Yeah… I know you’re thinking “No sh** Sherlock!” but I don’t mean simply that gas is more pricey than before. I really didn’t care (all that much) about the issue until it cost me almost $ 100.00 to fill up a tank in my not particularly gas efficient SUV. At that point I became “concerned” - really concerned because now the cost of going somewhere was non-trivial.
A 120 mile trip to beach? That’s 35-40 dollars
A 60 mile trip to go kayaking - $ 15-20 dollars
Is 4 + gas going to be the new reality? Let's assume it is. It now costs 15 to $ 20 dollars to go just 60 miles. That’s crazy!
Now why was was the cost just noise at 2-3 per gallon, but now it’s risen to the point of serious concern. Honestly I don’t know. Intellectually I know it’s all an incremental slope, but somehow $ 4 a gallon gas is rocking my world in a way that 3 dollar and change gas did not.
A good chunk of the the US economic infrastructure depends in a very large part of relatively cheap transportation costs. I think the impact (psychologically) of $4 gas is really going to change a LOT of the way we think and how creative we are.
I think you’ll find it makes very little difference. You only have to look at the U.K. and Europe to see that people still buy it in the same quantities. Sure we grumble, but we need the petrol.
Some people will be affected extremely by this; I’m thinking specifically of people like the men who work with my husband.
These guys live out in the country, where jobs are very scarces. In order to find jobs which pay a living wage they commute 30 miles here to work as laborers. (Many still work side jobs to make ends meet but that’s a different issue).
There is going to be a breaking point where the wages they make are not going to offset the cost of the fuel of commuting. Now they are in a bad spot. Do they stay around home and try to scrape out a living? They can’t afford to move here - our housing is priced above their incomes.
Laborers aside, now the City begins to be in a bind. These workers are important because they do the jobs which others won’t do for such wages. I’m talking about things like fixing potholes and cleaning out sewer manholes. In order to keep them, the City is going to have to raise wages - which then means higher taxes for the citizens.
As far as “serious changes” go, yes, many people will need to readjust their priorities. Folks in the large cities who have mass transit will feel the pinch of increased commodity costs, but folks in areas which depend on automobiles will get a double whammy.
I personally think it’s been time for this kind of attitude adjustment. I can’t blame the average U.S. consumer too much, because they’ve been lead to believe that it’s O.K. to operate that way. In other words, painful for some but necessary.
I live in Connecticut, our gas is some of the highest in the country currently. The Mobile down the road from my house is $4.17 this morning. :eek: Luckily I downsized my car from a very fuel inefficient Chevy Avalanche to a Volkswagen. 12mpg to 28mpg is nice. I will buy a green car once they get one I enjoy driving.
I don’t know if the prices will necessarily change the way we live to an extent where you see it as “wow this country has begun a cultural paradigm shift” but I think people who are on a budget [such as my family and I] will take a second look at traveling…
But I must say a beach trip for me is simply walking out the front door and down to the beach. Now walk out on my dock and see that boat right there??? yeah, she’s going to be hanging by the dock much of the summer.
I don’t drive, but I know that higher gas prices still affect me in various ways. The cost of goods is going up because of increased shipping costs, I’m sure that my taxes will eventually be going up to cover the expenses of the local public transit, and just look at what the airlines are doing to try to recoup their higher fuel costs.
Also, I have a friend who has a daily fifty-mile round trip commute. Lately she’s been staying the night at my place a few days a week, at least partly to save on gas costs. (I hope that it’s also because she enjoys my company.) We used to get together almost every weekend, but now we only do that if she stays over Friday night, or comes over on Sunday and stays overnight.
My wife commutes 50 miles one way, 100 mile round trip to work a day. She spends $200 a month on gas. $50 bucks every friday. Yes it sucks, and yes we may move. There is that possibility, and right now [this summer] would be the best time. So we’ll see.
I am like Phlosphr, I live in CT and pretty much everything is expensive here=(
Lets see, I am now telecommuting full time and avoiding the 100 mile round trip to hartford every day. I only go in 1 day a month mainly because they hate employees never being in the building. I joke it is to prove I havent trained my cat Jezabel to do my job for me and run off to Cancun. mrAru is getting into his jobs telecommuting program, but for like the first year all he will be able to do is 3 days a week from home, but it is a start.
We already drive a VW with decent milage, but as soon as I have it paid off next summer we are going to change our older VW [that mrAru normally drives] into a trade in for a diesel something, and running biodiesel through it as there is a gas station in Middletown that sells it. We are also investigating changing the house over to the biofuel instead of full on petroleum fuel oil. We already have a woodstove that once winter hits, we will be mainly using to heat the house during the day because now I work from home, I can keep it fed. We are also investigating getting a hydrosil electric baseboard heater to replace one 6 foot long stretch of what is now hot water baseboard heat just in case fuel oil/biofuel gets way too expensive we can use electricity at night to keep the pipes from freezing.
With some insulation augmentation and changes around the house we are already using half the electricity that we used last year [figuring from jan 07 to jan 08 as the baseline, since making the changes this past jan we have significantly improved our energy use. We actually got a reward rebate thingy from the electric company for dropping our energy use. We are still looking at things to improve!]
We already combine errands to minimize car use, and mrAru is thinking of getting a scooter from a friend [one of the big ones that does highway speed] for doing his commute during nice weather. I am not thrilled with the idea because it is a 100 mile round trip … but the thing gets something like 90 miles to the gallon.
I’ve already cut out some frills, but I’m going to have to think hard about whether I should keep my part-time job. It’s only a few hours a week but the extra money helps pay for my hobby (quilting). It’s a 20 mile commute for $8.50 an hour, and some days I only work for an hour or two. Financially, it doesn’t make sense to keep doing it. But I love it and they need me!
I definitely won’t be doing any more shop hops. Those are special weekends where you go to five or six quilt shops, get free patterns, sign up for drawings for nice gifts, and chat up other quilters. To hit all the shops it’s about 200 miles.
I don’t know about serious changes. Trips might be cut, and fewer frivolous purchases might be made, but the lousy housing market will make it unlikely that people will move closer to their jobs, and the lousy job market will make it unlikely that people will find jobs closer to where they live. People will probably try to buy more fuel-efficient vehicles, since that’s the easiest thing to change.
If the housing market and job market get better…well, people will then be no longer feeling the squeeze quite so much, so they won’t think it’s necessary to change.
What’s particularly annoying for my friend is that a few years ago when prices started creeping up she decided that it might be a good idea to trade in her beloved SUV for something a little more economical. She decided to check out the hybrids that were available at the time, and really liked the Prius but even with the proposed trade-in value of her SUV it was more than she could afford. So she settled for a KIA which has been giving her nothing but trouble for the past year. Now she wishes she’d gone for the Prius instead.
I have to disagree with that. At my last place of employment I was one of only a few Americans surrounded by Europeans. Everyone of them said that living in the States completely altered their concept of what’s within driving distance. Driving from Glasgow to London for a holiday? 400 miles, are you insane. Driving from San Diego to San Francisco? A not uncommon 500 mile drive just for a long weekend. Hell, Raiders fans drive down the 500 miles for a single football game.
This is largely predicated on cheap gas, and partly on the fact that many Americans equate having access to a car with freedom/autonomy.
Yeah, i expect you’ll see people:
a) endeavoring to live closer to where they work (or vice-versa) - definitely good
b) reducing their discretionary travel for leisure & hobbies - probably bad for the economy
I just went to a gig last night - my friend’s boyfriend was playing. She was telling me that the gas prices are making it very difficult for the smaller bands to tour. It was pretty depressing - those bands struggle as it is.
I think you’ll find more people spending work weeks in ‘temporary’ accommodations near their jobs, and going ‘home’ on the weekends. Informal arrangements such as Lurkmeister describes will spread, but at some point someone will open a basic dormitory for all those labourers.
I saw a proposal to make the work week 4 days of 10 hours each, rather than 5 of 7.5 hours, as well: that eliminates a whole day’s worth of commuting. These two proposals might dovetail very well.
This is happening in Mexico. I suspect it’s because of a lack of transportation and lack of housing near the factories rather than high gas prices though. Do you think people would go for that? Give up seeing your spouse and kids all week? Lounging in the recliner in your underwear? Maybe.
My son tried that for awhile, but it cut into his second job so he went back to 5 days.
When Gas rose to $3, we saw the increase as temporary, and expected the price to drop back down to $2 or so. Now that gas is up to $4, we know that its not going back down, and will likely keep rising. Now that we are accepting high gas prices, we are changing our attitudes about transportation. In the long term, this is a good thing, but it will hurt in the meantime.