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| 5/23 |
| 2007/4/9-12 [Transportation/Car, Transportation/Car/RoadHogs] UID:46244 Activity:kinda low |
4/9 "At $3.25/gallon, good mileage ranks 22nd as the most important
attribute in buying a car."
http://money.cnn.com/2007/04/09/autos/pluggedin_taylor_fueleconomy.fortune
\_ $3.25 is still too low to change consumer behavior.
\_ We should put a $5/gallon tax on it.
\_ Agreed, and redirect the tax to development for solar power,
geothermal, more efficient cars, or whatever. (Well, maybe
not as much as $5, but still.)
\_ Agreed (well, maybe not as much as $5), and redirect the tax
to R&D for solar power, geothermal, more efficient cars,
fixing the atmosphere, or whatever.
\_ Not as much? $5 isn't nearly enough. I was being
conservative, since it should really be double that to have
the desired social engineering effect. If you want to
change the people's actions to something more beneficial
to the government you have to put punishing taxes on
negative behaviours. The carrot of course would be free
government bikes for everyone.
\_ Get rid of the payroll tax, and tax fuel instead at the same
aggregate level.
\_ I agree that gasoline tax needs to be raised dramatically.
The time to raise it was 15 years ago. However, our politicians
were either too stupid, too cowardly, or too corrupt. Now
we simply cannot slap on a large tax on gasoline. But gas
tax can and should be ramped up at the fastest rate which
doesn't screw us up horribly economically. Also, a way
needs to be found to make this tax less regressive.
\_ No, it is never too late to do the right thing. If we're
15 years behind on this grand social engineering task, if
we want to properly control the negative behaviors of the
people for the betterment of government, we must increase
gas taxes even more to make up for the past weaknesses in
this area you pointed out. Raising it $5/gallon would be
a good start but to make up for the last 15 years, a $7.5/g
increase would take THIRTY years to catch up and that's not
even taking inflation into account. Maybe $10/gallon would
put us where we need to be and would still take 15 years to
catch up. Taxes don't need to be regressive. The earth
doesn't care if you're rich or poor. If you are killing
the earth, our only home, you must be stopped at any cost.
\_ Wow spoken like an ultra earth loving leftist. You
realize that no one listens to you when you use the
"we must do this because we love earth" tone right?
I'm not saying that you're wrong, just that you're
not convincing anyone.
\_ Strawman. If you don't take care of the planet that
hosts your entire civilization you are a fool. I
never said we should all kumbaya in a giant tree
hugging circle. We should however still put a
behavior modifying $10/gal tax out there to stop
people like you from destroying all we have. A
healthy earth is required for continued human life.
How dumb do you have to be to not see that?
\_ I believe the number of cup holders ranked 18th in the most
important attribute. I suppose once gas lines become the norm again
or gas is $10/gallon (whichever comes first) Americans will once
again care about fuel efficiency.
\_ I care, but only about whether my car gets 40 MPG versus
12 MPG. I don't think most people would alter their choice
of car because one gets 28 MPG and the other gets 31 MPG.
So in that respect, mileage is not very important. Even
though there's a 10% difference in mileage, the placement of
cup holders in the car is something that impacts my experience
more than enough to offset the difference in mileage. Since
most cars are in the mid-20's to 30 MPG range anyway then
what does it matter? The people driving 12 MPG or 50 MPG
cars are on the fringes of the survey.
\_ You are clearly a threat to the planet and must be
prosecuted and then executed as an environmental criminal.
\_ Sir: the trial is already under way. Executions
have already commenced and execution rates will increase
year by year.
\_ Excellent! But we must execute faster! Faster, I say!
\_ what does it matter if my car gets 20 or 26 mpg, when I
drive so little. We should focus on usage. Set tight
gas quotas and see what that does.
\_ what will the quota be and who gets special exemptions from
the limit? are you going to arrest people who sell gas on
the black market you're creating? |
| 5/23 |
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| money.cnn.com/2007/04/09/autos/pluggedin_taylor_fueleconomy.fortune -> money.cnn.com/2007/04/09/autos/pluggedin_taylor_fueleconomy.fortune/ Column archive Passing the buck on fuel economy Instead of ensuring that we use less gas, politicians and consumers take the easy way out, says Fortune's Alex Taylor. Alex Taylor III, Fortune senior editor April 9 2007: 12:26 PM EDT NEW YORK (Fortune) -- President Bush thinks we should use less gasoline to reduce our dependency on imported oil and limit the emissions of greenhouse gasses. That's a worthy idea, and one that is endorsed by most politicians and a majority of Americans. But rather than change their behavior or make any sacrifices to actually accomplish this, Americans would rather shift the responsibility onto somebody else. In this case, it's the auto companies - and it's a mistake. Play video Bush is right about one thing: Since Americans aren't willing to conserve gasoline on their own, the government should step in. Consumers talk a good game about fuel economy before they arrive at the showroom. But they get dazzled by glitzier features when they walk into a dealership. "Customers will trade five miles per gallon to get fancy cupholders," says Mike Jackson, head of AutoNation, the country's largest auto retailer. Back in 2000, when gasoline was the cheapest liquid around, fuel economy ranked as the 29th most important attribute in buying a car. Sound systems and convenience features rank higher as purchase considerations. But rather than giving consumers an incentive to change their buying habits, Bush wants to force automakers to build more fuel efficient cars by raising the corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards for passenger cars and light trucks. Auto execs want fuel efficiency, within limits By so doing, though, Bush is reviving an urban legend that the technology is cheaply available if only the lazy old automakers would bother to use it. Making people save gas by buying thriftier cars, as General Motors executive Bob Lutz has said, is like telling people to lose weight by wearing smaller clothes. For small cars, it might be enough to add aluminum body parts or a more efficient CVT transmission to boost fuel economy. And given consumers' consistent pattern of behavior, they are still likely to buy the biggest, most powerful cars they can afford. Another solution proposed by Bush is to increase the use of gasoline blended from ethanol. True, less gasoline would be consumed, but so much energy is required to make ethanol in the first place that there would be no appreciable net savings. Besides, ethanol is a much less efficient store of energy than gasoline, so the miles traveled per gallon of fuel consumed drops by 30 percent. If Bush wanted some guidance on how to quickly and efficiently meet his goals, he need only look to Europe and Japan, where the motor vehicle fleets get dramatically better mileage than they do in the United States. The reason is simple: Higher taxes force drivers to pay more for gas. Raising taxes in the United States, say, ten cents a year until they reach $2, would stop people from driving their Hummers to get a quart of milk. For those who would be economically impacted, the extra money they pay in gas taxes could be returned to them as a tax rebate. But any system so simple and so fair hasn't got a prayer of becoming law in the current political climate, where politicians quake at the thought of asking voters to make sacrifices. And without incentives, consumers will continue to choose cupholders over good citizenship. In the meantime, other interested parties are filling the breach. Last week, AutoNation became the first retailer to identify the vehicles that lead their classes in fuel efficiency. It will attach a green, leaf-shaped logo to all cars and trucks that produce at least 28 mpg or beat the average mileage in their class by 10 percent. At least ignorance of mileage will no longer be an excuse for wasting gas. |