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I wonder the same about the automakers. There are two movies which come to mind to explain how crazy and counterintuitive the auto industry has become. One is "Tucker" and the other is "Who killed the electric car?" . Both of these movies illustrate single minded power and profit motives of large auto makers.
When I saw the first Hummer H2 on the road I wondered why would anyone buy such a car/truck? I saw many a soccermom driving alone in the huge SUV while getting 8 MPG. Then I noticed most has a small sign on the door or back advertising a company.
It turns out that our wonderful US tax code allows to deprieciate the full cost of the Hummer in 2 years as a business expense. This is a loophole for Trucks over 6000 lbs. The code was supposed to be used for business trucks but GM exploited the loophole to sell many a gas guzzling Hummer.
I am amazed at the lengths people will go to aviod taxes. In Ciaro, Egypt there are very few windows in buildings. The reason for this is that the goverment taxes by the size and number of windows. So the entire city looks like it was bombed out with open holes in buildings everywhere!
So the solution is to think like a bean counter, since the bean counters make all of the important calls in this country. Give a huge tax break for cars getting over 50 MPG. Then the car companies will build more 50 MPG cars. Simple huh?
The only problem I see with the aero mods from an engineering standpoint is driving over speed bumps in the front, and providing a legal bumper in the rear boattail.
But these can be worked out with the millions spent on R & D on this website ;-)
I had a 1988 Old Calis that got 35 MPG in 1989. GM still can't do that today. So maybe we should have let GM and Chrysler fold. Maybe that is the solution too, stop propping up failing companies and let the market run it's course.
That's my rant for the day.
What's yours?
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