The price for a barrel of oil fell slightly Monday, but you wouldn't notice from driving around metro Detroit. The average price of unleaded regular in Detroit rose to $3.44 a gallon Monday, according to AAA's Daily Fuel Gauge Report. That's up 28 cents from a week earlier, even though crude oil prices began to stabilize between $98 and $99 a barrel late last week. "There's a familiar saying in the petroleum industry, 'Up like a rocket, down like a feather,' " said Lisa Margonelli, a fellow at the New America Foundation and author of "Oil on The Brain." "It takes days for oil that is purchased at a given price to make it through the refinery and then be delivered to the retailer." That means motorists will continue to pay more. Brandon Serra pumped more than $40 worth of $3.59-a-gallon premium into his Lincoln LS on Monday afternoon at a Marathon station in southwest Detroit. "It's not just about my car," said Serra who helps run his family's wholesale food business. "We're already noticing a big increase in freight charges on produce." Expect prices at the pump to keep defying the decline in oil prices for a while. Despite the rise in prices, Mark Griffin, president of the Michigan Petroleum Association, said retailers still aren't covering their costs. "Just to break even, the average station should be charging $3.53 a gallon today," he said. Understanding pain at the pump: Why gas prices are so high Oil prices moderated in Monday trading, largely because Saudi Arabia has pledged to make up for any production lost to the ongoing revolution in Libya. The International Energy Agency estimated that the armed uprising against Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi has disrupted about half of Libya's normal production of 1.6 million barrels per day. But just because oil prices edged down nearly a dollar a barrel Monday, don't expect the recent surge in gas prices to reverse. That's because of the complex way that oil comes to market, along with taxes and fees. When this most recent spike in crude oil prices began Feb. 21, most Michigan gas stations were selling their fuel at a loss -- on average, 18 cents below cost, according to Mark Griffin, president of the Michigan Petroleum Association. The average wholesale price has risen from $2.42 a gallon on Feb. 11 to $2.77 on Monday, Griffin said. That's about $3.50 when you include 18.4 cents for the federal gas tax, 19 cents for Michigan's gas tax, another 18.4 cents for the general sales tax, and 17 cents a gallon that credit card companies charge retailers to handle consumers' purchases with plastic. The average price of regular in Detroit rose to $3.44 a gallon Monday -- still below cost. So gas station operators are not raising prices to make consumers miserable. But when everyone can go online and see where crude oil prices are minute-by-minute, it's easy to jump to the logical conclusion that crude oil and retail gas prices should move in tandem, like two people dancing. But there can be other factors. Problems at refineries can disrupt the flow from the source to the wholesale distributor and retailer. Pipelines can fracture. Seasonal driving habits can raise or reduce demand. But Griffin said there is a pattern that provides a partial explanation for why pump prices stay high and sometime even rise higher after oil prices begin to fall. "When the price spikes up, retailers try to absorb the increases for a longer period than when their costs are going down," Griffin said. So once oil prices retreat, there's less incentive to lower retail prices. Pump prices tend to stay high so the retailer's loss shrinks or even turns into a profit. John Sellek, spokesman for Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette, said Schuette's staff is monitoring the relationship between wholesale and retail prices daily. He declined to say whether Schuette has found any cases of price gouging in the last week. "The people who really make a lot of money are the credit card companies who make a percentage of the wholesale price," said Lisa Margonelli, author of "Oil on the Brain" and director of the New America Foundation's energy policy initiative. Even if retailers charge credit card customers 10 cents more per gallon, that doesn't cover what the credit card company charges them. Margonelli said independent gas retailers who aren't attached to an oil producer's brand provide a stabilizing impact on prices.

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