Free Riders & Fuel Efficiency

March 20, 2007

Have your cake, and eat it, too.

That’s all well and good - except that a 50% improvement in fuel efficiency doesn’t cost “hundreds more” to build. It cost “thousands” more to build. And whenever there is a divergence between the highest bidder and the lowest seller, demand will go unsatisfied: No matter how many people are willing to pay $20,000 for a 40mph car, none will be built until someone thinks of a way to build them for less than that amount.

Everyone is willing to do “their part” to help the environment, as long as other people are willing to bear the true burden. People are always willing to force others to pay for things they desire for themselves.


Comments

1 Comment so far

  1. trav.is March 21, 2007 3:56 pm

    Too true. Also, the furor to set efficiency standards seems to ignore the law of unintended consequences.

    When the CAFE standards were set, it made the newer, more efficient cars more expensive. So people kept their older, inefficient cars longer - offsetting the standards. When people did buy the newer models, they drove them farther and more often because they got better mileage.

    When you consider that the hybrid cars in the article may actually pollute more than conventional vehicles, the push for standards really seems silly and misinformed. My favorite line: When you pool together all the combined energy it takes to drive and build a Toyota Prius, the flagship car of energy fanatics, it takes almost 50 percent more energy than a Hummer - the Prius’s arch nemesis.

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