Bailout Warning: Love affair with the car over?
Time to rethink transportation?The Brookings Institution has released a fantastic study on the relationship of the car and America that adds an interesting element to the auto bailout.
"America is experiencing its longest and steepest drop in driving, signaling a permanent shift away from reliance on the car to other modes of transportation. In the coming years, this shift will have far reaching implications for transportation, environmental, energy, and land-use planning."
Even before the run up in gas prices in 2007 and 2008, the report finds, American driving habits were starting to plateau. Since, however, American vehicle miles traveled dropped by 90 billion miles. Obviously, higher gas prices helped put a spike in this trend, but cheaper gas has had little effect on reversing this trend thus far.
Thus Brookings warns, for instance, that the current gas tax will be insufficient to manage US transportation needs (although many argue it has been insufficient for years already), which probably means the need for higher gas taxes. Of course, higher taxes would help exacerbate this trend away from the car.
How would this affect the real world run rate of the auto industry?
Higher gas taxes for infrastructure, plus higher costs due to world oil demand, could mean much higher gas prices for the future. Such events could result in an even larger drop in miles traveled and much less demand for new autos. Such a scenario, according to Big 3 testimony, would crush the US auto industry, regardless of any bailout.
Will any bailout for the US auto industry even consider and utilize such findings?
Labels: gas tax
posted by Dahcredyns at
12:31 PM
4 Comments:
It would be a wonderful day if we didn't need cars anymore. People don't realize how much better their lives would be if there were alternative ways to travel.
The car is an extension of one's personality magnified. It's no wonder the auto industry does so well. It's easy to sell people things that make them larger than they really are. And the world has no more room for such people anymore.
Time to change.
Well stated Noz.
I think the government should try to seize this opportunity to create change, but I don't think they have any such intentions.
A successful bailout requires significant auto sales, far more auto sales than are needed. Yet, it seems that Congress will prop up the auto industry to go green, when the greenest thing to do today would be to sell less vehicles and continue the push to alternative, non-car transportation.
Dahc:
You are correct....they have absolutely no intention to change. Why would they? How would they then reap the billions and trillions in warfare? In oil profits? In continuing an economic system of slavery?
Change? What's that?
The only time this country will change is if people grow the balls to take their country back. Problem is the types of people who will take the country are not desirable either.
can't really argue against what you say. still, i think obama will lead to some change. he has good intentions, i believe, but i'm not sure that is enough. well, i'm pretty sure that isn't enough.
as you point out regularly, people won't accept any pain. thus, politicians continue to pander and act as if there are no costs to anything.
one day China will call us on our debt and we won't be able to print enough money out of that pain.
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