Global gas prices vary greatly from 9 cents a U.S. gallon to $9.54

The global price comparisons can be found at this site. Unfortunately the comparisons are not made all at the same time. However, the prices give at least a ball park idea of the differences.

Prices may vary according to taxes in different countries. This is what happens in countries that simply sell at whatever the market price is plus markup plus taxes . This would include the U.S, and Canada. Government probably cannot change the price much except by moral suasion to try and get companies to lower profit margins. Sometimes committees are set up to study gouging etc. Usually this is just political posturing. To effectively lower prices two methods are possible.

By far the most economical is for a country that has oil resources to own the production facilities. This allows fuel prices to be sold at the cost of production or even below if the country wants to subsidize production. Saudi Arabia and Venezuela and several Gulf States as well as Libya represent this mode of pricing.

Where a country has no ownership of oil production and must import all its oil then if taxes are also high the price will be extremely high. The Netherlands, Sweden and the UK represent such countries.

In North America Mexico unlike the U.S. and Canada subsidises the price even though they must import quite a bit of their oil. Here are a number of price comparisons. First number is price in US dollars per liter ands second per U.S. gallon.

Canada $1.30 ($4.92)

Kuwait .234 (0.85)

Libya .17 (.64) no doubt much more now.

Mexico .69 (2.61)

Netherlands 2.52 (9.54)

Qatar .22 (.83)

Saudi Arabia .16 (.61)

Sweden 2.30 (8.71

U.K. 2.19 (8.29)

U.S.A. 1.00 (3.79)

Venezuela .023 (.09)

These figures are no doubt averages and may differ from the present price because some are a couple of years old. But they give an idea of the range and they show how the ownership of resources by the state usually results in much lower prices.