with a case of bottled water rising by 24 rupees (about 1.75 yuan).

To trace the source of these price hikes, just open the oil usage manual. In fact, gasoline, kerosene, and diesel are just visible incarnations of oil, but a complete oil usage manual could fill a complex chemistry textbook. Over the century of harnessing oil, people have learned to further refine naphtha from crude oil, which at 800°C decomposes into smaller molecules—crucial raw materials for the chemical industry: ethylene, propylene, butadiene.

Further down the line, oil loses its original appearance, transforming into plastics, rubber, and chemical fibers, infiltrating everyday life.

When oil prices just start to rise, electric vehicle owners might rejoice, thinking they no longer need to pay for rising gasoline—overseas, EV sales have surged. In Australia, sales at BYD stores increased by 50% in the past two weeks; in Singapore, a Xpeng store saw a 30% increase in customers in just over a week; some ride-hailing drivers using gasoline cars are also affected—they face high costs and low fares, but switching vehicles requires new investments. A driver in Hubei plans to switch to an electric car but can’t afford a new one, so he decides to rent an electric vehicle for Didi.

In fact, many parts of an electric car—seats, tires, interior—are made from petroleum derivatives. An electric vehicle might even need more oil-based materials than a gasoline car because it relies more on lightweight plastics.

▲ The manufacturing process of new energy vehicles depends on oil. Photo / Visual China

So, when oil prices rise, the first cities to experience traffic jams might be Yuyao in Zhejiang—famous for plastics. Large trucks queue up to buy raw materials, as plastic prices jumped 40% in a week. A truck driver waiting to haul goods in Yuyao had to post a video warning peers: if prices aren’t high, don’t accept orders from plastic factories for now—“Otherwise, you’ll be waiting at every warehouse.”

These purchased plastics might end up on the body of an electric vehicle. Years ago, Yuyao’s most famous plastic products were household items like seats and tableware, but now, automakers are the biggest clients. A typical example is a car interior company that started transforming in 2020; after four years, over 90% of its orders come from new energy vehicle companies.

Besides plastics, more people realize that their clothes also contain oil. The most widely circulated example is the down jacket—its durability comes from nylon, water resistance from polyester, elasticity from spandex—all made from chemical fibers derived from ethylene and propylene. Disassembling fabrics quickly sparks young Beijing residents’ thoughts: “If oil prices go up, will Beijing’s outdoor jackets still be down jackets?”

▲ Oil prices also influence the price of down jackets. Photo / Visual China

The soaring prices of bulk commodities derived from oil lead to crises in factories, making procurement the most anxious group. Throughout March, young buyers in the plastics industry worried about their orders, as raw material suppliers’ quotes fluctuated hourly—one price in the morning, a different one in the afternoon. Seeing raw material prices rising, she was relieved her company didn’t win two big orders, or costs would be too high to profit. Her boss was more direct: “Mark up raw material inventory and sell it at a profit; if we wait to sell after the price stabilizes, we might lose money.”

In Guangxi, 28-year-old factory second-generation Jackie owns three factories: a hanger factory, a paint factory, and a skateboard factory. All three are affected by rising oil prices. The paint factory is hit hardest because its raw materials for stability and special properties all come from oil. Upstream suppliers have to limit purchases to ensure supply for each client; the skateboard factory mainly faces higher costs for plastic shells. Jackie decided to temporarily use existing stock and slow down production. The wood hanger factory, whose raw materials aren’t affected, might see increased transportation costs.

Today, “products with lower profit margins are more anxious.” Jackie cites skateboards as an example: even if plastic shells continue to rise in price, they can’t raise the price of expensive skateboards just because of a few extra dollars in material costs—this explains why the cheapest plastic bags and bottled water are among the first to increase in price.

Higher-margin products, once their prices go up, face consumer doubts—like the “grain” (grainy products) that young consumers love to buy passionately. Bao Meng, a second-generation anime merchandise leader, notes that since March, the acrylic “grain” (a material derived from petrochemicals) has fluctuated daily—from 19 yuan per roll to 27 yuan. But Bao Meng dares not raise prices, only stockpile—discussions among fans show they don’t buy the raw material increase’s reasons; they know they’re paying for their favorite IP, and the raw material cost in a small “baji” (small item) is negligible.

▲ Photo / “Meeting the World”

In an underwear factory, buyer Dai Rouming understands that her factory also dares not raise prices. They mainly serve offline regular clients, and now everyone is tight on money. If they raise prices, customer willingness to buy drops sharply. But this doesn’t mean consumers won’t be affected. For example, after raw material prices rose, her factory’s response was to find cheaper substitutes—such as lower-grade suppliers or replacing premium Lenzing Modal with cheaper Lyocell.

More people are planning ahead, stockpiling as a consensus. They start searching: what else in daily life comes from oil? On Douban groups, suggestions cover almost all daily chemical products: laundry detergent, shampoo, body wash, and even face wash. People renovating accelerate their orders—doors, windows, appliances, walls, lighting—all related to oil.

A week ago, after hearing fabric prices would rise, Lolita fans bought 100k yuan worth of fabric in one go. She usually runs an online shop making Lolita dresses for fans, and since her scale is small, stocking 100k yuan worth of fabric is a significant investment. These fabrics are used as lining for long skirts. With each long skirt requiring 2.6 meters of lining, just the lining costs an extra 3 yuan per dress. Her reason for stockpiling is simple: save money, and also worry that different batches of fabric might vary in quality—stocking at least ensures more consistent product quality.

New parents are also considering whether to stock up on diapers in advance—besides cotton and pulp, diapers are made from petroleum derivatives, from the inside out and top to bottom—soft, absorbent, leak-proof, sticky, and packaged. A young mother ordered 27 packs of diapers at a maternity store, and new mothers during confinement are even more overwhelmed, unsure how many packs of S, M, L sizes to prepare for their newborns.

Women are more worried about sanitary pads increasing in price. Like diapers, sanitary pads contain non-woven fabric, PE film, and adhesives. Media contacted several OEM factories and learned that the raw materials for sanitary pads are light foam products, which are hard to stockpile due to limited storage. If raw material prices continue to rise, factory prices will be difficult to lock in. This news makes many women anxious. One mother shared a touching story: her young daughter, hearing that oil prices might affect sanitary pads, secretly used her pocket money to buy two packs.

Besides these daily consumables, some turn stockpiling into business. A Zephyrosaurus (a brand) recycler in Zhengzhou, after hearing about the war, quickly stockpiled over 1,000 pieces of down jackets. So far, the jackets haven’t increased in price, but she firmly believes in her bold decision and plans to “wait and see”—she sees rising oil prices as a huge potential business opportunity.

▲ Photo / “Blooming Flowers”

Oil Price Hike Accelerates a New Era

In China, the ripple effects of rising oil prices take time to reach everyone, but in countries heavily dependent on oil imports, the impact is faster and greater.

Two weeks ago, Sibyl from the Philippines found her daily life completely disrupted—this country, with almost no oil exploration, declared a “national energy emergency” on March 24. The situation was so severe that flights had to carry their own fuel to return. Sibyl noticed that all food prices had risen—rice, canned goods, milk… without exception. The per kilogram price of rice, previously 48 pesos, now costs 72 pesos. Transportation costs also increased; due to high oil prices, drivers stopped working, and Sibyl, who wanted to attend online English classes, had to spend 150 pesos to ride a motorcycle to work.

Here, rising oil prices manifest as life pressures. Over the years, Sibyl has been raising three children alone as an English teacher. Later, her sister’s family lost their income due to an accident, and Sibyl took on the responsibility of raising her nephews. Supporting five children with rising prices and high electricity bills, she can only save money and work harder. Snacks are the first to be cut; she reduced three meals to two, and during classes, she used to snack during breaks, but now she just drinks water when hungry.

Like Sibyl, many others are troubled by energy shortages. This week, Wu You, a Lao student, saw her school switch to online classes because many students had to skip due to no motorcycle fuel. She found that the nearby gas station no longer allows using basins to collect fuel—only one car at a time, with a limit of 1 million Lao kip (about 317 yuan). Soon, someone was reselling gasoline in student chat groups. Two weeks ago, Huang Ping, studying in Sri Lanka, was warned by his professor to stock up on supplies; his landlord even required students to turn off electricity once a week to save costs.

▲ The Philippines has declared a national energy emergency. Photo / Visual China

At almost the same time, governments in many countries began prioritizing “energy saving.” Thai officials reduced overseas trips, wore lighter clothes, stopped wearing ties to work, and some news anchors took off their jackets to encourage the public to raise air conditioning temperatures; Bangladesh, which relies 95% on imported energy, shut down schools, training centers, and fertilizer factories, prioritizing natural gas for power plants to avoid large-scale blackouts; in Pakistan, government vehicles reduced their frequency on the roads, and the most common vehicles are buses and ambulances.

But for ordinary people, these official measures can’t lower living costs. Recently, Sibyl’s city began rotating power outages; with temperatures reaching 30°C, night outages made sleeping difficult. Children sleep without clothes, and the only cooling device is a handheld fan with limited battery life. She considers buying a solar-powered device but finds it costs 20,000 to 30,000 pesos—meaning she’d need to teach seven more students to afford it.

The hardship extends to island tourism. Now, whether flying to Sanya or the Maldives, tourists face higher prices. A Maldivian tour guide feels that trips to the islands are more expensive, especially boat trips—some tourists complain that their island-hopping costs increased by $40, while others switch to Phuket, only to find prices there also rising.

Farther away, tourists in Australia and New Zealand are also anxiously awaiting their bills. Yuzu, 28, planned to rent a car and tour New Zealand in April, but learned that fuel prices had increased by 65%. With the country’s low population density, she dares not calculate how much more she’ll spend. As a car enthusiast, she’s especially glad she rented a Toyota Camry—more fuel-efficient than other models.

At these moments, people suddenly realize how deeply oil influences human society. With abundant resources and convenient transportation, gas stations seem to always have fuel, and oil production increases daily—like oxygen, it’s integrated into our lives. But now, due to war, the world must brace itself, trying to solve the various problems emerging from oil shortages.

▲ Photo / “Youth Facing the Wind”

But a cruel fact remains: oil is everywhere. On the way to school, children’s chewing gum contains oil—its gum base is derived from petroleum. Oil also transforms into food additives, like tar-based artificial colors “Amaranth” and “Sunset Yellow,” used in cakes, drinks, and even pill coatings. Oil has long become irreplaceable in medicine—after the pandemic, the most familiar fever reducers and painkillers, like ibuprofen, contain raw materials refined from oil. In China and across Asia, the largest producer of propionic acid (used in food and pharmaceuticals) is not a famous pharmaceutical company but Sinopec’s Yangzi Petrochemical—BASF.

As oil becomes more indispensable, every fluctuation in the industry triggers butterfly effects, changing industries and lifestyles. Nearly 170 years ago, whale oil was the main lighting fuel in Western households before kerosene was invented. Whale blubber was expensive—selling at $1.77 per gallon—while kerosene cost less than 1/25 of that. The reduction in lighting costs led to the decline of whaling, allowing whale populations to recover.

Similar stories happened in China. In the 1970s, Chinese chemical engineers aimed “to add a new coat to every Chinese person,” producing 480k tons of polyester raw materials annually, which could be transformed into 2.74 billion meters of polyester fabric. To produce this amount with cotton would require 10.6 million acres of high-yield cotton fields—larger than Shanghai itself. This efficiency outpaced cotton industry growth, and within ten years, the proportion of cotton in China’s textile fibers dropped from 73% in 1988 to 44.8% in 1998.

To understand why Japanese cars created the “fuel-saving myth,” we might need to go back 53 years, to the first oil crisis caused by a war in the Middle East. At that time, international oil prices skyrocketed from $3 to $12 per barrel. Americans began to reconsider their energy consumption. That year, the White House reportedly kept the thermostat at 18°C, and President Richard Nixon called on Americans to lower their air conditioning settings in a televised speech.

In such circumstances, oil car owners couldn’t help but worry about their beloved vehicles. Before, Americans preferred high-power, large-displacement “gas guzzlers,” but after the price quadrupled, they suddenly appreciated Japanese cars. Honda, Toyota, Nissan emphasized lightness, compactness, and fuel efficiency—though less flashy, they saved money. This marked the start of Japanese cars entering the US market, increasing their share from 4% to 20%, while American brands declined—GM’s sales fell 34%, Ford’s by 47%. Although they later shifted to smaller cars, they missed the best opportunity. The 1970s oil crisis also accelerated Europeans’ shift from large cars to small ones, from sedans to hatchbacks.

Today, small cars remain popular in Japan and Europe, and the habits formed then still persist. The 2026 energy alert, however, how it will influence our lives and future, only time can tell.

(Names in the article are pseudonyms)

References:

1. Oil Crisis Spurs Multiple Countries into “Energy Saving Mode” Caixin
2. 24 Days of Energy Crisis, Asians Enter Power Saving Mode Phoenix News
3. Science Popularization | Oil: The “Black Gift” Earth Gave Humanity China Mining News
4. Fuel Cost is 4 Times Electricity! Global Oil Prices Surge, China EV Boom First Financial
5. The “Oil Products” You’ve Used China Petroleum News
6. Talking about the “Universal” in Clothing, Food, Housing, and Transportation Science Times
7. Middle East War Affects Sanitary Pads China Newswires