A friend recently showed me this button. I hear it's also a bumper sticker. Wow, I hadn't realized it had gone up that much.
The same friend also showed me this article, and I guess compared to prices in other countries, I should be happy about $4 a gallon.
Sometimes I fall into the trap of thinking of happiness and economics as a zero sum game in which other people's suffering somehow means more "good" leftover for me. As someone who only has to fill up the tank every other month, at first glance I seem to be only minimally affected by gas prices. Similarly, I rent my apartment and can watch the housing market with detached amusment and think to myself, "good job not buying an over priced, poorly built condo in 2001."
So, as I ride public transit to and from my rented apartment, I get pretty self-righteous. I look out the window and think about how the money must just be rolling into my bank account. But unfortunately, economics is not a zero sum game. Since our economy relies so much on oil, such as needing trucks to deliver everything, the rising gas prices are raising all other prices along with it. And there is in fact no money rolling into my bank account.
POHS
likewise, the suffering in Myanmar is somehow failing to bring me happiness.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Trying to put gas in perspective
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1 comment:
I'm just back from Italy, where gas runs about $8 a gallon, and everyone still seems pretty happy (and where almost everything is delivered by truck too...the rail lines are almost completely for passenger traffic.) To be sure, things are generally closer to each other, and the suburb hasn't really taken hold, but it seems like almost everyone is capable of driving a car and eating. It's just that the car is smaller, and the food is locally grown and produced. I think there is definitely a point at which the price of gasoline will become really disastrous for America, but my European experience over the years suggests to me that we have a lot of relatively small modifications we can make in our lives that will accommodate gas levels at the current rate, or even quite a bit higher.
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