In some ways times don't seem so different. It depends on what you consider "normal".
This is from an article titled "Would you pay $55 for bottled water?"
To understand how expensive regular bottled water is, let's compare it with gasoline. With the price of oil rising, we typically think of gasoline as very expensive. On the other hand, some of us will barely blink an eye at picking up a few bottles of water from the same gas station. Here are the numbers:
A gallon of gas costs around $3 [when the article was written]. If we assume a one-liter bottle of water from the store costs about $2.50, a gallon of the same bottled water should cost about $10. Water, life's most necessary substance, costs about three times more than gasoline when it comes in a plastic bottle. If you wanted to fill up a car's 15-gallon tank with gasoline, it would cost you about $45. If you wanted to fill up that same 15-gallon tank with bottled water, it would cost you $150 [source: National Geographic News].
Tap water, on the other hand, costs a fraction of the price of bottled water. The same $2 you spend on a liter of bottled water will get you about 1,000 gallons of tap water [source: EPA].
Buddy Cotten said:
It also depends on the time period.
The discovery well for the spindletop field was drilled in January, 1901 and had an initial flow rate of 80,000 BOPD. The first year that well, the Lucas No. 1, produced 17.2 million barrels of oil.
During that time, oil dropped to 3 cents per barrel and water was 5 cents a cup on the derrick floor.
How times have changed.
Buddy
UT_PLM