The U.S. went through a couple of gas crises in the 1970s, and now we are in the midst of another one. High prices at the pump have got politicians debating about drilling for oil in ANWR, off shore, and other places.
Recently, the Antiplanner’s esteemed colleagues and faithful allies, Indur Goklany and Jerry Taylor, pointed out that gas is actually less expensive today, when measured proportionate to personal incomes, than it was in 1960. Jerry (who has also been debating whether or not to drill for oil in the L.A. Times) expands on this point, with charts, on the Cato blog.
The point they were making is that we aren’t really in a serious crisis, and politicians should not rush to adopt ill-considered policies that are “exactly the wrong thing” — policies like ethanol subsidies that end up costing a lot and producing few benefits. I completely agree with this point, and to underscore it I’d like to scrutinize the data a little more.
According to the Highway Use of Motor Fuel tables in Highway Statistics (link goes to 2006 table; for pre-1995 tables, go here), per-capita consumption of gasoline has increased by 85 percent since 1960. So even though gas may cost less, relative to our incomes, we use more so it is even more painful when the price goes up.
Click to see a larger version.
The chart above, which is from tables 2.1 and 2.5.5 of the Department of Commerce’s National Income and Product Account data, shows that, since 1949, Americans have spent between 8 and 10 percent of their personal incomes on autos, including buying, operating, maintaining, and insuring them. Included in that 8 to 10 percent is 2 and 4 percent of incomes spent on gas & oil. The chart also shows total miles of driving from Highway Statistics.
Look carefully at the gas shocks of the 1970s. When gas prices went up, the share of incomes people spent on gasoline jumped — especially in the late 1970s. Miles of driving declined slightly, but quickly recovered and continued to grow at the same rate as before the crises. Curiously, the share of incomes people spent on autos as a whole fell when the share spent on gas went up. A close look at the data reveals that, when gas prices went up, spending on new autos went down.
Interestingly, American’s spent 2.9 percent of their incomes on gasoline in 2007 — exactly the same as they spent in 1960. Increases in consumption were cancelled by the increases in income. What made high gas prices painful in 2007, and makes them more painful today, was that, as recently as 2002, we spent only 1.9 percent of our incomes on gas.
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Click to see a larger version.
The chart above, which is based on miles of driving and fuel used for highways tables in Highway Statistics, shows that when Americans started buying autos again after the 1970s oil shocks, they bought more fuel-efficient vehicles (the table shows an average of all motor vehicles, including cars, trucks, and buses). The average age of cars on the road in the mid-80s was about 7.5, which means the complete fleet turned over in about 15 years. Indeed, the figure shows that the growth in miles per gallon took about 15 years, after which it leveled off. (It leveled off because increased efficiencies in ton-miles per gallon were cancelled out by increasingly large cars that people bought in the 1990s.)
Americans adjusted to higher fuel prices in other ways too. In 1970, the average car on the road was only 5.6 years old. Today, it is more than 9 years old, indicating either that consumers are demanding longer-lasting cars or are taking better care of their cars so they don’t have to replace them as frequently. (The average car in the Antiplanner’s garage is 18 years old, suggesting that we can stretch our car budgets even further in this way.)
Transit ridership ticked up during the 1970’s gas crises, but like today, transit didn’t help most people the. In 1974, urban driving declined by about 12 billion vehicle miles (something more than 19 billion passenger miles), while transit passenger miles increased by about 1.4 billion. In 1979, urban driving fell by 14 billion passenger miles, while transit passenger miles grew by 1.7 billion.
Still, people substituted transit for 7 to 12 percent of their reductions in driving in the 1970s, compared with only 3 percent in 2008, suggesting that — despite hundreds of billions in transit capital investments — transit is even less useful and flexible today than it was in the 1970s. But as useful as transit might have been in the 1970s, it didn’t last: by 1995, ridership had fallen almost as low as it was in 1970, before the gas shocks.
Despite transit’s pitiful record, we see transit groups trying to turn high gas prices to their advantage. They aren’t trying to entice people to ride transit; they are trying to persuade lawmakers to devote more subsidies to it.
I suspect Indur and Jerry are worried that politicians will do something really dumb, like instituting price controls or subsidizing oil shale production (remember synfuels?). I am only worried that politicians will do something pretty dumb, like spending billions more on inflexible rail transit systems or mandating land-use regulation that promotes higher-density development.
Yes, high gas prices are painful. But we will adjust, as we did in the 1970s, by slowing our purchases of other things (like new cars), buying more fuel-efficient cars, and making other changes in our lifestyles that are appropriate for each one of us. That’s the way freedom works. Government should not interfere in those choices by trying to second-guess what is best for us or catering to some special interest group (such as the rail construction industry) that claims it has a silver bullet.
“Yes, high gas prices are painful. But we will adjust, as we did in the 1970s, by slowing our purchases of other things (like new cars), buying more fuel-efficient cars, and making other changes in our lifestyles that are appropriate for each one of us. That’s the way freedom works.”
Wow – so freedom = car ownership. I understand, there is NO other way to be free. I should ditch any hope I have of transportation by some other way because I can’t be free without a car. Thanks for letting me know that I have no choice in the matter.
And once again, it’s amazing how the A.P. would rather have us slow our purchase of other items, new cars, etc., then consider transit. Remember, a lot of the world’s economy depends on Americans buying “stuff” – we are the consumers. Every time gas throws another sucker-punch at us and we respond by curtailing our spending habits, the whole world groans in pain (wonder why the world economy is really starting to suck?). But I guess that’s better than considering the possibility of transit.
“Government should not interfere in those choices by trying to second-guess what is best for us or catering to some special interest group (such as the rail construction industry) that claims it has a silver bullet.”
Unlike the gas industry, the road construction industries, and other industries who have made highways and new roads the overwhelmingly predominant form of transportation development, leaving the other industries in their wake? Unlike the gas giants at ExxonMobil who have politicians and presidential candidates in their pockets?
This is politics – there are always going to be shenanigans. There are plenty of special interest groups with a hand in buiding new highways.
Wow – so freedom = car ownership. I understand, there is NO other way to be free. I should ditch any hope I have of transportation by some other way because I can’t be free without a car. Thanks for letting me know that I have no choice in the matter.
Indeed.
Many are slaves to this sort of imposed freedom.
DS
mandating land-use regulation that promotes higher-density development
And what about altering land-use restrictions so that they allow higher-density development? Or, have you never actually been to a zoning board meeting?
Politicians have a difficult enough time following trends in one variable. Asking them to consider prices and incomes simultaneously might make their heads explode.
I for one appreciate the government energy subsidies: be it the billions of dollars spent to stabilize the middle east and protect the oil shipping lanes of the Gulf, or the US saber rattling this week against Russia’s defense of Georgian oil lines. I can’t imagine how much I’d have to pay for gas if everyone wanted to act like Chavez.
t g :”I can’t imagine how much I’d have to pay for gas if everyone wanted to act like Chavez.”
Not sure what you mean. Has Chavez done anything which increased the cost of crude oil at U.S. refineries?
Chavez needs U.S. oil revenues far more than the U.S. needs Venezuelan oil. The poor grade of Venezuelan crude oil just cannot be refined everywhere. The U.S. alone possesses enough heavy sour crude refining capacity to use Venezuelan oil.
Dan: “so freedom = car ownership”
Perhaps not for you, but for almost all American families car ownership is exactly that. Anyone who believes that trains and horses ever provided the freedom the automobile enables is deluding himself, IMO.
for almost all American families car ownership is exactly that.
Sniff…golly – thanks, John, for letting us know that having only one choice is true, patriotic freedom.
Apparently the folks trying to increase their choices in the blockquoted upthread don’t know how free they really are by having only one choice.
Perhaps you should e-mail them and let them know these obstacles they are encountering aren’t ‘obstacles’, but patriotic reminders of their freedom?
DS
Dan,
That’s real nice that the elderly feel this way. It’s also nice that various city councils around the country have passed such resolutions. Now that they have, AARP can go to the city councils in those cities are ask them to acquire more right of way using local tax monies so that sidewalks and bike paths – which will almost exclusively benefit local residents – can be built. There is no reason, however, that federal gas tax revenues, which allow all of us to benefit from because motor vehicles can access every major city across the entire country, should be used so that some locals in one city can have better sidewalks and bike paths. They can go to City Hall for that – that is, if City Hall isn’t financially bankrupt yet.
My city’s transit agency right now is trying to build 30 miles of light rail. I’ve calculated that if the capital costs of all this light rail, coupled with the annual operating subsides, were to be invested in U.S. Treasuries and were to be used to fund bus operations, my agency could put another 700-1,000 buses on the road, which could be used to complement the 3,000 bi-directional miles of bus routes they already run. That would provide far more people with far more access to transit that dumping $100+ million per mile for light rail on a dozen streets in a city of 640 square miles.
I did not say that freedom = car ownership. I said freedom means getting to decide how to spend your money and time in the facing of changing resource scarcities.
The alternative is to have someone else make decisions for you. Even if that someone else is a democratically elected body (or, more likely, bureaucrats appointed by a democratically elected executive), it still comes down to one set of individuals making decisions for other individuals that are likely to be different from the decisions the second group would make.
You can call that what you like, but I don’t call it freedom.
There is no reason, however, that federal gas tax revenues, which allow all of us to benefit from because motor vehicles can access every major city across the entire country, should be used so that some locals in one city can have better sidewalks and bike paths. They can go to City Hall for that – that is, if City Hall isn’t financially bankrupt yet.
Neil, are you claiming that Fed gas tax revenues fund state, county, arterial, connector and local access roads?
No, of course you are not.
You know that General Funds of, say, cities pave and esp. repave their arterial, connector and local access roads (from bond issuance and taxation).
You also know that likely almost all of the ROWs are already purchased. You also know that – from your reading above – that the issue is ‘adequate’ sidewalks (not ‘missing’), and you know – because you can speak to the issue, right? – that complete streets seek to install things like bulb-outs for safety and widen and connect sidewalks.
So why the dissembling and distraction with Federal taxes at the local level, when only a fraction of fed funds (grants, awards) go to local streets and ROWs/bike lanes/accessibility/safety?
DS
dan,
I didn’t say anything about having only one choice. I said that for almost all U.S. families, car ownership is freedom.
Statements such as:
“More Americans age 50+ are trying to leave their cars”
“many Americans ages 50+ are trying to move away from car transportation as a result of high gas prices”
do not really tell us anything about how many Americans are ready to give up the freedom an automobile provides, do they?
Even the statement:
“Almost one of every three people (29%) polled say they are now walking as a way to avoid high gas prices. “
says nothing about whether these people believe they need the freedom their cars provide.
Perhaps Antiplanners can explain why I am freer when I’m driving (and have to pay attention to the road) than when I’m riding a bus/train/etc. (and can read, work on a laptop, etc.).
Statements such as:
[examples]
do not really tell us anything about how many Americans are ready to give up the freedom an automobile provides, do they?
Nice pretzeling to maintain relevance.
Sounds more like they are trying to get out from underneath the freedom to pay high gas prices. Sounds like they are finding alternate freedoms, such as the freedom to choose to not drive. The freedom to walk.
Or maybe you think they are more free because almost half of our seniors (patriotic senior-Americans who built this country) feel unsafe to cross the street. Yay, freedom to feel unsafe in their own country! Yay!
DS
“Perhaps Antiplanners can explain why I am freer when I’m driving”
No one said you were freer when you are driving.
Almost all American families have much more freedom of mobility when they own a car. You know that’s true, and it’s a waste of my time to even bother arguing with you.
I have to admit Dan, for someone who is frequently focused, accurate and logical, arguing that cars do not increase freedom seems…different for you.
When I first started reading this blog, I got pretty pissed off at the author for challenging light rail and public transportation. Then I looked at the figures and facts.
I don’t like cars. I don’t like sitting in traffic. I don’t like idiot drivers. I don’t like smog or noise pollution. But I do enjoy the freedom my car provides me. Living in Portland and being a teacher, I am pretty much forced (by the arguably unfair and bureaucratic hiring “system” of Portland Public Schools) to apply to jobs in the suburbs or surrounding communities. None of the four schools I’ve interviewed at this week are accessible by rail. Two of the four are near bus stops, but one of them is a 126 minute trip ONE WAY and requires three transfers and a 46 minute layover. I can drive to the same location in 20 minutes.
I don’t like a four hour round trip commute after a 10 hour work day even more than I hate driving and cars.
So, yeah, having a car seems a lot like freedom to me because it opens up opportunity that light rail and buses never will, and even though I hate cars, even though I hate what cars do to the environment (although the amount of CO2 put into the air by light rail construction will take decades to be offset by reduction in driving by ridership), I can take a job if I choose to drive. That’s freedom.
Almost all American families have much more freedom of mobility when they own a car. You know that’s true, and it’s a waste of my time to even bother arguing with you.
What’s your point, for the umteenth time? No one disagrees that transit in the U.S. is quite crappy compared to Europe, Japan, and many other countries. There is no evidence, however, that Europeans have any less freedom of mobility than Americans, it’s just that they travel much more by other modes than by automobile. According to data available from http://www.joelschwartz.com, at any given level of income, Europeans travel by personal vehicle about 40% less than Americans. Last time I checked, in many ways, their democracy is far more vibrant than ours (perhaps the result of having directly gone through two massively destructive wars in their backyards, as opposed to the U.S.)
The real problem here is that many who inhabit this blog seem to have a congenital ideological aversion to efforts designed to improve transit, price auto travel closer to what it costs society and the environment, and to restore the walkability of our cities and suburbs to some semblance of what they used to be before being widely destroyed by the decades long underpricing of auto travel, let alone the Stalinist-style road planning system in the U.S.
I have to admit Dan, for someone who is frequently focused, accurate and logical, arguing that cars do not increase freedom seems…different for you.
Thank you. Perhaps there’s too much cirumlocution in my comments above.
I’m pointing out that auto-dependency isn’t freedom.
As soon as groups try to break that auto-dependency, they find out how difficult it is in many areas to get around; that is: they are no longer as free to make choices. That larger context of needing a car is not freedom – its merely necessity in a constrained set of choices.
Sure, one can argue that cars help you get around in a landscape dependent upon the automobile. That’s like saying long tongs help you cook with a three-burner barbecue – sure you could use something else, but only something designed for that barbecue. Speaking of that, gotta turn the brats.
DS
Dan, I agree that having a car isn’t freedom. Nothing in life is “freedom” in that sense. But for the money I have it does give me another choice in how to get around. It saves me a lot of time in getting around. For example, it saves me a lot of time in getting to / from work. I’ll take some of the drawbacks of it in favor of being transit, bike or foot dependency.
by car
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&saddr=39.723164,-104.987755&daddr=S+Yosemite+St+%4039.615200,+-104.885650&hl=en&geocode=12097369454164969617,39.615200,-104.885650&mra=dme&mrcr=0&mrsp=0&sz=14&sll=39.72026,-104.991875&sspn=0.047203,0.11158&ie=UTF8&z=14
car without freeway
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&saddr=Broadway+%4039.723164,+-104.987500&daddr=S+Yosemite+St+%4039.615200,+-104.885650&hl=en&geocode=413443914591194477,39.723164,-104.987500%3B12097369454164969617,39.615200,-104.885650&mra=ls&dirflg=h&sll=39.667885,-104.93663&sspn=0.188957,0.44632&ie=UTF8&ll=39.668349,-104.9366&spn=0.188955,0.44632&z=12
transit
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&saddr=Broadway+%4039.723164,+-104.987500&daddr=S+Yosemite+St+%4039.615200,+-104.885650&hl=en&geocode=413443914591194477,39.723164,-104.987500%3B12097369454164969617,39.615200,-104.885650&mra=cc&dirflg=r&sll=39.72026,-104.991875&sspn=0.047203,0.11158&ie=UTF8&z=14
walking
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&saddr=Broadway+%4039.723164,+-104.987500&daddr=S+Yosemite+St+%4039.615200,+-104.885650&hl=en&geocode=413443914591194477,39.723164,-104.987500%3B12097369454164969617,39.615200,-104.885650&mra=ls&dirflg=w&sll=39.72026,-104.991875&sspn=0.047203,0.11158&ie=UTF8&z=12&start=0
“Perhaps Antiplanners can explain why I am freer when I’m driving (and have to pay attention to the road) than when I’m riding a bus/train/etc. (and can read, work on a laptop, etc.).”
1) I am not tied to a fixed route or schedule.
2) I have more time for work, leisure, etc. when I get to my destination
3) I am free from people talking loudly on their cell phones (or to each other).
4) I am free from having to sit next to people who have not learned the finer points of hygiene.
I’m sure you can think of many more yourself. Be creative.
This is still BS since your are loading the deck with a auto only policy. Start with an answer work your way to a question. Cox does the same thing too.
I’ll take the freedom that come with a car over being a slave to transit schedules and routs that don’t go where I’m going.
For me, cars = freedom
Tomorrow I will go pick up some product about 5 mile from home, then go to my first job site another 5 miles. Stay about a hour and then go to my second job site (another 10 miles.) work for about 3 hours then I need to be on Mt Hood by noon and then back to the first job site.
Not possible by way of transit. About 140 miles.
I think Craig has presented the crux of the car = freedom position very nicely. In essence it is the freedom to you time productively and efficiently.
Dan, on the other hand, has presented the crux of the car = imprisonment position. For those for whom time is plentiful and/or driving licences aren’t available (or shouldn’t be available) other people’s cars are a barrier to freedom.
It is sweet irony that the seniors who are now complaining about their lack of freedom are probably the very generation who insisted on the current auto-centric road investment back when they were in Craig’s current position. Perhaps it is this changing of employment status that has created the maxim the with age comes wisdom. You have to go back to living like a child or a teen, with the benefit of the hindsight that a teen lacks, to get a well rounded view of the world. Only then do you gain the wisdom to appreciate that freedom for some isn’t what America is all about. To have mobility freedom for all does mean compromises have to be made. That is not as hard as it seems. A roading hierarchy can ensure that happens in a way that accomodates the needs of all road users with the least negative impact on auto travel. Local roads that are used by local traffic can safely accomodate all modes that facilitate local traffic without adding more than a minute or two to most trip times. Arterial roads that carry arterial traffic need to seperate different modes to allow each to operate at it’s own most efficient speed. A considerable amount of thought needs to beapplied to allowing cyclists and pedestrians to easily and safely cross major arteries without compromising traffic flow. Even something as simple as compromising on pedestrian bridges is important to creating the perception of equal treatment for each mode. Although it is more expensive than a standard footbridge a compromise half overpass half underpass design has the desired psychological effect. This design simply reduces the normal bridge height by half allowing a simple embankment or mound to replace conventional steps which maes the bridge more accessible. By making autos descend to go under the bridge it creates the impression that it is autos that are having to go out of their way to accomodate pedestrians and cyclists. However, halving the change in height can allow either a steeper grade or a less fuel hungry climb back to ground level. Either option is much cheaper than building a full underpass. Pedestian security is enhanced because they are in the line of sight of approaching drivers rather than being hidden.
“It is sweet irony that the seniors who are now complaining about their lack of freedom are probably the very generation who insisted on the current auto-centric road investment back when they were in Craig’s current position.”
No one has presented any evidence showing that a majority or even a significant number of U.S. seniors are complaining about lack of freedom because of automobiles. As far as I can tell, you guys just made that up based on responses to very general survey questions.
“To have mobility freedom for all does mean compromises have to be made.”
Roads and highways, used by personal vehicles and buses, can provide freedom of mobility for all. Rails cannot. No compromise is necessary if we stop this foolish train fetish and pursue an economically sensible solution.
msetty: “What’s your point, for the umteenth time?”
It has never changed. Dan said “So freedom = car ownership”, followed by sarcastic comments which seemed to deny that was true. I said for almost all families in the U.S. car ownership does provide freedom.
Before personal automobiles became affordable, “freedom = horse and buggy ownership” for most of the nation. America was building roads for buggies long before it was building roads for automobiles.
No one has presented any evidence showing that a majority or even a significant number of U.S. seniors are complaining about lack of freedom because of automobiles..
Sure they have. Some just refuse to see it.
Again, regardless of the hand-waving on this thread, the issue is that auto-centric land uses don’t mean that people have freedom! (sweet, patriotic freedom!) when they have cars. It means they are dependent upon cars. If some must call that ‘freedom’, well, that clarifies things, doesn’t it.
And the numbers presented above, esp the “Almost half (47%) of poll responders say they cannot cross the main roads safely – 4 in 10 pedestrian fatalities are over the age of 50. ” sure does sound like freedom is restricted.
I’m sure, though, that some ideologies need to reject this information, as it does not comport with the belief system.
DS
“‘Almost half (47%) of poll responders say they cannot cross the main roads safely’… sure does sound like freedom is restricted.”
My statement was that most U.S. seniors are not complaining about loss of freedom because of automobiles. If they cannot cross the street safely there is likely a lack of adequate crosswalks and of law enforcement.
I am a senior myself. I stood in front of my town council to argue for better crosswalks on main roads on one accosion and for more traffic control police on another.
My guess is that a significant number of 19th century seniors complained they could not cross the street safely because of speeding buggies. If one chooses to live in an urban area, he can find much to complain about.
This is a stupid discussion.
John Dewey, It is a “stupid discussion” only bcause you have argued contradictory positions.
First arguing that “Roads and highways, used by personal vehicles and buses, can provide freedom of mobility for all.”
Then arguing that “I am a senior myself. I stood in front of my town council to argue for better crosswalks on main roads on one accosion and for more traffic control police on another.”
What Dan and I have been arguing is that autocentric road design restricts the freedom of non-auto road users, sometimes to the point of imprisonment in their own homes.
One thing you and I can agree on is “we stop this foolish train fetish and pursue an economically sensible solution.” If the problems being addressed are environmental then giving walkers back their freedom is the most economically sensible solution.
Everyone here who talks about superior European mass transit kills me. To begin with, almost all cities arose prior to the automobile, so have a density which makes mass transit logical that American cities lack. Second, the distances involved are miniscule compared to a continent-wide nation like ourselves. The entire country of Austria, for example, could fit inside the Grand Canyon–lock stock and barrel down to the last mountain, river, lake and city. As someone who has lived in both NYC and Europe and presently in New Orleans, I appreciate compact cities with great transit as much as anyone. But cars offer the ultimate in flexibility and freedom and buses are far more flexible and cheaper than rail even as much as I and the tourists enjoy the St. Charles street-car line. After Katrina they simply laid on more express buses so people decamped to Baton Rouge could work in New Orleans while living in B.R.
until their homes were rebuilt. When the demand subsided, the service was first reduced, than halted. Very flexible and efficient. No need to wait years for a multi-million dollar Lt.Rail line. Mass transit will always be regarded as the last resort of the poor in most places in the US unlike in Europe, mainly due to differing settlement patterns. In Atlanta whites refer to MARTA (Metro Atlanta Regional Transit Authority) as standing for Moving Africans Rapidly Thru Atlanta. So there is also a sociocultural
dimension which mitigates against wide usage as well as structural cityscape layout and financial construction/operating costs. People should stop trying to push the same old wet noodle uphill.
Still you are wrinting about policy that loads the deck towards auto use. As apose to a more balanced policy that includes both rail and road.