gas at $20/gallon
- Thread starter Toshi
- Start date
effects, my dear l'opie. i think the correct order of the world is when transport costs are not negligible: things should be built, grown, and consumed locally.
although your avatar has a santa hat, which i approve of, i probably don't approve of you so i'm fine with your sentiment.
you will not be invited to live on toshi-island once i form it in the days of the post-apocalyptic wasteland.
more seriously, why are you opposed to the concept of $20/gal gas?
may you crash your fancy car.
I wouldn't be opposed to it if I didn't have to drive 60 miles to my nearest riding spot. Even at my cars 30 miles per gallon, it would cost me $80 each time. I just can't afford that.
Thats the key. All the Hummer owners will be fuct, but just as fuct will be anyone that walks into a grocery store to buy anything that isn't powdered.
Basically, ****ty gravy and kool aide are in the clear.
crashing my fancy car was soooo last year. heh.
V-Dub GTI, that's my point: i don't think people should be driving 120 miles a day to RIDE THEIR BIKES. i didn't think i should be driving to whistler every weekend to go dhing either, so, guess what? i sold the dh bike and the suv that hauled it around...
So you will relish standing shoulder to shoulder with the uncouth masses ?
assuming diesel rises at the same rate (which it should) i'm frankly not concerned. a big rig gets ~6 mpg iirc. at 80,000 lbs. gross weight i bet it's carrying 50,000 lbs of actual cargo.
so let's invent a term to sum up the utility of a gallon of fuel. let's call it a woonsocket. a big rig hauling cauliflower gets 300 woonsockets (lbs/mpg).
a hummer H2 has a payload of 2200 lbs (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hummer_H2) and gets right around 11 mpg. it gets 20 woonsockets.
see my point?
no, i wouldn't. instead i'd hope to be walking down a nice sidewalk (or riding down a dedicated bike path) in a small community with all amenities within a mile or two.
You're absolutely short-sighted on this. Yes, there are MANY products that can and should be grown and consumed locally; however, what you're failing to understand is the positive effects of the global economy.
Forcing every product to be local means DESTROYING the economies of small countries that are barely getting by.
Please research the economic concept of "comparative advantage". It's not just that products can be made cheaper somewhere else, but that the somewhere else is bringing in enough money to develop social infrastructure necessary for the excessive population... infrastructure like schools and hospitals.
We're WAY past the farming days. We have too large a population on the planet for what you're proposing.
You'll kill billions by closing down global economics.
Short-sightedness is a serious problem for all ideas of this magnitude
What you envision is impossible for the entire planet
Would you rather people sit at home, doing nothing, or out enjoying them selfs doing something fun? I think that gas at $3.30 is high enough.
I bought my car specifically for the gas mileage to fun to drive ratio, I shouldn't have to pay an astronomical amount of money to fill it up, because I made a wise choice. Unlike some people that drive cars that get 15mpg, and drive over 120 miles a day to and from work.
~Matt
[Caution, this post my contain opinions]
I'm going to keep my other opinions to myself, but what do you believe will be the impact of having 'all the amenities' available for every 2-5 mile radius? Given, Japan might be the only true example of how it works, but how would it be possible in the states?
good luck finding a reputable pharm program online. I do think we should all drive less and that gas should cost more, something like $5 a gallon. If they increased the price with taxes it would help pay down the national debt while helping curb consumption. Some of that money would need to be put back into public transit since a good chunk of the population would be devastated by such high gas prices
In a community where all the help will live 15-20 miles out of town because they can not afford to live there.
No one wants section-8/affordable housing in their neighborhood.
you're full of it: increasing transportation costs wouldn't "close down global economics". opportunity cost includes the cost of shipment... sure, it'd alter the mix of products, but i'm again in favor of that. it seems absolutely ridiculous that we send cargo ships full of sawdust from the oregon coast to asia, and back again full of goods made from the same.You're absolutely short-sighted on this. Yes, there are MANY products that can and should be grown and consumed locally; however, what you're failing to understand is the positive effects of the global economy.
Forcing every product to be local means DESTROYING the economies of small countries that are barely getting by.
Please research the economic concept of "comparative advantage". It's not just that products can be made cheaper somewhere else, but that the somewhere else is bringing in enough money to develop social infrastructure necessary for the excessive population... infrastructure like schools and hospitals.
We're WAY past the farming days. We have too large a population on the planet for what you're proposing.
You'll kill billions by closing down global economics.
Short-sightedness is a serious problem for all ideas of this magnitude
i believe the "true impact" will be that stores will be smaller, and will cater to a local audience. why are small stores failing under the weight of walmart? because people still can afford to drive out of their way to the giant parking lots of wallyworld. once they can't then the small retailer will return, selling milk and eggs to the locals.
ah, "the help". that brings up another interesting topic, one i've been wondering about for a while: with the current trends in the US economy it seems inevitable that the vast majority of people will not actually be DOING anything at their jobs, but rather peddling goods made elsewhere. (or maybe driving the delivery trucks for those same goods.)
i think the solution is to use technology to automate as much of the menial stuff as possible (cleaning, and even self-checkout stands), and have people actually WORKING, doing something productive. imagine that. yes, people should work in a trade.
Please use actual economic theories to explain yourself instead non-sequitors and emotional response.
What you're proposing would kill billions as I've already explained, but you didn't retort.
why not rent out your house for a year and move? if you're renting, why not move? why not look for a job closer by? if the answer is economics, then your reasoning for wanting a lower gas price is no more valid (or invalid) than my reasoning for wanting gas to be more expensive: it would just shift the balance to favor people living closer.
also, note that i chose $20/gallon in the title intentionally. i don't think anyone will even bat an eye when gas hits $5/gallon. it will do so soon, and apart from a spate of news reports to mark the occasion no one will care or change their ways. true story.
I could also see it going the other way though. Hence the Target/Wal-Mart/Best Buy anchored retail centers that have pretty much everything you could ask for that have begun to be nothing less than expected for newer communities.
i'm in favor of people biking. take up road biking and spin around your neighborhood then. you're trading gasoline for adrenaline, and i think it should be more expensive to do so.
and good choice on your car, it is indeed at a nice point between frugality and fun. even if everyone drove GTI-performing vehicles, however, i don't think this all is sustainable (this all being our current state of affairs).
I could try and get a job down there, and we've talked about it. But she needs to spend 3 years 40 miles south, and then 2 years 40 minutes north....we live right in the middle....splittin the difference.
"non sequitur", i believe. you invoked comparative advantage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage), where the theory is that the country with the lowest opportunity cost to producing a good will ultimately be the supplier of that good to the benefit of all. my contention is that transport costs, while not explicitly encoded into that model, are part of that opportunity cost.
the system won't "break" -- that's ridiculous. it just will mean that the inherent advantages in a country's economy will have to be that much more robust compared to those of comparable countries for exportation of goods to be economically sound. translation: switzerland will still export chocolates, but particle board might just be made in oregon by listless former loggers.
well, there you go: you've framed it as an economic question, and in the calculus have decided that it's cheapest for you to stay put. having gas be $20/gallon wouldn't affect this process, but would just change the inputs (and maybe alter the outcome).
may i recommend that you look into very fuel efficient vehicles... the Honda CRX VX and Civic HX come to mind.
and, again, this is the point of this thread: i don't think this is right. instead of opposing it on aesthetic grounds as some might do i think it should simply be too expensive a proposition for people to drive out of their way to shop.
i sincerely hope that the reality of 2020 does not include soccer moms driving yukon denalis to the mall with nary a care or a second thought. i may go postal.
think of all the relationships that would fail because couples would not be able to afford to travel to see their partner
that is a pretty ****ty scenario....
that is a pretty ****ty scenario....
Just turn the classical music up louder.
Yeah, becuase we all date over the Internet
I'm not saying it's right. I also understand that it's impossible for these large retail centers to be located closer than 10-20 miles apart unless the population is dense enough. What would keep a corporation such as Wal-Mart from shoving an even larger supercenter into the midst of your walkable/rideable bubble? Wally world already incorporates a few other entities into their stores such as McD's...if they weren't able to buy out smaller businesses, it seems it would be in their favor to lease space as I assume McD's does. I just can't quite picture small business prospering in this situation. The already powerful would be able to afford the high transportation costs and the small guy would go under quickly.
Wal-mart, in an effort to make more money, is doing a pilot that integrates their stores in small settings in the community.....similar to a mom and pop grocery store
The greatest thing about this thread is the fact that you have driven all over the country in a sports car taking pictures and $hit.