I like high gasoline prices. I wish they were higher.
Some things are hard to do in a democracy.
A lot of my friends think Big Oil is the problem. I don't. I think my fellow Americans are the problem.
Gasoline prices are visible in-your-face reminders of inflation. High gasoline prices are bad politics.
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| California gas prices |
Politicians have a problem taking actions to raise gasoline prices to address climate change. Republicans oppose taxes; Democrats oppose regressive ones. Families of low or moderate income spend a higher percentage of income on transportation fuel than do wealthy people. That concerns Democrats. Higher gasoline prices generally favor people in cities and disfavor people in the countryside. That concerns Republicans.I like high gasoline prices because they are a persuasive price signal telling people to use cheaper alternatives. When it is cheaper for people to fuel electric vehicles with solar panels on the roof of their homes than it is to buy gasoline, then the whole economic system will adjust. Solar companies will install collectors, financial firms will finance them, and car companies will have the vehicles to buy. It is starting to happen.
I have written before that I don't blame Big Oil for drilling, refining, and selling us gasoline. We use fossil fuels because they were available and cheap, and 19th century technology made it work. Fossil fuels are still cheap. We still flair off natural gas at many wells because it doesn't pay to collect and sell it. We don't buy fossil fuels because we are talked into it by some con man. We want them. Oil companies supply what we demand. Americans have every power to regulate how oil is drilled, refined and sold. When people in Oklahoma get tired of the mini-earthquakes they will elect politicians who will create new fracking rules. If drilling and fracking causes methane leaks--and they do--then it is up to the American political system to stop it. We won't do that? Whose fault is that?
Businesses offload their externalities onto the public, or the future, or into oceans, or onto foreigners. We know that. We see it. We know that conscience and good will is an unreliable brake on selfishness. There must be mechanisms to shape self-interest. That is what democratic government is supposed to do.
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| Trump: 69%--Biden: 30% |
Democrats are probably correct in thinking that a majority of people favor "saving the planet from climate change." What is not correct is that a majority of people are willing to sacrifice very much to achieve that goal. What is my evidence for such a claim? The politics we experience right now. Coal mining has tortured and scarred West Virginia; surely people there hate what it has done to their state. No. If a majority of people hated coal mining no amount of money in campaign contributions could keep coal-supporters in office. Politicians support coal because the voters do. Wyoming, Texas, Oklahoma, and North Dakota are all coal or oil states. They are the most Republican states in the country.
I don't praise selfishness. I describe our political reality. We-the-people make choices. We are the enablers of Big Oil. We distract ourselves when we blame the wrong target. There is reason for Democrats, environmentalists, and climate activists to want to deflect blame onto Big Oil. Their real complaint is with a sacred target: Democracy itself. People are reluctant to sacrifice for the common good, especially for a distant and remote purpose. Democrats think that surely the problem must be campaign finance corruption, or mass delusions created by Fox News, or gerrymandering, or too many senators from the wrong states. Anything but us, selfish humans, using the energy source that is cheapest and most convenient.China might lead the U.S. in addressing climate. The air in some cities there is bad enough to motivate their political process. If their leadership decides to transition from coal to nuclear, solar, and wind they need not worry about pesky voters in coal country.
In a democracy, the way to put Big Oil out of business is to create cheaper and better alternatives to oil. That needs to be the focus for Democrats. We cannot force change on people, but when fossil fuels cost more than alternatives we won't need to.
20 comments:
High gas prices are a tax on the economy. It’s not just the cost to get across town that goes up it’s also your energy bill and the cost of goods and services. You don’t have to be jiimbo crumpacker w a robinhood app to know that the price of a million btu of natural gas is tied to the price of a barrel of oil. How are we energizing Oregon? We’ve lowered our coal usage to 27% and raised our natural gas use to 25%. Solar use is a whopping .8% because it simply doesn’t work. So if you’re looking for cheaper alternatives buy a bike. Until we have scientific breakthroughs that cost big bux the wealthy will continue to not give a sh__ and Oregon’s poor will pay the price.
https://www.oregon.gov/energy/energy-oregon/pages/electricity-mix-in-oregon.aspx
In spite of being enormously profitable, oil companies receive enormous amounts of corporate welfare. It’s obvious that our use of fossil fuels is quickly degrading the quality of life on our planet. Those who care, especially those that it will affect the most (our children) are committed to developing healthier alternatives.
Life is change and you can be sure it will come. Gas, coal and oil will inevitably go the way of tobacco, hopefully sooner rather than later: available but expensive – no more federal subsidies. As long as we still have huge RVs towing SUVs, gas is too cheap.
I agree with Democrats that a majority of people favor saving the planet from climate change. However, I don't believe more than a modest fraction of people really believe that the planet's livability is at stake. Talk is cheap.
Just as they once carried water for the Soviet Union as the avatar for collectivist morality, Democrats especially in academia and the news media now carry water for China, whether it's on COVID blame--or lack thereof--for catastrophic initial lies about transmissibility, for climate change amelioration measures, or on human rights. Will China lead, as suggested here? Maybe in sales of eco-gear to the Thunberg West.
The Guardian reported Wednesday that President Xi has just assured his Communist Party that China will not let "low-carbon ambitions" interfere with productivity and the "ordinary life" of its citizens. China is building 43 coal-fired plants this year, more that the rest of the world combined. So much for those important unenforceable climate promises secured from China by diplomatic powerhouse John Kerry.
As long as we still have huge RVs towing SUVs, gas is too cheap.
RV/SUV owners vote. There are a lot of them. Just get onto an interstate highway in the summer and look around. They outnumber Priuses by a wide margin.
I could show you 100 articles on the subsidies for ‘renewable’ energies that outweigh all the subsidies for stand alone energy generation that are in the low single digits combined and you’d still claim sold baseline source carbon emitters are somehow subsidized by your tax dollar. It’s simply not true.
It's really fascinating to consider how much we take for granted the miracle of fossil fuel. What would this world look like without it?
It's really fascinating to consider how much we take for granted the miracle of fossil fuel. What would this world look like without it?
Like this.
Transportation and industrial agriculture requires a distributed energy delivery system. Electricity and electric vehicles have range and recharge rates that are out of phase with with current systems using gasoline and diesel. The hybrid systems use both battery storage, fuel tank and plug-in capability. Hybrid system reduce the carbon footprint for ground transportation but not enough. A current option under serious study and engineering is to substitute hydrogen as the hybrid fuel. Refueling with hydrogen has the potential of being run like gas stations only this time you would be actually using a gas. Banks of solar cells would be called upon to make hydrogen from water or using small-scale nuclear power. Two tracks are under study and potential development at this time: one, a hydrogen burning internal combustion engine; two, a fuel-cell direct trickle charger to maintain the onboard battery. Both systems show promise and both would require government funding for further research and prototype manufacturing for scaled up production. Whether this system will power Peter's rototiller is not known but I never thought I have an electric leaf blower or electric chainsaw either. I am sure that when the technology is proven corporations will see a way to profit, then get out of the way and let capitalism run with it.
A lot like it will look like after man is gone. The Jewel of the Universe.
Gasoline is a commodity.
Why is regular gasoline pricet at $3.359 at most stations her in central florida, with no refineries nearby? ($3.159 at Sam's or Costco this week)
$5.59 in some parts of California, $3.99 near Beaverton?
www.gasbuddy.com
Are you getting what you expect from state and local gas taxes?
We've got highways and to roads, and many new highways and other transportation under construction, including private rail projects.
Ya gotta love it! Low Dudgeon is not only in denial of our ever-increasing temperatures, fires, floods, superstorms, melting icecaps rising sea levels and just plain pollution, but compares concern over it to a commie plot. Very intelligent.
Meanwhile, it sounds like anonymous is claiming that fossil fuels aren’t subsidized, although it’s hard to tell for sure. In fact, they’re subsidized tens of billions of dollars in the U.S. alone, and that doesn’t count the costs borne by taxpayers related to the climate, local environmental, and health impacts of the fossil fuel industry. This is just one of many credible references:
https://www.brookings.edu/research/reforming-global-fossil-fuel-subsidies-how-the-united-states-can-restart-international-cooperation/
You might want to look at this website home chicken. You can blather about China all day. Big black dots equal first world economy, ‘generally’ ie Russia. Emissions aren’t the cause of a changing climate: people are.
www.globalcarbonatlas.org
Re: subsidies
Fossil fuels subsidized?
Yes, as are solar, wind, and in some cases hydro. That's the tax system that federal, state, and local legislation has enacted.
The reverse is also true, as new legislation has in some cases made fossil fuels less attractive.
Still, progress to find the right mix of energy reliance is still slow, and definitely influenced by political rather than economic biases.
The point, of course, is that it's really stupid to be subsidizing something that's killing us in large numbers.
The Global Carbon Atlas says otherwise and if you think John Kerry isn’t respected diplomatically in the international realm then you’re living in Mike Pompeo world.
Anon @4:15–
1. “Says otherwise” how, or what?
2. Pompeo to Kerry is Hyperion to a satyr.
Higher prices for gas affect the poor more than they do the rich. Many of my friends have bought hybrids or electric cars. Those of us too poor to do that own second hand cheap old vehicles with 250,000 miles on them, and must pay more for gas.
Plus, more poor folks drive to work in person, while those better off often get to work from home.
Lets not forget the disappearance of streetcars as an auto industry tactic to force us into cars. If fossil fuels are analogous to recreational drugs, the pushers eliminated the over-the-counter safe alternatives.
Read - Oil Power: The Rise and Imminent Fall of an American Empire Paperback – January 1, 1975
by Carl Solberg (Author)
An excellent read about how three corporations conspired to remove the rolling stock (streetcars and bus systems) in 100 cities around the United States and systematically dismantle them.
I wish gas taxes were higher and used to fund improved and free public transportation, and to undo the damage caused by the oil companies.
Anyone who cares about America's security and prosperity should want to get rid of fossil fuels.
But Peter is right. Prices on everything will continue to climb because people are paying.
Companies care about the cash, not the complaints.
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