Trucks and sport utility vehicles will outsell cars for the first time since February, according to a December report by Edmunds.com, which tracks industry statistics.
"Despite all the public discussion of fuel efficiency, SUVs and trucks are the industry's biggest sellers right now as a remarkable number of buyers seem to be compelled by three factors: great deals, low gas prices and winter weather," said Michelle Krebs of AutoObserver.com, a division of Edmunds.com, in a prepared statement.
"It was this summer that customers were concerned about the gas mileage. It hasn't been a topic of conversation lately," said Dave Lawson, the general sales manager at Pomoco Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Newport News. The majority of Pomoco's inventory is SUVs, and its best-selling models are minivans.
Low gas prices are good in helping us through troubled economic times. Low gas prices are bad in allowing consumers to buy gas guzzling cars without thought for environment/future costs. High Gas Prices are good in reducing gas consumption, pollution. High Gas Prices are bad in giving succor to the worlds Petro-Dictators from Venezuela, to Russia and Saudi Arabia.
So, since the market isn't quite working as hoped and needed, our solution must be high gas prices, but imposed from internally. A gas tax to both reduce consumption, improve mileage and environmental impact, and turn the income to sponsoring R&D to assist our car industry, improve the roads, or other environmental benefits. Only in this way can we actually change consumers behavior and through that, lead to a reduced greenhouse footprint. Government cant legislate behavior, but it can use market signals to change it.
Regardless, we must declare Homo Economicus dead, and with the chaos of the Global Economic Crisis, the entire discipline of Economics on life support. If it is a science, then it needs to spend some more time studying who this species actually is, rather than who it would like us to be.
No comments:
Post a Comment