God forbid TTAC should criticize someone for making an outrageous suggestion to get people to think (rethink?) their opinion about an auto-related issue. But you gotta wonder if the book “$20 Per Gallon” is at least ten bucks too high in the hyperbole department. Still, credit where credit’s due. By setting sail on a ship fantasii, author, civil engineer (of all things) and Forbes reporter Chris Steiner has outed the environmental hairshirt wearers amongst us. Needless to say, the New York Times is chief amongst them. They’ve published a Q&A with Steiner that somehow manages not to lump-him-in with alien abduction deprogrammers—although the piece is filed under the Freakeconomics banner. Instead of demanding Steiner’s list of prescription drugs, the Gray Lady’s Annika Mengisen “asked him to give us his predictions for what our lives might look like with gas at $8 and $18 per gallon, respectively.” Fun!
Before we begin, an extract from the tome in question, courtesy of (who’d a thunk it) NPR.
In fact, many people’s lives, including many Americans’ lives, will be improved across a panoply of facets. We will get more exercise, breathe fewer toxins, eat better food, and make a smaller impact on our earth. Giant businesses will rise as entrepreneurs’ intrepid minds elegantly solve our society’s mounting challenges. The world’s next Google or Microsoft, the next great disrupter and megacompany, could well be conceived in this saga . . . This revolution will be so widespread and affect so many that it will evoke the Internet’s rise in the late 1990s.
But this revolution will be even bigger than that . . . This tale will bring with it all the global impact of a World War and its inherent technology evolutions — minus all the death. Some people even welcome oil’s coming paucity and expense as one of humankind’s grand experiments.
Utopia! We haven’t seen a good political polemic promising the best of all possible worlds since what, the sixties? To explore the possibilities, the New York Times turns on Q&A (the laziest, most editorially dubious journalistic format known to man). At $8 a gallon (2019), how will children get to school?
A: How you live largely depends on where you live. For people who live in walkable communities, life at $8-per-gallon gas will be far easier. Their kids will just hoof it.
Huh? Nebraska parents shudder at the thought. Anyway, you might have thought Steiner would be promoting mass transportation. Nope. Steiner reckons the school districts couldn’t afford to run busses. So . . . what?
Meanwhile, more family sacrifice at $8 a gallon. Steiner says Disney World’s toast; the cost of an economy class (presumably) round trip plane ticket will soar to a prohibitive $800. But hey, hybrids are go!
Consider this: driving will cost about three times as much as it does now at $8. That’s a giant difference. A family who now drives two cars 15,000 miles per year currently pays $325 a month for gasoline (assuming $2.60 and 20 m.p.g.). In a world of $8 gas, their monthly gas bill would be $1,000. That’s like a second mortgage. Costs like that will drive hybrids to be wildly popular — and so, too, will be the practice of cutting down on miles driven. The easiest way to do that, of course, is to get rid of your car, assuming you live in a place that will allow it (a lot of places don’t, obviously).
Obviously. But tough luck for them, eh? Next, the effect of $18 per gallon gas (2029 – 2039) on . . . sushi. Actually, that’s too far out there. So let’s go back to the “kids to school” issue:
By the time gas has reached $18, most people will live in places where density dictates that schools be grouped closer together, putting them within an easy walk or a brief bike ride.
Genetically speaking, that’s going to suck. But it does fit in with the whole smaller is better, global village, wear your hairshirt and like it mentality that’s informed the extremities of the environmental movement since ever there was one. As for personal transportation, fuhgeddaboutit.
At $18, you won’t have a driveway. There will be a whole generation of Americans growing up without cars at this point. They’ll live close to schools, close to new train lines, and close to places like restaurants and grocery stores. Electric cars will make an impact, but they won’t come in with the pricing power nor the volume to prevent massive changes in where we live and how we live.
So not even electric cars can save us? Holy shit that’s bad. So I guess we better enjoy our petrochemical lifestyle while we can, right? Right!
Eat sushi. Drive the trans-Canadian highway (in summer). Go to Australia. Go see Tokyo and take notes — life will be more like that and less like, say, Omaha, in the future.
So now you know: Tokyo’s going to be the new Omaha. So what of $20 a gallon gas? Too horrible to contemplate, I guess. Either that or the author, his argument and his interlocutor ran out of gas.
It sounds like the author’s argument ran out of gas before he started. Let me summarize:
“It’ll be great, except when it’s not [which will actually be 99% of the time]. When it’s not, too bad!”
At $18, you won’t have a driveway. There will be a whole generation of Americans growing up without cars at this point. They’ll live close to schools, close to new train lines, and close to places like restaurants and grocery stores.
It’ll be the 1850s all over again. Oh, and some of us are allergic to sushi.
This assumes a smooth orderly transition, slow gentle rise.
A different assumption involves abrupt transition. Al Queda setting off a nuke in Riyadh, perhaps.
Economic collapse. Trucks not getting through with groceries. .22s a scarce commodity, then soon nothing left to shoot.
Another assumption is USD stops being world currency. Oil quoted at 3 euros a gallon costing $18 USD per gallon. Again the trucks stop moving in US.
Hmm, so life would just be rosy, never mind the fact that everything we consume has to be shipped from somewhere, very few cities in the U.S. would support this type of “utopian lifestyle”, and tourism would be a thing of the past. Many cities, and obviously not just in America, thrive off of tourism, are they supposed to just FOD? Oh, and how are we supposed to get that $100 Bento Box? How are fishermen going to be able to operate their boats, how’s it going to be shipped, and are there going to be restaurants in every neighborhood to serve it? It’s preposterous to think that, without any truly viable alternative, gasoline at unaffordable prices would be anything less than disastrous for most people in the U.S.
The optimism is nice. At least it isn’t packaged with Cormac McCarthy’s The Road
“Instead of demanding Steiner’s list of prescription drugs, the Gray Lady’s Annika Mengisen “asked him to give us his predictions….”
If the NY Times had writers like you, they would triple their circulation. You crack me up!
This tale will bring with it all the global impact of a World War and its inherent technology evolutions — minus all the death.
Based on the last century of history, this type of disruption is much more likely to cause a world war, death and all.
I can see how high gas prices might, a few generations down the line, lead to somewhat improved lifestyles and cool new technologies (I lived in Manhattan for years and liked taking the subway). But it would be (will be?) a tremendously painful process.
I caught this nimrod on the NPR piece (must not have been a ball game on the radio…) He definitely has a New York state of mind. I can only imagine how many orgasms Terry Gross had listening to his drivel.
The interesting thing to me is that he assumes that people will blithely give up personal transportation to be herded into walkable communities or communes or slaughter pens or something, and that nothing else will respond to an enormous spike in the price of oil. No mention of alternative energy sources becoming economically viable or anything like that. Nope – simply that Disney World and Walmart are toast, and everyone must move into dense urban centers like his enlightened neighborhood in The City.
Sorry folks, I plan on staying out here in the boonies and cooking up homebrew fuel. The rest of you can move to “walkable communities.”
–chuck
Sound to me like he’s describing…OMFG…Europe!!
According to this brainiac (similar ones infest the current administration big-time), since I live 17 miles out of town/away from work, I’ll end up
a) losing my home to the banks (because I could not afford to drive back & forth to work from it) – plus it wouldn’t be “just me” so essentially, eventually, the strain of so many houses in the countryside being “given up” would entirely collapse the banking system – and therefore, according to the experts, the entire economic system too
b) I would end up paying much more on rent in town compared to what I would spend on my house payment so I could walk to work (you know, that little thing called “supply and demand economics” wherein everyone who now live out of town would be ‘forced’ to rent in town – dramatically driving up the costs of rents) I’d also be living in less space in town, no doubt (only have 1100 sq feet now – sufficient for my needs)
c) I probably would only be able to keep my Prius for a little bit of pleasure use – if I’m lucky
This would mean selling my collector car, and my wife’s car (or giving her car back to the bank since nodoby else would be buying cars anyway)
d) Michigan would essentially sink without trace as the auto industry would totally collapse. No point in the government subsidizing a buggy whip industry if all the horses are dead, is there?
e) Unemployment would probably soar to 50% with the disruption of the economy
Didn’t Russia’s centrally planned economy for 70 years teach humanity anything?
Teachable moment, eh? Not if our “leaders” in the current regime are so “smart” as to be unteachable, apparently. (In plain English, if you think you know all the answers and reality contradicts what you think you know, then you simply ignore reality – until it bites you in the ass, of course). I daresay, most of the inhabitants of the cities on the coasts are UNTEACHABLE. And they are the national leaders, eh? After all, the NYT is nothing, if not a party organ for the lordsoverus and how THEY think/want the world to operate.
This is just another example of the same shit we have to take from these imbeciles who think they know better than the rest of us.
Gasoline going from $3 to $8 would be a 160% increase. The real estate price of my city went up that much during 2005~2007. Went down a bit in 2008, and now back to historic high again. As I speak, people are bidding over asking prices. Many houses receive multiple offers.
People didn’t instantly become homeless. Life continues even for those who don’t possess a house. I don’t see any real benefit of that housing boom other than some home owners can afford expensive SUVs using home equity.
If it’s OK with a 160% housing boom, a 160% gasoline boom would be even better because there will be fewer SUV/pickups on the road to block my view. The additional fuel cost will be inconsequential comparing to the home mortgage burden the younger generation must bare.
So, I am with the author.
The guy is a moron at anything above $6.00 a gallon any number of things become possible. You can make gas out of water, the carbon dioxide in the air and a nuclear power plant.
http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/005004.html
Any chemistry majors out there can explain how it’s done. It’s not that hard.
While I agree that this guys predictions are overly rosy, anybody who doesn’t think gas prices are going to rise substantially over the next 20 years is fooling themselves.
Oil is a finite resource. Exactly how much is left, no one can say for sure, but I don’t hear anyone arguing that it is unlimited. As the easy sources get exhausted, the remaining sources of oil will be more difficult (and expensive) to recover.
This, combined with increased demand from growing populations and mobility of countries like China and India (exactly what do you think they are going to put in their Nanos?) will put huge pressures on the supply. Which will drive up the cost for everyone.
I agree with z4eva. The end of cheap oil, at least in the short term, will more likely make our lives miserable and lead to more wars (remember Iraq?) than it will to utopia.
It’s heartening to see what sacrifice Europeans and Japanese are willing to bear just to get a car. I happen to have a number of friends internationally and they always get a car the moment they can afford it. So there.
Liberals always dream of destroying suburbs, they did since 1880s. Only back then everyone living in suburbs took a steam-powered train. Cars are simply the excuse for them to corral people into cities. It’s so transparent for anyone who studied a little bit of history.
menno :
July 31st, 2009 at 12:57 pm
b) I would end up paying much more on rent in town compared to what I would spend on my house payment so I could walk to work (you know, that little thing called “supply and demand economics” wherein everyone who now live out of town would be ‘forced’ to rent in town – dramatically driving up the costs of rents) I’d also be living in less space in town, no doubt (only have 1100 sq feet now – sufficient for my needs)
——————————————–
On the bright side, that suburban MacMansion can be had for cheap. The money I save, can fuel my Prius for the next 1000 years. Plus there will be no congestion on the free way.
If future oil prices rise as he expects, it’s reasonable to think that a lot of his other predictions will become true.
However, one of the mistakes I think he makes is to underestimate the power of human beings to preserve their current ways through innovation.
For instance, it’s quite true that many of us will eventually live in an urban, walkable community model if we don’t already (although that trend has already been taking place anyway for reasons other than gas prices). However, the automobile still offers two enormous advantages: unparalleled personal freedom for transportation, and the most efficient way to get from Point A to Point B. There will still be a strong demand to see it preserved in some form, and innovation (i.e. electric cars and such) will rise to meet that demand, much more than I think he expects.
So basically US will turn into Europe, huh? What will happen to Europe?
No more drive thru, no more sitting in an idling V-8 SUV in front of a WalMart with A/C blasting? No more WalMart, in fact :-) No more FAT PEOPLE…
I don’t know, I walked to school for years and it was really great. Yes, in frigid weather, too — fun in the snow. In fact, I really hated it when I transferred to a different school and started taking the bus. Yuk. Not to mention very risky, the way our drivers usually drove.
If fuel prices were to severely increase, it would spur the ownership of high MPG motorcycles and mopeds.
Yes, this would be a sort of de-evolution to 2nd world status but still much more appealing than being confined to a boring walkable community.
As others have alluded, home brew and black market fuel will arise and we will find freedom of movement on rugged, thrifty Husqvarna type two wheeled vehicles that can run on crude fuels. This will allow us to side-step the less than smooth road conditions as infrastructure deteriorates.
Thus the unintentional consequences of the nanny-staters schemes, we freedom riders will have an even greater thrill as we blast past the planned communes.
Yeah, it’s always “If this one thing changes” with the corollary “…and everything else stays the same”. Even on those relatively rare occasions when that corollary is stated, the problem with economic predictions remains that everything else never stays the same, because you are dealing with the decisions that people make. When that one thing changes, people find ways to deal with it, and they are seldom those that the author making the prediction anticipated.
Getting excited about the pleasures of $20/gallon gas is pure disasterbation. It like saying that WWII caused the post war economic boom and thus recommending another world war.
Gas prices will never reach $20/gallon, inflation adjusted. The cost would be so disruptive at prices much lower that demand would fall sharply before we reached that level. Also other technologies, while imperfect, would become acceptable well before then. And new technologies would come to being proir to everyone moving to cities and eating only locally farmed, organically grown foods and/or government cheese.
Oil is not a finite resource; the earth produces it, not “fossils”. And because of this, the price will vary mainly due to political concerns and regulation.
Anyway, $20 gas only sounds shocking if it happens quickly, which it can’t.
Moreover, Americans will pay anything for a gallon of gas, altering their behavior very slowly over time. Which then causes the price to drop.
Not to worry.
Only 3 ways to get gas that high. First, we keep burning it in our land yachts and the laws of supply and demand gradually head us in that direction. Gives us 50-60 years to adjust.
Or, some government bureaucrats decide to artificially set the price. Ask your favorite econ professor what happens. There will be fuel surplusses like you have never seen before because at that price, it will be wildly profitable.
Or, the government taxes the crap of of it. Now, it is the government telling us that we have to cram into 1880s style houses that we can’t afford because nobody has jobs. Nobody who sits for election will ever do this.
I vote option 1.
In all reality – the most direct, effective and efficient way to reduce our wasted consumption of all resources is to make it expensive. Gas over $5 a gallon changes all Americans from wasting fuel, driving needlessly, etc. Of course our elected officials will never set bar on gas b/c it puts their careers in jeopardy – so we’ll have to wait for that time when it will eventually happen b/c of resource issues.
Whether oil is a finite thing or whether the earth produces it is pretty much a moot point. The important fact is that certain people have the hand on the levers of control over oil, no matter whether it is finite or not.
They screwed up big-time by putting the price up way too fast and helped to kill the goose that lays the golden egg (the US economy).
at anything above $6.00 a gallon any number of things become possible. You can make gas out of water, the carbon dioxide in the air and a nuclear power plant.
http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/005004.html
Any chemistry majors out there can explain how it’s done. It’s not that hard.
Why not just make methane or propane? Hell of a lot easier. Methane is completely non-toxic, but it’s a terrible greenhouse gas if it leaks. Propane is probably the best choice.
I don’t know what the energy loss of such a process is compared to running electric cars over the power grid, but it does solve the energy storage problem. Batteries just don’t cut it, and probably never will.
But yeah, at $20/gal, you probably could turn beeswax into auto fuel for cheaper :).
I never understand all this “We need to go to alternative fuels right now, while we still have plenty of gas” stuff.
If we have to go to alternative energy sources anyhow, what are we saving it for? It’s a pointless exercise. At the least we have 50 years to get there. It more likely that we have a hundred – (two hundred?) years.
To say that we will not have any technological advancements during the next 50 – 100 years is, well, stupid if not crazy. Even assuming that all the “low hanging fruit” for energy generation and consumption have already been implemented, there are still going to be substantial improvements. Quite seriously, what technologies are we using today that have not been dramatically improved in the last 100 years? The last 50 years?
As has been stated above, these ‘end of the world’ scenarios alway assume that only a single factor changes and that nothing else will. With the population explosion we’re going to run out of whale oil for lamps!
Well, with global warming, the need for fuel oil to warm houses in the winter is going to fall dramatically!
Oh, and if all else fails, we could begin using nuclear power, right? Oh wait! Can’t do that in America can we? Japan, a country the size of California has half the number of nuclear power plants that the U.S. does.
/Rant Off.
Did I miss something?
Wouldn’t we just come up with a cheaper form of energy to power our cars?
Thus netting us right back where we are today?
Ahh Lokkii gets it too… Good point on the whale oil.
Liberals always dream of destroying suburbs, they did since 1880s. Only back then everyone living in suburbs took a steam-powered train. Cars are simply the excuse for them to corral people into cities. It’s so transparent for anyone who studied a little bit of history.
Today, the dream of reeling the suburbanites back into the center cities runs hard up against the fact that many of those cities have huge unfunded public pension liabilities that will translate into huge taxes. In addition, at least in my part of the country, the center cities have driven off industry with poor business environments. And for families with young children, you can add the disincentive of public schools that are both expensive and low-performing. It might take $20/gal gas to overcome the disincentives the cities have set up for themselves. I’d sacrifice a lot to avoid moving back to the one I lived in for 18 years and on top of that, its actually further from my job than my rural suburban home is.
I was just in Tokyo last week, and I can say without reservation that when gas reaches $8/gallon, the sushi improves dramatically.
You know, as we’re all reading this article and thinking “how ridiculous, this would be devastating to ourselves and so many other people”, this might be a good time to sit down and think about why we’ve all put ourselves in a position to be devastated if the price of gas jumps. It’s kind of foolish to have put ourselves in this position, donchathink?
I don’t know why so many people are hating on Europe here.
A lot of people talk about “market corrections” which are prevalent in free market economics, yet seem to hate the idea of high petrol prices.
Certainly in Europe, high petrol petrol prices, would lead to a massive correction.
It would force people to drive sensible cars, makes trips they REALLY need and/or WALK. This would lead to cleaner air and a healthier population.
As for the US, high petrol prices, would lead to another correction which (after my holiday there a few weeks ago) you lot desperately need.
High petrol prices would force people to live closer to each other and amenities. Thus, creating communities in which can interact and socialise with.
Surely that’s a good thing?
So when the truckers stop shipping goods, food, etc, into his precious “well-designed urban metro area” because the cost of fuel is too high – what then?
Scare sells; in this case, it’s selling a book.
The simple way of life that all of this is going to bring about can’t possibly feed the beast, so it’s a moot argument from ‘go’. Anyway, like it was said above, a rise in price won’t happen in a vacuum. That $20 bottle of Cali cabernet will simply rise to $38, and I’ll be buying my wine from MI wineries from then on!
Oil is not a finite resource; the earth produces it, not “fossils”. And because of this, the price will vary mainly due to political concerns and regulation.
Yes, the earth “produces” diamonds, too. All you need is a few million years of unrelenting pressure and heat for it to happen. Why, that’s not a problem at all. Silly me. And this whole climate change thing? Well, that’s not a problem either because the biosphere can work around it in a few thousand years. Oh, and nuclear waste? That’s not permanent, it goes away after a few aeons.
“Fast and loose with the truth” does not even begin to describe what you’re playing.
We will run out of cheap, easy-to-extract oil at some point. We will run out more quickly as more people use it. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to reduce consumption before we’re stuck spending more energy than we can extract trying to wring oil out of tar sands and the like?
Predicting the future is as old as the concept of a future. It has entertainment value of some sort to some people.
I don’t think the point is really to dispute if it ever will happen (that never detracted from my enjoyment of Star Wars, for example), but rather, if we chose, to engage in some rational and disciplined hypothesizing.
I haven’t read the book, so I don’t know if this guy is “predicting” or “imagining” but I’d guess he’s guilty of too much of the former, to the detriment of his credibility.
Even though the original post lit the flame fuse, it might be more interesting to actually think about it, rather than just call the guy a moron.
KatiePuckrik :
July 31st, 2009 at 2:51 pm
The thought of someone outside my taste and my lifestyle telling me what is “sensible” is insane. You wanna save mother earth from exploding. Fine you WALK, you eat BUGS or whatever floats your boat (oops you can’t own one in your world) and does no harm the environment. Meanwhile I will continue to enjoy driving my Evo, drinking JD, and enjoying BBQ and steak (yes grilled). :) Freedom of choice rocks!
He sounds like Kunstler, but without the doom and gloom. I think Kunstler is a little too doomsday for me, but I suspect his version of the future is more accurate than this guy’s. How much is plastic going to cost when gas prices approach $20/gallon. What will all his utopian innovations be made from? How much will it cost given the escalated costs of resource extraction.
FleetOfWheel refers to “boring walkable communities.” I don’t get it. Come to Vancouver and compare our boring walkable communities to our suburbs. Our most expensive real estate is in our walkable communities, and I can assure you there is nothing boring about them.
Healthy skeptic: However, the automobile still offers two enormous advantages: unparalleled personal freedom for transportation, and the most efficient way to get from Point A to Point B.
Usually the most time efficient, yes, but nowhere near the most energy and resource efficient. We’re entering an era where you can’t ignore the latter for the sake of the former. Gas prices will get expensive, and we will need to make adjustments.
if Gas cost $20.00 a gallon than $20.00 will be worth $2.00-$2.50 in today’s dollars.
The price is meaningless except in comparison to wages and other prices.
Gasoline was $0.20 at one point and I would rather be living in the time of $2.00 gas than $0.20 gas.
Let’s see. Four litres to a gallon, so $20/Gal is $5/L, or about €3.5/L. That’s not a whole lot off of what Europe was paying when fuel went through the roof.
Truthfully, I’m amazed at the crybabyism in this thread.
We, as a culture, have developed in such a way that’s proving to be unsustainable. It’s going to get moreso as fuel gets more expensive (and it will, especially as the economy recovers). At some point, we will need to reduce consumption in order to live within our means, just as we’ve had to reign in credit use. Of course, reigning in credit appeals to conservative American values, while being green smacks of liberalism, and is therefore evil and communistic.
Does this mean we’ll no longer be able to haul fruit across the continent and across the world, and will have to put up with limited supplies, high prices and preserved foods? Yes.
Does it mean that rural communities will have to reorganize in such a way that they model European, Asian and African hub-and-farm setups? Yes.
Does it mean the end of suburban sprawl and communities that are pedestrian-hostile? Yes.
Does it spell the end for commuting? Yes.
Does it mean we’ll see a new emphasis on localism, bringing with it the return of gainful employment in local, small-scale manufacturing and retail? Yes.
Does it mean a growing importance in the knowledge industry? Yes.
Does it mean that there will be painful adjustments for lots of people who are dependent on the status quo? Yes.
Now, here’s the thing: we can either be proactive and inch our way their in a gradual way, or we can continue to do things the way we do and wait for the inevitable “market correction” that would be painful, assuming it is a market correction and not a sociopolitical one (eg, war) instead. Do you want to deal with the problem on our terms and according to our own schedule, or do we want to wait until it bites us in the ass unexpectedly?
I have no idea where this resentment about conservation and forethought comes from because it’s just bizarre.
Meanwhile I will continue to enjoy driving my Evo, drinking JD, and enjoying BBQ and steak (yes grilled).
Until the day that you can’t. And unfortunately, your freedom of choice comes with a price that, even if I were to eat bugs and live in a tent, I would have to pay.
So how about we share the load a little, ok? You drive your Evo on weekends and steak only once a month and maybe we won’t both be screwed when the next oil crisis spikes. That way you can keep driving your Evo—if not as frequently—instead of having to walk.
To those who think that trying to herd us into cities is some kind of liberal conspiracy, you are sadly mistaken. This movement is actually the brainchild of the prophylactic, alcohol and music promotion industries luring us into their scheme with hot, young, educated women, 1/2 price beer specials and thumping beats all within a few blocks. The fact that you can walk back to your place (while over the legal limit) with your new friend is the coup d’etat.
Don’t succumb to this nefarious plot!
Continue to spend your Friday nights in the basement searching he internet for your dream Russian bride. The struggle continues!
loverofcars1969
Yeah, sorry for trying to suggest that maybe living and working together as a society is the way forward(!)
I forgot that the American way of life is stepping on the other person’s head and screwing everybody else.
I’m just glad life isn’t like that in Europe.
High petrol prices would force people to live closer to each other and amenities. Thus, creating communities in which can interact and socialise with.
+1,000,000. Thank you.
I’ve been harping on this for a while. North Americans have been sold this vision of the suburban lifestyle by developers and city councils because it suits their needs (cheap to develop, lots of easy tax revenue).
The sad part is that most Americans and Canadians don’t even realize the degree to which they’ve been manipulated, and respond with resentment or aggression when it’s suggested that they change, resorting the base anti-intellectualism about “know-it-all city folk” telling them they have to live in “hundred-story high-rises” when what actual urban planners recommend looks more like a pre-war American town than Manhattan. Suburbs, as implemented, are really just horizontal highrises that isolate people in a subtle but similar way.
The suburban lifestyle has been so thoroughly wrapped in the flag (and falsely associated with the rural lifestyle, with which it shares nothing). Rural life is not a real problem: there’s so few people who choose it or can make it work economically. But even try to suggest a North American can’t live somewhere and they get twitchy.
For the record, I grew up on a farm. I live in a small city now, but made the choice to live in an older house near the core so that I can walk to most places I need to go to and meet people on the streets. I think it’s a lot healthier than a suburban McMansion for me and my kids (both socially and physically) and it’s quite a bit nicer than the urban high-rise I lived in as a student.
This movement is actually the brainchild of the prophylactic, alcohol and music promotion industries luring us into their scheme with hot, young, educated women, 1/2 price beer specials and thumping beats all within a few blocks. The fact that you can walk back to your place (while over the legal limit) with your new friend is the coup d’etat.
Ah yes, Liberalism extended to the clubhouse and the bedroom. Let’s hear it for leftist women!
(or men, or whatever…)
@psarhjinian:
I really doubt that we’ll ever run out of oil. The same fear was heralded 40 years ago. Since then, the earth’s population has more than doubled and oil remains plentiful. Oil shortages occur due to problems above the ground, not below it.
Global warming will end when liberals stop talking about it.
As for the ‘liberal conspiracy’ to herd us into cities, I don’t think it’s working. People seem to be fleeing the cities.
We will look like India does now. Scooters everywhere. Limousines will be Tata Nanos
With 20$ a gallon I’d recommend to drive on Champagne or some good white wine.
Grown up car-less in post-war Vienna/Austria, I’m all too familiar with such “future” scenarios. That’s why I know that “mass transit” actually means “mass transit”. Although fifty years are gone now, I still can smell that incredible stench of various body odors on hot summer days in streetcars.
Of course, this has changed now, although not to the better. The invention of mobile phones together with a general acceptance of all kinds of rude behavior renders public transport unusable for sensible people. It still is simply disgusting.
I really doubt that we’ll ever run out of oil. The same fear was heralded 40 years ago.
And we did run out of a lot of really easy to access oil. You’ll note we’re now into places like the Alberta tar sands, which a few years back were commercially worthless because extraction was too energy intensive to make money.
Well, it’s still energy intensive, but the price has gone up so it’s now commercially viable. At $20/gal, expect other sources that are expensive in terms of money, environmental cost, net energy or political risk, to become useful.
Eventually, we’ll exhaust other easy reserves and be stuck with more sites like the tar sands, which carry a huge capital, energy and environmental cost. And then we’ll run out of those, too. We’re already seeing it with natural gas and many elements (helium comes to mind).
So the question is: why wait until we’re behind the eight ball?
psar: you’re fighting a losing battle, friend. The tragedy of the commons is in full control. Nobody wants change.
When gas is $20/gallon, minimum wage will be $100/hour and gold will be $5,000/ounce. Nothing will change other than devaluating the dollar.
loverofcars1969 :
July 31st, 2009 at 3:33 pm
Fine you WALK, you eat BUGS or whatever floats your boat (oops you can’t own one in your world) and does no harm the environment. Meanwhile I will continue to enjoy driving my Evo, drinking JD, and enjoying BBQ and steak (yes grilled). :) Freedom of choice rocks!
——————————————
People do fight or even kill each other for resources. It’s ruthless, recent and very real.
We tree-huggers propose that we hold back a little bit to borrow us more time for research in alternative energy, so that neither you or me need to eat bugs.
But if you insist to use energy excessively, that’s fine with me too. I don’t intend to meddle with other people.
Just know that when resources are all depleted, you and me (or your children and mine) will inevitably battle for whatever remaining. And you aren’t necessarily physically or mentally more fit than me. You will probably be the one eating bugs, or being eaten by bugs.
$20/gallon gas makes the Volt a huge success. If most of that $20 is product price it means the NorthEast is screwed as we heat with fuel oil – basically diesel with some more impurities such as paraffin. In much of the northern US, solar is, not to mince words, stupid, at its current level of efficiency, cost and projected lifespan. You can play along here:
http://www.solartradingpost.com/calculate.php
How about a nice Toshiba micro nuke? Fuels those electric cars, heats and cools the homes….
http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/a-nuke-on-the-yukon/1
10 megawatts – that would be 830 homes at 100 amps draw, 120V, continuous
psarhjinian :
We’re already seeing it with natural gas and many elements (helium comes to mind).
I think your information is out of date. Natural gas is abundant now – new drilling techniques & discoveries have sharply increased reserves in just the last year or two.
Hopefully the same will happen for oil.
This is real “Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining” material:
The world’s next Google or Microsoft, the next great disrupter and megacompany, could well be conceived in this saga . . .
The NYT and the rest of their center-left brethren spent the better part of a decade trying to break up Microsoft and now they want us to believe that their whole motivation for mega-taxing Gasoline is to bring forward the next MSFT from the ensuing wave of Creative Destruction?
Joseph Schumpter is probably vomiting in his grave.
By all means, don’t do us any favors.
midelectric@3:55, that is the best post I’ve ever seen on here. Free virtual beer for you, sir!
And yes, I live in a “walkable community”. It means I can walk (yes, walk!) home drunk one the weekends from bars. And the bar isn’t TGI Fridays! Or even a CHAIN! Imagine that.
My driving is purely for pleasure, inter-city travel less than 800 miles distance or so, and hauling lots of/large stuff, not for necessity, and I love that.
The horrible, horrible walkable communities will be like small-town Vermont, not Manhattan, for everyone that has a big fear of cities and high-rises. That’s a straw-man.
Oh, and if all else fails, we could begin using nuclear power, right? Oh wait! Can’t do that in America can we? Japan, a country the size of California has half the number of nuclear power plants that the U.S. does.
If the US does ever get serious about energy independence, Fischer/Tropsch refineries to produce gas and diesel from coal using electricity generated from nuclear power plants are the way to go.
But whackos like the propeller-head who wrote this disasterbation screed hate coal even more than they hate nukes.
Actually, this is a great idea!
Just think! We can put goddamn near every ‘merican to work passing ava-frigging-cados from Bakersfield to the A-ampersand-MFing-P in New York so this NPR-spewing idiot can have some guacamole with his organic MF-ing BBQ duck-virgin-whole-wheat tacos at Mesa Grille (sorry Bobby – the place is great).
BECAUSE @ $20/Gallon petrol and $28/Gallon diesel, ain’t nuthing happening but ambulance companies getting rich off ObamaCare emergency room drop-offs. And there will be plenny O dat sh&#!
I never quite pictured how much we are reliant on oil. A loss of oil will most likely prove disastrous for a huge portion of the world.
I don’t know about the rest of you I just got OUT of a big city.
Walkable? Maybe. Not for my wife when we had multiple rapes in our “good area” in a short time. She still drove to/from work as it was safer, even though it was a 10 minute walk.
We are now out in the suburbs 40 miles from the city and I don’t think I’d trade it for anything.
* Everyone waves hi
* People all know each other fairly well
* We are not right next to any industrialized area so it’s quiet & mostly smog free.
* Getting to the highway at 4:30am to go to the city doesn’t take any longer than at 8:30am.
* No traffic jams (locally) at 5pm
* every possible store you want is within about 8 miles with 40-50 mph roads everywhere and dual left turn lanes being common
* You can register being out of the town with the city (4+ days) & the city will have a police officer come by once or twice a day to make sure nobody has broken into your place.
Contrast that with where I was from (A big walkable city) — Chicago
* My rent for a 4 bedroom apartment was 40% more than my house payment for a 4 bedroom house.
* Taking public transport home 7 miles never took less than 45 minutes and had taken over 2 hours before.
* Riding a bicycle to work was just asking to be killed (evidenced by “ghost bikes” chained in multiple locations I passed on my way to work where previous bicyclists died)
* No point at leaving work between 4:30 and 6:30 because it would take almost/over an hour to drive 7 miles.
* Lots of public transport but very few 24/7 routes.
* Property prices that were 4-5x higher than what I’m paying — for smaller pieces of property.
* higher sales taxes.
* higher crime.
* No parking anywhere.
* suspension destroying potholes & speed bumps
* Corrupt politicians
* Parking meters replaced with payboxes owned by private companies, enforced by the city.
* tons of sub 3 second red light cameras
Thanks, but I can’t imagine moving back to a heavily populated “walkable” area anytime soon.
Did you see the interview with the author of this book on Market Watch.com?
He had this creepy, delighted grin when talking about all the sacrifices Americans will have to make should his vision come true.
You can see that same wishful thinking in the doomsayers on here.
They fervently hope that hydrogen or other alternatives will never come about.
They so desperately want to control your life and admit they will “allow” you to eat 1 steak per month.
Must be sad to get up everyday and wish against other people’s liberty.
Here’s their rationale: every single little thing you do affects everyone else, viola…they get to tell you what you can do.
@Robstar,
Don’t forget to sell your city sticker! They need it to control the vote.
I left Bucktown in 1996 (I love Chicago) but I guarantee that “I” have voted there in every election since! You know, Chicago – vote early, vote often.
Sorry, Richie!
I have been following the unfolding Peak Oil dilemma for about 4 years at theoildrum.com. Before 2008 I like many commenters and posters there thought that Peak Oil would mean ever rising prices.
2008 taught us that as gas prices rise they reach a level that crashes the economy. In 2008 it was about $4/gallon that precipitated the crash. As the economy crashes, gas prices will fall back because of lack of demand even though less gas is available due to Peak Oil.
With the next recovery gas prices will rise quickly again even as they have done in the last 6 months or so. A new high above $4/gallon will probably be reached in a better economy with a modest recovery in auto sales.
At a new gas price high the economy will again go into recession if we haven’t switched to ethanol, natural gas or electric powered vehicles by then. Another recession will put us back into our current situation and another cycle down will have been completed. Cycle will follow cycle down the backside of Peak Oil.
Since there is so much resistance to change in how cars are fueled, it seems little can be done about it. Add in the booming demand in China and other developing countries and the future for American auto sales in a saturated recession prone market is not bright.
This is now the consensus at theoildrum.com and I agree with it.
At a new gas price high the economy will again go into recession if we haven’t switched to ethanol, natural gas or electric powered vehicles by then. Another recession will put us back into our current situation and another cycle down will have been completed. Cycle will follow cycle down the backside of Peak Oil.
Are you suggesting that oil supply – not multiple derivatives on fundamentally unsound home loans – is the cause of the current state of the economy?
dgdurls> You can’t sell the city sticker anymore — your license plate is imprinted on it!!!
@Robstar,
Now there’s a case of technology bringing a perfectly good business to its knees! ;-}
Robstar–
Read my comment about the “ZOMG!!! EVERY CITY WILL BE LIKE MANHATTAN!!!” strawman. Think Burlington, Vermont, instead.
Or this town, that was built using new urbanist guidlines:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seaside,_Florida
Robstar–
Did you read my comment about the “THEY WILL FORCE US TO LIVE IN MANHATTAN!!1!!11” strawman? Think Burlington, Vermont, instead. Or Google Seaside, Florida. Not real scary.
@FleetOfWheel:
If fuel prices were to severely increase, it would spur the ownership of high MPG motorcycles and mopeds.
Yeah, but more mopeds and motorcycles drive up healthcare expenditures. Can’t be having that now, can we.
Robstar, you’re absolutely right, but there’s just no prying idealism out of the hands of those for whom positivity is more important than reality.
Here’s reality: I live in a high-density condo in a “walkable” community right now, because it’s all I can afford. As I type this, there are stupid babies screaming, dogs barking and I just commuted from my job in another high-density high-rise via a hot, high-density bus. If I walk anywhere, I’ll almost certainly get approached for spare change by someone I can smell a block away.
It’s a nightmare, and I can’t wait to gas up my car tomorrow morning to head out into the mountains where I might, if I’m lucky, get a couple hours of peace and quiet. I’d go absolutely nuts if that kind of relief became less available because the tank of gas suddenly cost me $150.
I live here because I chose a career that’s only really found in larger cities. I didn’t see it at the time, and that’s my fault — I’m paying the price. Even now, the cost of fuel is a part of what’s keeping me from moving out of the city and commuting in each day. I keep hoping that I’ll work my way into a financial position where it’s a more reasonable option, but inflation is against me.
So, although I’m as pleased as punch that the greenies of the world find pleasure in the thought of living shoulder-to-shoulder with a million other self-centered, noisy rubes and living off rainbows and unicorn farts, there’s also a very large demographic who finds that vision of the future default lifestyle to be utterly terrible. Could it be that some of us want to live in the ‘burbs because we just like the comparative space? No, we’re just lacking a “community mindset” and we’ve been railroaded into missing the ideal of living in a concrete box.
How could I have been so blind?
Here’s reality: I live in a high-density condo in a “walkable” community right now,
Christ on a Cracker, you still think “walkable” means “Manhattan Condo?” Did you read the thread?
Stop by Ashland, Virginia some time. It is crime-free, quiet, voted for McCain something like 80-20. The homes are attractive Victorians on 1/4 acre lots and fenced in backyards.
You can also get your essential needs within walking distance, it has actual sidewalks, cafes, and bars without having to drive 20 minutes.
Don’t get the mockery of those who embrace “smaller is better”…While that certainly is not always true, whats with America’s obsession with bigger is always better? This utter bullshit is drilled into kids heads from day one. “Oh what a BIG boy!!” Sometimes less is really more. Just look at the waistline of typical Americans today. Supersized sacks of shit. A little more exercise certainly wouldn’t hurt. I don’t blame obesity on cars per se, but anything that encourages more activity is a good thing. I would hate to see fuel so expensive so that driving became available only to the fat cats, but at some point, the supply will not keep up with the demand, and the earth’s ability to produce it. Sooner or later, energy will consume more and more of our personal budget and when that happens, our standard of living will go down the toilet.
20 bucks a gallon, that’s 50 c a mile (say, since one effect will be to push people into more efficient cars).
In Oz the true running cost for even the crappiest new car is around $1.25 a mile. (http://au.toyotaownersclub.com/news/au_indexPage.php?59)
So your car already costs you far more than that when all is said and done, so yes, it will cost you more, but not that much.
Personally I relish the challenge of designing 40 mpg cars, and having a captive market to sell them to. (Evil laugh)
stainless, may you find the peaceful place you desire, to settle down and enjoy life rather than being crammed into a cesspool of lowlifes.
Trying thinking laterally. Is there some other job you could use your skills in?
I’ve lived in the UK, and did not enjoy being in a 12′ wide 2 story “row house” then later, a 14′ wide 2 story “row house”.
Ironically, I had to drive 40 miles to work then 40 miles home from the 2nd house, because when I changed jobs, there were so few houses near my remote rural work, literally the closest house I could find was a town near the seaside. That was an ususual and peculiar situation due to the nature of my work, though, not a problem with the UK.
Yes, fuel did cost 300% of what it did in the USA, and my wage was about 1/2 what it would have been in the states. Which are a couple of reasons why I came back home to the states.
Everyone is convinced that our entire transportation system would crash with $8/gal diesel.
It would evolve to become more efficient, but the trucks & trains would still role:
With the stroke of a pen long combination vehicles could be legalized for the entire Interstate system. Viola! your freight fuel mileage has almost doubled. Trucks would be governed at 53mph.
Local trucks would become hydraulic hybrids. Hybridization gives a package car or trash truck a 30-50% efficiency boost.
CNG would become popular for local and regional fleets.
Our current heavy use of air freight for frivolous purposes would end.It makes economic sense to overnight the critical part for your $5M piece of capital equipment, not a book or widget that your saw on Amazon. There is no point in the 48 states that is more than 4 days away by truck.
Some of the abandoned rail lines that became bike trails would be part of the “trails to rails” program. A lot more freight would ride the rails in 53′ domestic inter-modal containers.
Class I freight railroads would electrify the high traffic mainlines.
Assuming oil output really is at or close to peak, which most of the gas-at-$20 crowd seems to imply, $20 gas is a godsend. It may sound back asswards, but in the face of falling supply, and demand growth in the developing world, should prices stay low, it will only be because our economy is in such shambles that demand is permanently crippled. So, assuming declining production, higher prices are a sign of good things.
Now, against that background, I’m not entirely sure higher gas prices will result in quite the doom and gloom some seem to think. I live in a city, so call me smug, but I did use to live way out in the sticks. And I still rarely bothered taking the car out more than once a week or so. Even for those who day commute, unless their home is already priced at construction cost or below, much of the increase in commute cost will simply be cut from land prices, or rents. Which may suck if you’re a mortgage lender or landlord, but otherwise, who cares.
And I can’t help but wishing for semi deserted freeways with too little prey to make setting speed traps worthwhile. Heck, were that to be the outcome of $20 gas, I’d probably, contrarian that I am, start driving a whole lot more than I currently do.
@stuki,
The price of gas isn’t about how much it costs you to drive from suburbia to wherever.
The price of gas – and diesel – is about what it costs to harvest corn for ethanol and corn-syrup. What it costs to deliver truckloads of wheat to mills and flour from mills to bakeries. The price of fuel is about how much it costs Jeff Bezos to ship your Roomba to your front door or Zappos to send you new Birkenstocks (did Jeff buy Zappos yet?).
So hope not for high gas prices so you can have deserted highways because you’ll also have deserted grocery store shelves.
Understand? Comrade?
Yeah, oil will run out at some point. So what? By that time we’ll have nuclear plants all over the place to charge up our EV’s, which by that time will as performance-capable as today’s gas-powered vehicles.
Regarding the original post, the whole idea smacks of death-of-suburbia lib wet-dreaming to me. I don’t think dude’s thought this through. The laws of supply and demand apply to all things, so when the unwashed, gun-toting hordes start flooding his concrete paradise and drive the price of latte’s and merlot through the roof, what will he do then?
So hope not for high gas prices so you can have deserted highways because you’ll also have deserted grocery store shelves.
We got along quite well when we used to be restricted to hundred-mile diets. I make a point of trying to buy local produce and I can get along quite well, despite living in the Canadian Shield’s less-than-apropos growing season.
Somehow, we stocked shelves in an era before JIT food distribution and foods engineered to ripen (badly) on the truck. I think we can survive again, we just have to (eventually) give on the Cornucopia Of Freshness produce section full of foods that, if you note, are wasted in huge volumes anyways.
The way we move foodstuffs today is madness incarnate. Walk your grocery store and note that you’ve got apples from China, South Africa, Argentina and New Zealand. Apples. We can grow apples in North America practically anywhere that isn’t tundra or desert and we can certainly can them at their peak, but instead we haul them on boats from halfway across the planet because we can buy them in bulk from huge growers and distributors on the cheap, to the detriment of smaller local growers, people in the source markets, and our energy use as a species—all because fuel is cheap.
Think about how many small businesses have been killed and how many jobs have been outsourced because of mobility. Think very carefully about the ticky-tacky housing developments that keep people isolated, fearful of neighbours and driving everywhere because the neighbourhood design is hostile to pedestrians. There is a real cost to cheap fuel, and it’s becoming more apparent how soon it will come due.
And no, public transit** and highrises are not the solution; walkable, integrated neighbourhoods are. The poster who mentioned Burlington, VT cites a great example of a sensible urban North America. No one, but no one, is recommending everyone be moved to New York and Los Angeles and subsequenty be forced to eat only vegetables, drink coffee with an Italian name, marry a member of the same sex and listen to Al Gore all day long.
** Saying “Oh, we need more public transit” to traffic problems is a band-aid solution. You don’t need much beyond backbone transit in a sensibly-planned environ; you should be walking distance for most things. Slapping on transit is to sensible urban planning what adding salt and ketchup is to cooking a good meal in the first place
dgduris,
I’m just trying to be positive, man :)
And while you’re right that oil prices will feed into the prices of most things, for most Americans, I doubt the actual quality of life difference will be that big. Even if food prices across the board triple, it will, for most people, not mean anything close to empty shelves, at least in the starvation sense. After all, food is a rather small share of total household consumption in the US. And there’s plenty of slack built into most households’ food budgets. It’s not like most people go that far out of their way to shop cheaply, or at least the people I know don’t, even though some of them do consider themselves rather frugal.
The biggest declines resulting from sending an increasing share of our output to Arabia will be borne by highly elastic higher order goods. Like air travel. Or 1400+hp offshore boats. Those luxuries will increasingly be reserved for the Arabs. My contention is that the decline in the quality of life experienced by most Americans from a change like this, won’t be that big. It will obviously be a decline, but not the catastrophe some seem to assume.
Or, somewhat technically, I suspect most Americans’ utility function with respect to fossil fuels consumption, are pretty far out on the diminishing returns end. So even a quite sizable drop in fossil fuel use, won’t lead to that much perceived suffering.
“I can only imagine how many orgasms Terry Gross had listening to his drivel.”
eewwwwww.
Now I have to drink a bottle of vodka to forget the image.
OK, so gas at $18 a gallon is a bit far fetched, and will probably be decades before or IF such unfortunate realities occur…
But at the same time, wake up people(!), the writing is on the wall and has been for OVER 30 years. Burning oil harms our planet severely, provides money to a**hole regimes and terrorists, and the competition for the remaining dino-juice is only going to get worse in the coming years.
The time to be proactive is NOW, before a major crisis point. Funding for bio-fuels and alternative fuels research, raised gas mileage standards, and beginning to develop infrastructure for sustainable alternative fuels is critical to our current and future national security…
Ever notice how little of the world’s oil belongs to “nice, friendly people”? Canada is the only other decent country with any substantial reserves, and you watch…without a MAJOR shift in energy policy, the coming oil dramas could even turn our neighbors to the North into major jerks in future decades.
Anyone in denial about these facts is as prepared for future realities as the long-dead dinosaurs we use to power our vehicles.
Even though I drive a Miata, and know that vehicular fun AND good gas mileage can coexist, it makes me kind of sad too…but V8’s, jumbo-sized SUV’s, and other gas guzzlers NEED to be put out to pasture, and/or reserved for special occasions. It’s “smoke ’em if you got ’em time”, folks, and reality knocks on our door…
I really doubt that we’ll ever run out of oil. The same fear was heralded 40 years ago. Since then, the earth’s population has more than doubled and oil remains plentiful. Oil shortages occur due to problems above the ground, not below it.
Ah, yes, the Infinite Oil theory. Not only scientifically clueless but also hopeless myopic. Did you fail to notice that oil companies are searching worldwide for new supplies and finding jack sh1t? Did you notice that existing wells peak and decline predictably?
—
I really doubt that we’ll ever run out of oil. The same fear was heralded 40 years ago. Since then, the earth’s population has more than doubled and oil remains plentiful. Oil shortages occur due to problems above the ground, not below it.
—
Global warming will end when liberals stop talking about it.
Well let’s hope they don’t stop talking about gravity. Ok, I know these folks don’t respect science and all, and now it’s clear why: scientists are all liberals (except fake scientists that publish fake “studies” to trick gullible idiots, those are the good ol’ boy conservatives).
Speaking of myopia, it’s hope the folks in charge can see a little bit further into the future than just this week.
—
—
The point of the piece is to illustrate all the decisions our society has made based on the assumption of cheap personal transportation.
There is some ambiguity with the original article’s question. Fixing only for the local price of gas makes many assumptions. For example, it doesn’t specify whether the increase is directly from crude prices or through taxation. It also doesn’t address how other energy sources are affected. This is the source of confusion for many comments above. As such, it’s at best a totally abstract and hypothetical question unsuitable for arguing over specifics.
Finally, Freakonomics is an excellent book. It’s a sample of an empirically based look at the world, something sorely needed in the modern world.
@psarhjinian,
Our world economy is now constructed upon the reality of global goods transportation like it or not.
I too prefer produce produced locally. But ppl isn’t going to feed the world – or get virgin whole wheat taco shells to Bobby Flay’s place in NYC – and those NPR types really need their virgin whole wheat.
Further, if you don’t house people vertically, you won’t have either land left to grow food or fuel left for same as it will all be used to transport workers hundreds of miles to NYC/LA/Chicago/wherever so they can work.
You know, the thing that gets me is the attitude that everything that has come before must be the product of idiots because we are so much smarter than they were.
We have high-rises because they are a more efficient way to house people close to where they produce for society. We use petroleum-based energy sources because they are more efficient than the aforementioned whale oil and we’ll be using electricity generated by the tides before long – unless the moon falls into the earth (No, Greenpeacers, this is NOT an imminent threat).
It all takes time, but society moves slowly – and based on pressures of REALITY – not bunk fabricated to strike fear in the hearts of the average reader of People Magazine (how much $$$$ is Al Gore making on Global Warming consults this year?)
Rant 2:
@stuki,
It must be nice where you live. Where I live we have communities promoting bicycling to work because the people in those communities cannot afford cars having made the choice to keep their families in the homes they have owned for generations instead of moving into “the projects.” Unfortunately, the bus lines cannot afford to service the area.
Also, obviously, you’ve never visited a market in a country where they have a “planned” economy.
America is failing because in large part – we have no clue what is essential and what is luxury.
Oh! Yes, I live in America. About a mile from Mr. Farago. I am VERY optimistic…and old enough to know that there are no simple, single-facet solutions to any problems that have evolved over decades, regardless how eloquent the orator of such proposed solutions may be.
Oh man, us car guys, we sure do get ourselves into a tizzy when somebody says gas might yet get really expensive!
Folks, it ain’t so complicated. If gas stays cheap then everything is hunky dory, and then Steiner’s book is just one of those many predictions that went wrong.
If gas gets expensive — and I think it will, because we will have economic growth in India and China and Russia, and that will screw up the demand-supply equation — then what happens?
Well, that’s market economics 101, isn’t it? High prices will cause a shift in demand to other things. We’ll be travelling less and walking more. Cities will become even more sensible and suburbs more boring. Farmers will pay more to drive their kids to school (boo hoo) and other kids will walk more (yay). Hicks will cry and hipsters will rejoice. So the NYT is on the side of the city slickers? If you don’t like it, then read the North Platte Telegraph.
Prices change! Deal with it when it happens, and hedge for what might happen, i.e. don’t buy a fatso car.
There is a point most seem to be missing. I am fine with what gas costs when it costs what it costs. In other words, let the market set it and I can deal with it. If it is low, I may indulge in some luxury. When it is high, I will adjust my lifestyle like I did in 2006 when I let go of my beloved Ford Club Wagon and bought a Honda Fit. If it gets real high, I will make other changes, and may move somewhere that requires less driving.
My problem is when someone decides that he/she/they are smart enough to set a price different from that set by the market (which is all of us making free and voluntary transactions). Price controls never work. Try them and we are guaranteed either surplus or shortage, depending on whether the price gods set the price too low or high. Or put really high taxes on gasoline and not on other useful stuff like electricity or clothing (I’m not going to wade into taxing food and water, but gasoline may come not too far behind to some, depending on their situation). The result will be more unintended consequences than you can count. It is still some people manipulating how other people live.
When I was 5, my mom decided what and how much I should eat. Now that I am 50, I get to do this myself. I also get to decide where to live, what I drive and how I spend my free time. There are large segments of modern society that want to tell me what I can and cannot do in virtually every facet of my life. When these folks get to decide how much things “should” cost, the game is up, folks.
You know, the thing that gets me is the attitude that everything that has come before must be the product of idiots because we are so much smarter than they were.
No, only some people who’ve kept up with the latest advancements in knowledge are so much smarter than before.
I think it’s pretty obvious many people haven’t.
When these folks get to decide how much things “should” cost, the game is up, folks.
How much should a kilo of a heavy metal cost? How much should it cost when dumped in your back yard? How much should asbestos cost?
Not so simple now, huh?
You either choose price control or regulation, or STFU next time I dump toxins in your back yard.
jpcavanaugh – look if gasoline didn’t require the oxygen of the air in order to burn I would agree with you, the market should set the price for this commodity.
I say “Burn all the gasoline you want”. However there are externalities that you don’t pay for when you burn gasoline. Those externalities are the health care I have to pay for when my lungs find the oxygen of the air now contaminated with the fumes from all that gasoline you’ve felt so free to burn.
By your actions you are exhibiting the same kind of irresponsibility that I would exhibit were I to pass by your car later on and donate a pound of sugar to its gas tank.
Actually, so many of the posters on this story are up in arms about being told “what to do”. Well, nobody should be told what to do provided they take full responsibility for their actions. Fully 3/4 of all diseases are the byproduct of life style choices, you know, doing what you damn well please. Well, why should I have to pay for somebody who chooses to be a slug? If there was only an equitable way to distribute responsibility. On a small scale, a nearby town surcharges people who use a disproportional amount of water because much of what they use is wasted on lawns. Seems a step in the right direction to me.
My ’79 Lincoln Continental was waaaay cooler with gas at $4.25 a gallon. People looked at you wide eyed in that thing. $100.00 fill ups = 245 miles =/-. Looked even more out of step with the times. Loved every minute.
To those who think that trying to herd us into cities is some kind of liberal conspiracy, you are sadly mistaken. This movement is actually the brainchild of the prophylactic, alcohol and music promotion industries luring us into their scheme with hot, young, educated women, 1/2 price beer specials and thumping beats all within a few blocks. The fact that you can walk back to your place (while over the legal limit) with your new friend is the coup d’etat.
Funny stuff. Don’t think my wife and kids would go for it though.
How much should a kilo of a heavy metal cost?
However much people who want it are willing to pay.
Not so simple now, huh?
Yeah, still simple.
You either choose price control or regulation, or STFU next time I dump toxins in your back yard.
Are you my lawn treatment guy? If so, we need more toxins on those broadleaf things in the very back by the fence. Your toxins are doing a great job keeping the rest of lawn weed-free and green. Keep up the good work!
T2 & Agenthex- The US passed the Clean Air act in 1970. I have read that something like 95% of pollutants that came out of a tailpipe of that era have been removed. I understand what externalities are and therefore do not advocate a repeal of the Clean Air act. Wanna debate whether the air is clean enough? OK with me.
But please don’t equate my desire to drive a legally equipped car that is large enough and powerful enough to be safe and comfortable for my family of 5 to pouring sugar in my gas tank or illegally dumping toxins in my back yard.
Rivercat30 – a much better treatment of the issue than mine!
golden2husky:
You certainly would be better off (just in terms of peace of mind) not to believe in the fear-mongering MSM trash you seem to inhale, as “fully 3/4 of all diseases are the byproduct of life style choices”. Of course, this is nonsense.
Sane (i.e. tax-paying) people generally do not need any advice on what risks to take and what choices to make from notorious idiots like politicians, journalists and/or attention-whoring “scientists”.
Independent of time and culture, it has always been a safe bet NOT to follow mainstream. Give it a try. You simply have more choices and more fun.
My problem is when someone decides that he/she/they are smart enough to set a price different from that set by the market (which is all of us making free and voluntary transactions).
+1
Even though the market is driven by speculation more than demand/supply. But Barak gonna fix dat mess!
Forbes reporter Chris Steiner may be a civil engineer, but that doesn’t qualify him for writing a book that–and forgive me, I haven’t read it–must be basically about economics. My guess is that he’s young (20s, maybe 30s), idealistic, and naive. Seems to me Europe already has $8/gallon gas, or rather 9-10/gallon gas. They live closer together, and they drive smaller cars, so they make due driving an average of 9,000 miles a year instead of Americans’ average of ~12,000.
I don’t know when he’s predicting $18/gallon gas to occur, but I doubt that it’s in the next 20-30 years, because unless some catastrophe happens, the price will rise gradually, and people will adjust gradually, and there’s probably a lot of slack that can be taken up by smaller, more efficient cars. Mind you, I’m all for walkable communities, and I somewhat envy a friend who lives in a Cambridge neighborhood that’s near enough to good markets, entertainment, his kids’ schools and his work that his 2001 Civic has less than 40k on the clock. (I’m not sure what the Odyssey has, but I doubt that gets a huge amount of service, either.)
I also am in favor of local food as much as possible, and when I had a girlfriend to share it with, I was a member of a farming cooperative where the stuff was grown less than 5 miles from my house. But studies have shown that in certain circumstances, food flown thousands of miles (New Zealand lamb, which grazes on grass) can be better, ecologically, than food grown close to home (say, industrial beef in Nebraska if you live in Omaha).
Of course, it will be harder and harder to do local food as the US population, now 306 million, rises to 438 million by 2050 (Pew Research Center). If you want to do something about that growth, which among other things, will reduce your ability to drive, know that (according to Pew) 82% of that growth will be due to mass immigration. Join numbersusa.com, which makes it VERY easy for you to lobby your representatives to stop this nonsensical growth by cracking down on illegal immigration and those who employ illegal immigrants, and reducing the number of legal immigrants from the ~1 million-plus annually to 1-2 hundred thousand or so.
well said Martin Schwoerer (5 or so higher up).
Are you my lawn treatment guy? If so, we need more toxins on those broadleaf things in the very back by the fence. Your toxins are doing a great job keeping the rest of lawn weed-free and green. Keep up the good work!
Let it be known that rivercat30 does not mind industrial waste dumped on his property.
Please provide your address and I’m sure plenty of corps are willing to oblige.
—
How much should a kilo of a heavy metal cost?
However much people who want it are willing to pay.
While it’s hard to compete with your free toxic waste disposal offer, I might start a pickup service for my cost + some profit; it’s for polluters where I dispose of their heavy metals in the water pipes into your house.
Everybody wins in market capitalism.
—
But please don’t equate my desire to drive a legally equipped car that is large enough and powerful enough to be safe and comfortable for my family of 5
Your kids should enjoy it while they can, because they’ll be telling theirs how your generation screwed it up for everyone.
—
Sane (i.e. tax-paying) people generally do not need any advice on what risks to take and what choices to make from notorious idiots like politicians, journalists and/or attention-whoring “scientists”.
It’s too bad they suck at it. Almost nobody except other scientists read the research, which is probably why the general populace is so ignorant of the subject and so easily manipulated by the charlatans who gain from the status quo.
BTW, try the tap water while you’re down in mexico to see what a world free from these idiots tastes like.
Herb:
I rechecked the article and it said ‘upwards of 3/4 of all preventable disease”, so pardon my inaccuracy. This story was in the NYT and on Fox, so I would hope that takes the left/right tinge off of it.
I don’t have the time to spend digging up facts to check the MSM all the time, but right off the bat I found that “smoking is the number one cause of preventable disease and the killer of one of every five Americans.” So, just one life style addicti, oops I mean choice is responsible for 20% of ALL deaths. So, figuring all the other wonderful choices people make, like being morbidly obese, near zero activity, excess alcohol, illicit and prescription drug abuse, hitting nearly 75% of preventable causes seems at the very least plausible.
I don’t have any interest in telling people how to run their lives if their choices and actions affect only them. But we all pay for this one way or another. I, for one, have no desire to see my health insurance continue to rise to pay for stupid choices, period. No doubt, just the way you (and I for that matter) don’t have any desire to bail out Detroit or Wall Street.
Lastly, I’ll listen to the overall consensus of scientists anytime. These people are not in it for the money. When good researchers makes what some drug using asshole baseball player makes, then we will discuss lack of scientific integrity and political posturing for personal gain. Now, if you want to bring up “science” when it is backed by industry, well there’s plenty to discuss there…
I don’t have any interest in telling people how to run their lives if their choices and actions affect only them. But we all pay for this one way or another. I, for one, have no desire to see my health insurance continue to rise to pay for stupid choices, period.
I’m not sure if this is the reason that your health insurance is rising. I mean, with my insurance company, the risk factors you mentioned result in an increased premium for that individual when they are present. IOW, when a smoker goes to get insurance from my provider, they pay more for it but I don’t.
On the other hand, I’m guessing that there are plenty of providers who do distribute the costs of these risks over the pool of insured people. My wife’s insurance plan, for example, is employer provided, has a flat rate, and required no exams or questions prior to initiation. In that case, I’m guessing that risk is distributed because they have no idea who smokes and who doesn’t.
@Robert Farago:
Genetically speaking, that’s going to suck.
Why is that in particular (schools within walking distance) going to suck? And why are some people here so hostile towards “walkable communities”?
OK, I understand that a lot of people have the need to have a huge house and a huge back yard, but I always thought that people realized that the bland, overspaced, killer-boring sleeper-suburbs were a necessary evil of sorts, an unfortunate byproduct of people’s need for space. I never imagined that someone actually LIKES that fact they live in the suburbs – empty and dehumanising and devoid of community as they are – just that they are willing to put up with it because all other options are out of reach, or b/c the suburban solution is the best compromise in a given set of circumstances.
What, some of you folks actually LIKE the fact you have to get in and drive just to go buy a loaf of bread, or drive your kids to school?
Not to mention that there are some undercurrent of stereotypes regarding city living around here – it’s no longer the 1890s, or the 1950s even – hell not even the 1970s – all those environmental regulations (not to mention vast improvements of hygiene) have made living in a denser environment just as pleasant as a suburb. It’s still a bit more noisy though, although they do have sound insulating doors and windows these days. As for safety concerns, it is the extreme segregation and zoning of cities caused by suburban-type development which makes them LESS safe.
City living is still hell. I just escaped from the city, and your claim that such stereotypes no longer exist is true….if you can afford the million dollar condo or the ridiculously high rent that some of these apartments call for. Otherwise, you’ll be stuck listening to one neighbor blast his love music while banging his girlfriend on one side, while your other neighbor gets into another argument with his girlfriend.
These kinds of experiences may be great if you’re some twenty-something struggling artist who is soaking up the rich creativeness of the city, but I’m too old to deal with all of this big city crap. Give me a house, and if that means I’ll have to burn a bit of gas to get my bread and eggs, then so be it.
@quasimondo
For the fifty millionth time, walkable community != the big city. Get it? In fact there are many big cities that are NOT walkable at all. Los Angeles and Huston come to mind, and outside the USA, Brasilia.
I’m wondering how the elderly, the crippled, the differently abled, and the just plain poor will fare in this future Utopia of walkable communities, but really, who gives a hoo-haw about those losers?
This is my favorite comment so far:
“I forgot that the American way of life is stepping on the other person’s head and screwing everybody else.
I’m just glad life isn’t like that in Europe.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
This was clearly written by someone who has never opened a history book or actually lived in Europe. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there’s been a lot of head-stepping in Europe since, say, forever. Ask a Jew, Armenian, Frenchman, Belgian, Italian, Spaniard, German, Pole, Vandal, Goth, Roman, Serb, Croat, or anyone else you can find.
Last but not least, what’s up with nobody giving RF propz for the Earth, Wind, and Fire reference?
I’m wondering how the elderly, the crippled, the differently abled
All those people you named, particularly the elderly, are screwed over by sprawl. Why? Because the elderly often lose their ability to drive. In a sprawl-style suburb no driving=no life. Sometimes it can even mean no food if your local grocery store doesn’t deliver. So they go to expensive retirement homes, become totally dependent on their children for just about everything, or continue driving and get in wrecks due to their declining abilities.
rivercat30,
You still pay for the smokers on Medicare, Medicaid etc., as well as for those in your own pool whose traits are illegal to “discriminate” against.
As well, you pay, indirectly, by favorable tax treatment of plans like your wife’s, which pilfers some low risk individuals away from your own plan’s operator, hence depriving him of economies of scale.
In other words, in “health care debate” terms, the fact that you are not explicitly banned from buying private insurance, does not mean that massively subsidizing and distorting the market for plans different from the one you have, does not negatively affect your own coverage. Even in most European countries, you can perfectly well buy your own health insurance. That does not mean you’re not negatively affected by your oppressors’ Lenin inspired plans.
JACK BARUTH I’m wondering how the elderly, the crippled, the differently abled, and the just plain poor will fare in this future Utopia of walkable communities, but really, who gives a hoo-haw about those losers?
Well, Mr. Baruth, a lot of crippled elderly, like my late mother, who had multiple sclerosis, but nonetheless, kept teaching at Tufts even as she lost her mobility, and a dear friend who had a diving accident in her 20s who runs the technology and disabilities program for the entire cal state college system get around quite well on electrically powered scooters or wheelchairs. Berkeley, California, a walkable city if there ever was one, is a major center for people with all kinds of disabilities. I’ve seen a few people there operating the joy stick on their chairs with their mouths, because they couldn’t use their arms. It may have been the first city in the US with almost universal curb cuts, and they do quite well there. As for the just plain poor, a lot of them ride bicycles. A bicycle was my exclusive form of transportation during my 20s, in Berkeley and then Washington DC.
PS: I hope this was just some lame attempt on your part to be funny.
golden2husky:
you are right This is not a right-wing/left-wing issue, it’s more fundamental.
“Preventable causes of death” simply sounds strange to me. “Choose your favorite death”, or “only a long life is a happy life”, or what is the idea? The “memento mori” approach makes more sense, IMHO.
And that is why I do hate this “engineering” attitude towards life
– that simply has no room for concepts like “fate” or “bad luck” (not even “good luck”, or luck at all),
– that from the possibility that individual insurance rates MAY rise insignificantly tries to derive the justification to invade other peoples lifestyle
– that hopes to improve life by creating thousands of stupid little laws and regulations
– that seems to assume that eating more salad will help you to live forever.
Followers of this line of thought of course insist on flat-rate speed-limits, although at the wrong place 20 mph might be way too much. They wage (tax-funded) wars against drugs, against prostitution, although there never has been a culture without drugs, without prostitution. They insist on (tax-funded) bans on trans fats, on foie gras, or whatsoever, they need (tax-funded) crusades against everything that seems to make fun to someone else. They simply don’t get it, because they are not only naive, but most of all emotionally dead.
Besides the fact that they suck, these fear-ridden zombies (and of course, those making a living on them by fear-mongering) are the real burden on society.
Back to the topic: I’m already living in a so-called walkable community, and enjoy it to be able to walk to restaurants, to the butcher, to the baker, without needing a car and without being forced to buy factory-made stuff.
The next brewery is just 6 miles away. So, I’m on the safe side, provided they do not ban beer, because of its scientifically proven detrimental effects on national health & safety.
Although there is public transport in 2-minutes walking distance I never use it anymore, because it sucks.
Instead, I am saving this money to buy me an old 12-cylinder Jaguar, just for having fun and for maddening the local Greens and do-gooders. This car might turn out to be more expensive and more annoying than public transport. But I will take this risk in full knowledge that such a decision neither has any positive effects on the future of our planet nor on my financial reserves.
@hazard,
walkable communities – that is – neighborhoods where kids walk to schools and people walk to the grocery or a bar are great. Really great. They work in much of Chicago…and Providence and other cities around the country…but not as well as they could.
Problem is we disempowered liveable neighborhoods where we needed them most – in the inner city – with bussing (another brilliant leftie solution to taking responsibility for one’s surroundings, schools and future). Kids and parents have no investment in their neighborhood because they don’t do much but sleep there. That has to change! We have to empower people to be in charge of their lives and their neighborhoods and not leave those things to idiots in city hall(s) or (worse) the D of C!
Jack Kemp was right. You all didn’t listen to him either!
Jack Baruth:
I’m wondering how the elderly, the crippled, the differently abled, and the just plain poor will fare in this future Utopia of walkable communities, but really, who gives a hoo-haw about those losers?
Actually, all those groups are much better off living in walkable communities than in suburbia. Walkable communities tend to be higher density and therefore have better public transit – which is great for the elderly (esp. since they invented those low-floor buses and trams) and for the poor (who would otherwise be stuck without a car, waiting 1 hour for the bus so they can go anywhere). Also this mean the elderly can walk to the store from their house in about the same time it takes them to walk from their car in the supermarket parking lot to the store entrance.
The disabled, assuming they are in a wheelchair, find it much easier to simply “roll” themselves down the block to a store than to get in car, drive, get out (probably takes the same amount of time).
The poor get indeed the best deal because they can avoid spending half their money on their car, or otherwise being transportationally disabled if they can’t afford one.
@quasimodo:
City living is still hell. I just escaped from the city, and your claim that such stereotypes no longer exist is true….if you can afford the million dollar condo or the ridiculously high rent that some of these apartments call for. Otherwise, you’ll be stuck listening to one neighbor blast his love music while banging his girlfriend on one side, while your other neighbor gets into another argument with his girlfriend.
My point holds, because those condos wouldn’t be a million and those rents wouldn’t be so high if they weren’t desirable. Still, no one said that you can’t have blocks with single-family houses in the heart of a big city (the yards are smaller though, for sure) – the point so to avoid having these as far as the eye can see, with no other content – then you get suburbs. It’s all aboutmixed development – a street with appartment blocks here, a street with houses with spacious back yards there.
“This is my favorite comment so far:
“I forgot that the American way of life is stepping on the other person’s head and screwing everybody else.
I’m just glad life isn’t like that in Europe.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
This was clearly written by someone who has never opened a history book or actually lived in Europe. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there’s been a lot of head-stepping in Europe since, say, forever. Ask a Jew, Armenian, Frenchman, Belgian, Italian, Spaniard, German, Pole, Vandal, Goth, Roman, Serb, Croat, or anyone else you can find.”
Like Mr Holzman, I am hoping that this was just some lame attempt on your part to be funny.
Firstly, history is no indicator of the future, secondly, I live in Europe which kind of undermines your analysis and thirdly, I’m guessing that you know I have a point which is why you are making this sarcastic comment.
In Europe, social systems are geared toward giving people a fairer chance (benefits, social health care, etc). There is a better sense of community, both nationally and local.
In America, just making suggestions is enough to infuriate anyone.
Bill Maher recounted a story of when Barack Obama was campaigning to become president, he made a suggestion that people should check the pressure of their tyres in order to save fuel. People went crazy! “Nobody’s telling me what to do!”
Why is it that whenever someone in America suggests something which may better the country, people react as if their freedoms are under threat?
Just checking one’s tyre pressures can save the driver fuel, reduce imports to the United States and help reduce the widening trade deficit.
But, none of that matters. What really matters is that my freedoms (may) be under threat(!)
Then, when reports come through of increasing imports of energy, the US dependent on foreign oil and more jobs being lost in America, what’s the next cry?
“We need to protect US interests!”
Funny, because when you were given the chance to do something about it, you cried about your “liberties”.
It’s almost pathetic.
On the subject of city vs suburban life, one of the banes of my existence, in beautiful Lexington Mass is those goddam mowing services in the summer, and leaf blowers in the fall. I’m sure the air is cleaner here than in Cambridge or Boston, and it is certainly bucolic considering that I can be in Harvard square in about 14 minutes by car, or 35 by bicycle, but the noise from the lawn care companies is atrocious. My close friends who live in Cambridge don’t have this sort of problem.
In America, just making suggestions is enough to infuriate anyone.
Bill Maher recounted a story of when Barack Obama was campaigning to become president, he made a suggestion that people should check the pressure of their tyres in order to save fuel. People went crazy! “Nobody’s telling me what to do!”
Why is it that whenever someone in America suggests something which may better the country, people react as if their freedoms are under threat?
You get your news from comedians? You’re revealing your prejudices against Yanks again by your willingness to believe such an absurdity. That never happened. No one was “outraged” by the suggestion that we should properly inflate our tires. Even Americans aren’t that stupid. Csaba Csere explains fairly well what actually did happen and why it caused a stir in the presidential campaign.
@Strippo,
Great post. Unfortunately, too many voting Americans do get their news from comedians.
@Strippo
Not a great post. In fact, it’s completely missed the point.
Look at this thread and see the furore it’s caused when someone suggested that maybe saving fuel and living in communities which are walkable may be a good thing.
People here believe that living apart and far from each other is a good thing! (I still can’t fathom it)
But you know what? It’s not my country, so I’ll stay out of it. But when the next US government report says that the trade deficit of the US is widening and how the US is dependent on foreign oil, think about whether importing all that energy is worth it…..
@Katie,
I live in an American city and don’t have an aversion to living close to people. I grew up, though, in a more rural setting and understand living far from people as well (crops and all that).
I don’t think you can make an accurate assessment of American’s desire to live close or far from each other based on your data set.
Small data sets lead to profiling and that’s not nice.
KatiePuckrik:
When politicians begin to care for tire pressure, it is time to go into alert mode. Because it will end in mandatory tire pressure monitoring systems (c.f. http://www.autobloggreen.com/2009/02/06/tire-pressure-monitoring-systems-to-become-mandatory-in-the-eu/).
Some overpaid busybodies decide that you are too stupid to care for the correct tire pressure yourself. (Same thing as the ban of light bulbs in Europe.). Morons on the political top level will decide for you, based on bogus numbers “scientists” deliver. The next logical step is the setup of bureaucratic schemes on all levels to enforce it.
Of course, this will cost money to everyone and simply is a waste of time and money.
Our fine media will distribute those bogus numbers and will hail this splendid idea to save the polar bear and the world.
All in all this is a nice example for the saying that the opposite of “good” is not “bad”, but “well-meant”.
Not a great post. In fact, it’s completely missed the point.
I wasn’t shooting for a “great post.” My point was you proceeded from a false premise grounded in naked condescension. Reflect or don’t reflect on what you wrote. It’s your choice.
Look at this thread and see the furore it’s caused when someone suggested that maybe saving fuel and living in communities which are walkable may be a good thing.
My neighborhood walkability rating is 91%. I burn maybe 100 gallons of gas a year. Any Prius driver who burns less gas than I do is mentally challenged for buying a Prius in the first place. Yes, we exist. Shocking, isn’t it?
But you know what? It’s not my country, so I’ll stay out of it.
Did I say “butt out”? All I’m suggesting is that your cartoonish view of Americans weakens your arguments. It’s also amusing for the thick-skinned among us, which is why we don’t often give you a hard time about it. The only thing is, I don’t think you’re trying to be funny (at least not in that way), and I don’t think you really want to be viewed as nothing more than opinionated comic relief from across the pond. But ultimately it’s your call.
@KatiePuckrik,
The US trade deficit is overwhelmingly due to foreigners remaining stupid enough to buy our government’s debt. All that foreign money being wasted around America, has to find its way back home, one way or the other.
@David Holzman,
Cambridge sure is not your average American city. As much as I’d like to detest the place for silly politically partisan reasons, I don’t know of many more livable communities in the US. It’s like the lone outlier demonstrating that even leftist communities can function well, as long their population is restricted to Ivy League grads and students :)
And I completely agree with you on the leaf blower crowd. And you can also add the yap trash brigade. As well as dysfunctional car alarm fanciers. Not to mention the idiots who feel like they must, or more likely are forced to, alert entire zip codes that they are backing up their delivery van 2 feet at 1 mph.
Empirically, like you mentioned, the first problem certainly goes up as one leaves dense cities. Emphasis on dense. LA is a different story, altogether. In the tonier neighborhoods, the two stroke noise is pretty much permanent.
As pertains to yap trash, it goes both ways. Where I live (SF), people do try to keep their dogs quiet most of the time, and there seems to still be some social stigma attached to having a flat out neglected dog, or having your yard sound like a 24/7 canine torture chamber. But, as with most things, most people just aren’t particularly good at it. And in denser neighborhoods, there are so many more yahoo’s within earshot. But, at least the average person has a job or interests of an at least somewhat intellectual nature, so there is some basic understanding that wanton noise is undesirable for concentration and such.
In many suburban, and particularly exurban settings, I have noticed people almost take pride in having the loudest, most neglected mutt in the neighborhood. The earlier they can toss the poor thing out in the morning, leaving for their 3 hour commute to some mundane job, the later they can come back, and the louder Yappo is, the more manly they feel, or something like that. And if anyone suggests they take care of the mutt, they, at least many of them, go on the offensive; aiming to “show that snooty neighbor”, heading straight for the shelter to pick up another pack of mutts to abandon in the yard all day and night.
Car alarms are obviously more problematic in the city, as are backup beepers. The absolute worst when it comes to the latter, tough, is when a new subdivision is being built, which generally happens in suburbs. There are few better displays of the absolute idiocy of public safety commissions or whatever, than watching, and hearing, 30 pieces of machinery constantly beeping over each other, while everyone on the worksite wears earplugs specifically to avoid hearing the racket.
The absolute worst when it comes to the latter, tough, is when a new subdivision is being built, which generally happens in suburbs. There are few better displays of the absolute idiocy of public safety commissions or whatever, than watching, and hearing, 30 pieces of machinery constantly beeping over each other, while everyone on the worksite wears earplugs specifically to avoid hearing the racket.
Stuki,
tell me about it! Gawd, I hate those things. I have a summer place on Cape Cod, and for two days last summer, while I was trying to work, a neighbor was having a driveway installed. The beeping went on constantly, all day. I would really like to find out who came up with the idea of those beepers, and force them to listen 24 hrs a day for a week. I’m sure those things shave more years of life off of people from the stress of hearing that damn noise than they save from people who don’t get hit by vehicles backing up. It is insane. And my impression is that the people driving the vehicles that have those can’t turn them off. And they are absolutely the most annoying noises. I mean, why couldn’t they simply have recordings of someone saying, “I’m backing up now, could you please get out of my way, becasue I can’t see you.” Or some such thing. And at this point, instead of beepers, they could simply equip all trucks with blind spots in the rear with cameras.
Dog barking is not a problem where I live (mine comes in immediately if she starts barking, but she’s not a very barky dog unless she sees a squirrel or a bunny). Neither are car alarms.
Yes, I suppose Cambridge is unusual. But so are Providence, RI (if not quite as walkable), Portland, Maine, and Portland, OR. I wouldn’t be surprised if Salt Lake is around the U of Utah. Still, they are undoubtedly exceptions.
@KatieP:
Firstly, history is no indicator of the future, secondly, I live in Europe which kind of undermines your analysis and thirdly, I’m guessing that you know I have a point which is why you are making this sarcastic comment.
Educated men know that history is an indicator of the future. In fact, it is the only method by which the future may be in any way anticipated. And the history of Europe is rife with violence, class warfare, and murderous behavior that makes the United States look like a theme park.
But wait! Forget history! Let’s talk this year:
“All told, the number of verbal or physical assaults on Jews and ethnic Arabs that European authorities link to the Gaza violence has now passed 100 across Europe.”
Let me tell you something about the European lifestyle that you’re too complacent to know: it was designed by your betters to keep you in your cages. Any stupid hick American can become unimaginably wealthy and powerful, but in Europe they keep you folks in line, living in your 800sqft flats, driving one-liter cars, walking most places, and relying on easily-controlled mass transit for your needs.
Mr Baruth,
Hate to break it to you, but in Europe anybody can become rich, just like in North America.
The only difference is, we have a social system to help people less fortunate.
“It’s called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.”
George Carlin said that……he was an american, too.
KatiePuckrik: The only difference is, we have a social system to help people less fortunate.
We have one in the U.S. too. The idea that the poor in the U.S. are completely on their own is a myth. There is no “difference” between the U.S. and Great Britain in that regard.
And just like the systems in Great Britain and France (and other countries), it has also become very good at ensuring that certain recipients remain mired in poverty for generation after generation.
Again – unfortunately, in this case – there is no difference between the U.S. and Great Britain in that regard.
KatiePuckrik: George Carlin said that……he was an american, too.
Ironic, considering that he lived it. But then, in the U.S., some of the richest people always prefer to see the glass as half empty, rather than half full. Unfortunately, a disproportionate number of them infest the entertainment business over here.
@KatiePuckrik:
” The only difference is, we have a social system to help people less fortunate”
Talk is cheap. Looking at immigration trends are a better way of ferreting out which “system” people actually prefer, and that has been a rather one way street ever since America’s founding. And still is, unless things have changed dramatically in the last few years. So, obviously, some do see other differences.
@David Holzman
The sound of Backup beepers that emit broad spectrum noise instead of pure sine tones fall off much quicker in (at least perceived) volume as distance from them increases. An array of beepers arranged across the back of the vehicle will fall off quicker still, by cancelation. Both could be made to be just as noticeable in the “danger” area, while being much less bothersome to third parties. Replacing them with strobe lights, or even simple lights, would be another, in most cases better, way to alert people. As would replacing the pretty much omni directional beepers with highly directional ones.
The underlying problem is that you have no right to not have sound pressure blasted at your head, the way you have a right to not have toxic fumes, or lead bullets, blasted at it. If you did, anyone wanting to make noise above a threshold, would have to get your permission, which you could withhold, or allow for a price. Then, the wannabe noisemaker could decide if muffling the sound would be more cost effective than paying for the right to emit it.
And just like the systems in Great Britain and France (and other countries), it has also become very good at ensuring that certain recipients remain mired in poverty for generation after generation.
The US (and Uk in some studies) ranks near the bottom of social mobility in western nations.
The Uk has its own cultural reasons, but it’s pretty obvious the assumptions by free-market simpletons in the US don’t quite work out.
@stuki: You forgot the MIT-spawned tech companies that make substantial contributions to city coffers. :)
@agenthex: It sounds like you two agree — a poorly designed safety net would lead to low social mobility, right?
a poorly designed safety net would lead to low social mobility, right?
Britain has other problems with inter-generational mobility. Their private/public education divide (where rich people only go to the private institutes that the top universities cherry pick from) is one of the worst. Shades of nobility never really overthrown.
Britain not too long ago also created vast wastelands of industrial areas which probably didn’t help mobility of the lower/middle class there.
Why is it that whenever someone in America suggests something which may better the country, people react as if their freedoms are under threat?..
Amen to that. Simple fact is that many people do drive with low tire pressure. We all know what that can mean, so why would anybody be hostile toward it? If the tire pressure monitoring requirement allowed for ticketing by police if caught with the LTP light on, well then you would have a real reason to scream. Otherwise, if out of spite for your wallet you chose to ignore the light as government intrusiveness, go for it. Most people will be grateful that the tire that was getting soft on the highway was brought to their attention before they needed to fork over $140 for a new tire. A tire pressure warning light is no different than a monitor for low oil pressure, other than the cost of the repair.
Stuki, thanks for the clear summary on the damn beepers. Years ago I saw (but did not hear) jackhammers working in old town Alexandria VA. There used to be a noise pollution office in EPA until ronald reagan got rid of it in ’81.
Re the safety net: according to a study in the American Journal of Medicine, 2007 (David Himmelstein et al) 60% of bankruptcies were linked to medical expenses, up from 40% in 2001. You don’t have that problem in most other countries in the world. So there’s a downward mobility in the US that other countries don’t have.
@Stuki,
Evidently, you’ve never had to cross Cambridge during a snow storm. Try that once and see how you feel.
@Mr. Holzman,
Agreed on the leaf-blower crowd. But remember they are generally employed by SUV-driving tree huggers – so you shouldn’t expect too much.
Re. Noise Pollution. Well, sans, RWR, you could have enjoyed more of the Jimmy Carter Economic morass – but in peaceful bliss, I guess.
@golden2husky,
Amen to that. Simple fact is that many people do drive with low tire pressure. We all know what that can mean, so why would anybody be hostile toward it?
People weren’t hostile to the fact that correctly inflated tires save fuel. People were hostile to the theory – stated as fact – that ensuring that every American vehicle was running on properly inflated tires (“tyres,” katie) would be as great a benefit for the American Petro reserve as drilling in ANWAR. Of course THAT’s just insane bobble-head-politico speak.
agenthex: The US (and Uk in some studies) ranks near the bottom of social mobility in western nations.
If one believes flawed studies designed to produce certain rankings, yes.