Vicious Circle Of Gas In Farm Belt

CBS News Correspondent Jim Axelrod continues to drive from New York to San Francisco, charting the impact of gas prices across the country.

In the high plains in Sidney, Nebraska, he says the spike of gas prices doesn't mean cutting back a five-day vacation to two days. In the farm belt, the price of gas and diesel is much more of a make-or-break issue.

Each time Mike Beyer fills up his sprayer, it's 130 gallons.

"Regular use, if I'm running hard, one tank will last a day," Beyer said.

Beyer had a contract for diesel set last year at $1.80 a gallon. The contract ends this week. With the corn harvest coming, he's going to have to pay current prices: $2.70 a gallon.

"It's a hard hit," he said. "Maybe I'll have to get another job. I don't know. I work from four till dark now."

Hard hit? Do the math. That's a hundred dollars more -- right from his pocket -- each day he uses his sprayer.

"You got this crop this far. Can you afford to leave it there? You can't afford to leave it there," Beyer said. "It's a Catch 22 and you can't afford to harvest it."

And you don't have to be a farmer to fall victim to the effect of spiking gas prices on farm communities.

Just ask Roger Muckel. He flies a crop duster. He buys gas 8,000 gallons at a time.

Muckel told Axelrod that the cost to fuel his crop duster has tripled in the past four years.

It's a vicious circle in Sidney, Nebraska. Roger passes his cost hikes to his customers who, as we know from Mike Beyer, are already getting hammered.

"If they're not making money, they spend less money with me," Beyer said.

But the farmer doesn't have anyone to pass it on to. Gas for the irrigation pumps... the sprayers... the trucks... and the tractors.

"We have to just eat the extra and go on from there," said one farmer.

Axelrod says that gas prices are clearly a far more serious issue here than simply cutting into vacations. In fact, the last time farmer Mike Beyer had a vacation was on his honeymoon.

He was married 19 years ago.