Vehicle makers say US fuel economy standards put a million jobs at risk

[ThermionicScott]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

I also have to wonder how the so-called average Joe manages to pay for these things.

I have no doubt that the auto industry would collapse if people could only buy cars with their savings.

[Xist]

Originally Posted by ThermionicScott

I have no doubt that the auto industry would collapse if people could only buy cars with their savings.

Boom

I for one think it is unreasonable to expect fuel economy on new cars to improve faster than I can modify it on my Civic--and that might finally convince me to get off of my ever-expanding four points of contact and work on my car.

Isn't oil subsidized, then taxed?

For the record, top oil subsidies are:
Strategic Petroleum Reserve
Reimbursing farmers for fuel taxes for farm vehicles (used on their own farms)
Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (so poor people do not freeze in the winter)

Hey look, something else is more complicated than I had realized. Forbes Welcome

[freebeard]

Originally Posted by Batman Junior

People here are generally good about these things - please keep it that way if you're going to talk about these topics.

On every corner there's a giant metal Santa Claus, who watches over us with glowing red eyes.
They carry weapons and they know if you've been bad or good.
Not everybody's good but everyone tries.

Jonathan Coulton
Chiron Beta Prime

https://wiki.jonathancoulton.com/Chiron_Beta_Prime/Lyrics

Regulation may attempt to steer processes it can't control ('member Prohibition?). Fortunately we have Elon Musk, possibly the only person in the country who moves faster than #45. https://www.wired.com/2017/01/inside...g-los-angeles/

"Jobs at risk" is a logical fallacy — Red Herring. There's twice as many jobs at risk if you do relax regulation. Just different jobs, like not mining coal.

[sendler]

The problem is always the same. We put the burden on the auto manufacturers to "push" fuel efficient cars on the buyers who don't even have the slightest care in the world about fuel efficiency with gas at $2.39. You can't force a retailer to sell something that people don't want to buy. And still stay in buisiness. If the goal is to get people to quit burning up so much fossil fuel, it must be heavily taxed. And then the windfall can be given back to the working classes in other breaks so they can still get to work such as the subsidies that are currently running on electric cars and programs like the successful "cash fo clunkers" to get these old pick up trucks off of the road. Windfall money would also be available for loans to green energy developement, mass transit, efficient housing, food subsidies. A carbon tax doesn't have to hurt the poor and middle class. And then the rich guys can drive whatever they want and gripe every time they fill up to pay for the mess they are making. Many people have been saying it for a long time and now people like Musk have a loud voice. Start phasing in a big carbon tax now.

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

I may h

I also have to wonder how the so-called average Joe manages to pay for these things. Not to brag or anything, but I'm well above average financially, and the end-of-model-year discounts I hear advertised are more than I've ever paid for a car.

Haha, they don't. The bank pays for it then the average Joe ends up paying the bank back almost twice the price of the car.
I think I have my wife talked into saving up, paying cash for a 2 or 3 year old lease turn in here in the next year or 2.
She wants a new car, I don't want her to be locked into a 5ish year payment plan.

[t vago]

Step 1 - propose ham-handed government regulation to increase fuel economy by "punishing" the auto manufacturers if they fall below the fuel efficiency standard. Make the standard force cars to have a 5% improvement in fuel economy every year, but only require larger vehicles to have a 3.5% improvement per year. Also grant exemptions to those larger vehicles, and allow math tricks to gimmick fuel economy improvements that are not allowed with cars.

Step 2 - implement and watch the market favor larger vehicles in general, and a tiny amount of cars that get insanely high fuel economy but that are so pricey that only "rich people" can afford them, so as to avoid the "punishment" called for in the fuel economy standard.

Step 3 - whine about market choices and grumble about finding ways to punish the market.

Step 4 - ignore that step 1 was heavily influenced by the very automakers who were being "punished" to begin with, via regulatory capture.

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

It's a matter of priorities.

Anywhere from not having a desire to make the banks more rich, lack of insecuritty, to having no need to impress or to be in fake competition with peers and total strangers.

[Fat Charlie]

Millions of jobs got lost when Detroit didn't build what the market wanted... But management liked the fact that Hummers made more profit per unit than Aspires. Oddly enough, when the factories closed and the shareholders and bondholders were left empty handed, the upper management that created that situation survived.

Originally Posted by sendler

If the goal is to get people to quit burning up so much fossil fuel, it must be heavily taxed.

And that's the most efficient way to do things. Given the public policies that pollution is bad and using less fuel is good, Here's the cost you're going to pay to burn the stuff: figure things out. Let that invisible hand that the free market people like to talk about do its thing. We're already subsidizing cars with all our road construction, parking requirements and the like- what's so bad about shifting the subsidies to other transportation options that have a shot at reducing congestion?

[sendler]

Originally Posted by Fat Charlie

Millions of jobs got lost when Detroit didn't build what the market wanted... But management liked the fact that Hummers made more profit per unit than Aspires.

Generally, people do not want efficient cars. Because gas is cheap. Huge sales volume still comes from large SUV's and pick up trucks. Not because the manufacturers make more profit. Which they do. But because this is what people want. Because gas is too cheap. The general public in the US has intentionally yet to grasp the inconvenient truth that they are hogging up way more than their fair share of resources.
.
The trouble is a long way off. More than a lifetime. So people refuse to face it. Even if the media would allow them to know about it. But it is big trouble. The whole free market world economic paradigm requires constant economic growth. Which is directly tied to energy consumption growth. 0% growth equals deep recession. Prolonged negative growth of any amount equals collapse.
.
Crude oil will pass peak and start getting more and more expensive. We will have done not enough to replace it or our obsolete economic paradigm and be caught in an energy trap where it is too expensive to do anything about it.
.
Fair warning. If you are reading this, your eyes have been opened. I will let your imagination fill in what happens in 50 - 150 years when we inevitably pass peak oil. Sorry.
.
Please read Tom Murphy among others. Who was an Astro-Physicist by trade and all around smart guy who apparently just started to think about things.
.
http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by Fat Charlie

Millions of jobs got lost when Detroit didn't build what the market wanted... But management liked the fact that Hummers made more profit per unit than Aspires. Oddly enough, when the factories closed and the shareholders and bondholders were left empty handed, the upper management that created that situation survived.



And that's the most efficient way to do things. Given the public policies that pollution is bad and using less fuel is good, Here's the cost you're going to pay to burn the stuff: figure things out. Let that invisible hand that the free market people like to talk about do its thing. We're already subsidizing cars with all our road construction, parking requirements and the like- what's so bad about shifting the subsidies to other transportation options that have a shot at reducing congestion?

The auto maker bourgeoisie only care about profit. The only thing they care about more than profit is making more profit.