look, it’s simple. even at $4/gal, gas is cheap. Yes, there is sensitivity to prices; back a few years ago when gas prices rocketed up, consumers ditched trucks and SUVs for compact cars en masse. That is, until they figured out they could still “afford” to own the vehicles they wanted at $4.xx/gal.
Disagree. Prices in Europe are $8-10/gal. That would change a lot of attitudes in a hurry.
the problem with CAFE is that it’s ass-backwards and totally fucking retarded. it does absolutely NOTHING to influence what vehicles people actually buy. It tells the automakers “the average fuel economy of the vehicles you SELL will be this, and if you fall short we’ll fine you.”
based on what standard? ECE? EPA? What kind of durability testing did they do? Will the car and it’s battery last 10 years and 150,000 miles? Does that car meet 2013 NHTSA/ECE safety standards?
Watch Top Gear some time. Not the watered down Top Gear America, but the original on the BBC. Look past the exotics they play with and see the shitty little substandard average Joe kind of crackerbox junk cars you can get in Europe. That is why we Americans are willing to burn more fuel than they do; to avoid driving absolute trash.
The way it’s supposed to work is that if you sell a lot of low mileage cars and trucks, you also have to sell a lot of high mileage ones. If that means selling them at a loss subsidized by charging more for the gas guzzlers, so be it. The trouble is that they can get out of it by paying the fine, which does nothing to get more efficient cars on the road. That’s why I think a cap-and-trade scheme would work well, so if you’re a company that doesn’t make any efficient cars, they can subsidize companies that do. It would also encourage big companies to dig into their foreign lineups and bring in some of the more efficient cars they sell abroad.
What do you mean by a “progressive” gas tax? One that’s based on income?
The trouble with simply raising gas taxes is that it disproportionately hurts poorer drivers, who buy used and so are stuck with whatever new car buyers are buying. That’s not such a problem in Europe where driving is optional, but it’s not in much of the US. Higher fuel prices would also would hurt the economy at large by raising shipping costs. A CAFE act with teeth would be a much more targeted solution.
I was going to take this to this, but unfortunately it was raining. I’d already arranged a dedicated parking space in an empty lot right next to the door. I even had signs made…
The Atom averages about 33MPG at 300HP, but it is an outlier because of its low weight.
Full links (instead of single pictures) for the above here and here.
I didn’t read the entire thread so if someone already mentioned this I apologize. One thing I get tired of hearing is something along the lines of Americans had been paying to little for gas compared to those in Europe. The biggest reason that the Europeans are paying so much isn’t the cost difference in what they are paying for raw oil, but in what taxes are being added onto the price of their fuel. Yes, some of the higher prices are due to their lack of refining capacity, but the prices are artificially high because of Government greed or policy.
It infurates me when I hear that we aren’t paying our fair share or such (I know you aren’t saying this), but if we as Americans are able to enjoy lower fuel’prices than the rest of the world, than lucky us. Nothing is preventing other nations from building more refineries. It is their problem, not ours. Because we have well stocked grocery stores and the majority of our population is well fed does that mean we should strive to reach the standards of a third world African nation? Of course not. We who live in the US are truly blessed and should be thankful that we have the advantages that we do, not apologize because the populace in another nation doesn’t have it as good as we do. Those living in high gas price countries need to pressure thier respective Governments to build refineries and lower taxes. All peoples, regardless of their nationality should try to reach the Gold Standard, not try to bring the Gold Standard down to their level to make it fair. /Rant off
As far as horsepower is concerned I doubt we will ever see the race for more end. What we will see is better the improvement of technology so the same or more power can be made with smaller engines and. economy. We have already seen this, I one of the examples being the old muscle car engines that were huge but made little power. Today, small four bangers make more power than eight cylinder engines of yesterday.
How will CAFE “have teeth?” why does it make sense to you to punish the automakers for what their customers choose to buy? CAFE seems like nothing more than a half-ass populist “solution” conjured up by people making sure they can get re-elected.
Having driven standard, everyday cars in the USA and UK extensively I’m probably in a position to offer a valid opinion so I’d be interested in which ones you think are particularly bad.
Fuel taxes are much higher in Europe. For example, UK fuel duty is about $3.35 per US gallon. Prices are currently at £1.40 a litre, which is $8.40 per US gallon. However, this has had a number of positive benefits, as it’s forced the auto industry and consumers to be more concerned with efficiency. It’s driven the development and widespread adoption of economical cars. Turbo-diesels have been widespread for a couple decades now, and have greatly improved in power, economy and refinement. A recent trend is for small, turbocharged petrol engines. It’s instructive to compare the US and European models of the same car. For example, in the US, you can only buy a VW Golf with two engines, a 2.5L petrol or a 2.0 TDi. In the UK, there are eleven different engine models available. In the UK, it’s possible to buy a 1.4L turbo which about matches the performance of the 2.5L petrol (160 BHP vs 170 BHP), but which gives about 40% better fuel economy. It’s an expensive model to buy though. The mainstream one is the same engine producing 122 BHP, giving perfectly good performance, and a 0-60 time of 9.5 sec.
It will “have teeth” by not allowing automakers to merely pay fines, but requiring them to take some action to get more high mileage cars on the road.
It’s not like customers make decisions about what they want in a vaccuum. At present, the economics of fuel prices and vehicle pricing provide little incentive for people to choose higher mileage vehicles (or to buy new efficient cars instead of slighly less efficient used cars). A more aggressive CAFE would cause automakers to change the vehicle pricing to favor higher mileage cars. It only “punishes” automakers if they don’t change the kinds of vehicles they offer after the changes in demand this will cause.
I suppose you could achieve the same thing by making a UK-style horsepower tax or a carbon tax or something like that, but I think a fleet-average scheme gives carmakers and consumers more leeway.
Yeah, but its often hilarious! Like when he described what it would be like to own a Corvette in Britain (“too brash, too ghastly”): “It’d be like showing up at the Queen’s Spring tea party wearing chromed cowboy boots and chaps”.
How about 200,000 miles (and 10 years old), and still going (note the warranty too, which is the minimum expected lifetime since they’d be forced to replace it otherwise):
No noticeable degradation either.
But what if the battery dies after the warranty? No need to panic over the cost, you can even get a used battery from a scrapped car (e.g an accident that didn’t damage the battery):
People spend that much all the time for even relatively minor repairs on their cars.
I don’t see the wars ending. There’s always going to be something fast. It may be limited edition, but it will be there. Besides, you can already get things that run 10s in the quarter mile and get 50+ mpg. They’re motorcycles.
Obviously a higher gas tax is much more sensible than nonsense like CAFE, which is why we’ll never do it. We want better mileage, but we don’t want it in our cars, we want it in your cars. The notion that a manufacturer is obligated to maintain a certain average MPG is insane. What’s wrong with a manufacturer that produces only economy cars, or a manufacturer that produces only sports cars?
Raise gas taxes and the problem solves itself. People buy economy cars if they don’t want to pay high gas taxes, and buy gas guzzlers if they don’t care. Even better is to change gas taxes from a tax per gallon sold to a tax per dollar sold. That way as gas prices increase over the next few decades we automatically raise gas taxes even though the rate stays exactly the same. As for the notion that poor people will have to pay more if we raise gas taxes, well, it sucks to be them. Beef up public transportation if you wanna help the poor, don’t subsidize gasoline for them.
That’s why I think a cap and trade type setup would work well. You can still be a company that builds nothing but trucks or sports cars, you just have to buy credits from a company that sells more economy cars or alternative fuel vehicles. Of course every major car company except maybe BMW has small fuel efficient cars somewhere in their global lineup, so they can also just bring those in and price them to sell.
I agree that a heavier gas tax would also prompt more sales of fuel efficient cars, but that’s solving the problem with a sledgehammer. Public transportation simply isn’t practical for the densities in many American cities, to say nothing of rural America. Especially if you’re doubling fuel costs, since buses are the only practical low-density public transit mode. And, again, it will have a severely deterious effect on the economy as frieght costs skyrocket. The same thing can be achieved through efficiency standards without causing a traumatic reconfiguration of large aspects of the US transportation system.
