SpaceBanter.com - View Single Post - Drudge: Spy satellites watch Americans from space

Fred J. McCall

h (Rand Simberg) wrote:

:On Tue, 23 May 2006 14:22:58 GMT, in a place far, far away, Fred J.
:McCall made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
:such a way as to indicate that:
:
::Caring about gas mileage does decrease demand.
:
:But only if it lasts for a relatively long time. Decreased demand due
:to gas mileage tends to be a very laggy phenomenon, since people don't
:immediately throw away their cars and rush out to buy new ones.
:
::Six bucks a gallon
::would have the economy seriously in the tank.
:
:Why do you think that? Prices in Britain are currently over $7/gallon
:and they don't seem to be "seriously in the tank".
:
:Because they're long used to it, and have much more fuel-efficient
:vehicles. They're past the lag that you note above.

And that's why high gasoline prices might actually encourage an
economic boomlet in the US. Folks are going to want to replace those
big cars and SOMEBODY has to make the new ones.

:And much of
:Europe's economy is in fact in the tank (though not just because of
:high fuel prices).

Which countries are in trouble now that weren't in trouble before oil
prices spiked?

Saying "not just because" is over emphasizing the case. High fuel
prices have very little to do with various European economic woes.

--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
--George Bernard Shaw