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So lets look at this in the viewpoint of the government trying to preserve oil, gas etc. as long as possible so we can enjoy its benefits as long as possible.
1. Let people conserve on their own. Well as we see on this site, people do do this and do it well, but we're a small portion of the population, and for most people, they will conserve only if they get a substantial and direct benefit from it. People will still drive hummers and escalades when the consequence for them is small.
2. We could do a gas tax. It was mentioned that many countries have large gas taxes, but the US does not. I am heavily against a gas tax because higher gas prices decrease the health of the economy. If we enacted say a $1 gas tax right now nationwide, we'd almost certainly have a double dip recession.
3. We could tax cars with bad fuel economy and do tax credits for cars with good fuel economy. The tax credits already exist, but I'm against taxing cars with bad fuel economy because some people actually need the larger car. A contracter really needs to have a truck, etc. and to put big taxes on those cars will hurt the people that really need it as well as the stupid people who buy them even though they don't need it. However, I am open to this possibility.
4. We could enact regulations that force people to drive efficiently and ticket them if they don't (ex. lowering highway speed limits to 55, no idling over x number of minutes). While personally I have no problem with these sorts of things, people sometimes do need to go fast or idle for a while, etc. and it does start to become overly regulatory when the government does this sort of thing.
5. We could support alternative ways of transportation, such as cheap subways and other transit systems. This would be great, except that this sort of thing only works well in urban areas, and it's extremely expensive, and there is no way we could afford such projects right now with the looming fiscal cliff.
Any others?
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