CAFE requirements are stupid
Why should we force car companies to produce cars that people don't want to buy?
If you want a car that gets 10 MPG then you should be able to buy one.
We need a gas tax so that if you DRIVE the car that gets 10 MPG then you have to pay for the damage that you cause.
"Even if you believe saving gasoline is a holy cause, subsidizing electric cars simply is not a substitute for politicians finding the courage to jack up gas prices. Think about it this way: You can double the fuel efficiency of any car by putting a second person in it. You can increase its fuel efficiency to infinity by refraining from frivolous trips.
These are the incentives that flow from a higher gas price. Exactly the opposite incentives flow from mandatory investment in higher-mileage vehicles. You paid a lot for a car that costs very little to operate—so why not operate it? Why bother to car pool? Why not drive across town for a jar of mayonnaise?"
I hate to say it but I agree with the above quote and it is from an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal.
Since I won't pay any more money to Rupert, I read it here.
- whecht's blog
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If gas were $7 a gallon then
If gas were $7 a gallon then people would want cars with better mileage.
My point is that I don't care what kind of car you buy because buying a car doesn't use much gas.
I care what kind of car you drive because driving a car uses a lot of gas.
One problem is, people buy
One problem is, people buy cars/trucks today and plan to have them for ten years. But life circumstances often change. For example, I needed a truck, with four wheel drive, so I bought one. Unfortunately the gas mileage sucks. Yet I had no choice, as there are no 4WD trucks that get decent gas mileage. So what other choice would I have?
CAFE standards are necessary. Did I want to buy a vehicle that gets really crappy gas mileage? No. But there were no other options. And the government needs to impose basic standards, because if we leave it up to private industry, they WILL build vehicles that nobody wants to buy. And then the government has to spend billions of dollars to bail them out.
Is there a better solution? Perhaps. But it is clear this cannot be left up to the free market on its own to resolve.
Interesting. I agree with
Interesting. I agree with both of you. Peter who says gas taxes will not be increased, and W who quotes someone who quotes something about the simple logic of gas taxes needing to be increased.
The SysOp of this site once warned me about cutting and pasting entire articles to this site. If for example we actually have a readership outside of some family and an equally small number of friends and acquaintances, we might get into copyright trouble. So for the record the quotes in w's post that started this thread are from the WSJ at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870388030457523669217598775... By HOLMAN W. JENKINS, JR. Greg Mankiw in his blog did quote Jenkins by name, but I didn't see where he pointed out that he was quoting the Wall Street Journal.
With that arcane detail out of the way, since when have both w and AM agreed on an editorial in the WSJ? Peter however points out that like most editorials in the WSJ the author of the piece is living in a dream world. We just are not going to get a gas tax.
Perhaps we should work on reality. Why don't we call it a "Patriot Investment surcharge."
Just my idea, and thanks for my word of the day. "pigovian."
The gas tax will not be
The gas tax will not be increased no matter how much it needs to be. Therefore CAFE standards seem to be something that actually can be done.