I think the biggest drop in gasoline use is because people have no JOBS to go to. Sure, they are not traveling, or buying things...but when there is no daily back and forth to work, a person doesn’t need to put much gas in his car. Compare the rush hour traffic in the big cities...many fewer on the roads during those times than before when all the millions of unemployed had a job. People are even doubling up to go grocery shopping in order to stretch their dollars to buy food and not spend so much money filling the gas tank.
Back during the first big fuel price spikes several years back there was one likeable part of it for me.
The collectivist boss and the collectivist wannabe-so-bad-it-killed-him boss could not grasp the idea that someone liked to enjoy some quiet and privacy esp. since I went to lunch at 1, 2 or even 3 to annoy them. It was a 24 hour faciilty.
There was a Longhorn about 20 minutes away, with light or no traffic, I could make it in 15 or less. It was too far away for the collectivists to bother coming out there and bothering me. I got the burger and fries, always good there.
Other days I went home since it was a few minutes short of the Longhorn.