Any thoughts about this proposed program from Congress?
To me, it has nothing to do with consumption and is just a veiled bail-out for auto makers. It also seems to further reward bad behavior and cause the personally responsible folks to pay for the extravagance of the masses.
Apparently, it takes about 6.7 tons of CO2 to produce a new car before you even drive it. Then, add to that the waste that comes from crushing a car that could be drivable for years to come. Now, figure the amount of extra mpg you need to offset the production emissions. According to the Wall Street Journal, it could take from 5 to 20 years to pay off the CO2 debt incurred from the new car.
The part about personal responsibility annoys me too. I, for example, bought a '07 car that is rated at 24 mpg. Bill and I carpool on 95% of days, which represents a personal choice with a number of personal sacrifices which we gladly make for the benefits of having one car and a smaller transportation budget. No one in the government asked us to do this, nor is the government rewarding us for it.
The beneficiaries of this bill could be our wealthy neighbors who bought an SUV at the same time we bought our car and are now ready for a new vehicle. Perhaps they want a swanky Lexus or a Jag convertible. In this instance, I rather regret that the government is willing to take $4,500 from me and redistribute it to my neighbor while at the same time providing a benefit to the car manufacturers who were unwilling to think about sustainability 5 years ago. There are a lot of things I could do with that $4,500...or the many multiples of $4,500 that I pay in taxes each year. I'd really like a wind turbine. Or new storm windows to keep the heat in my house. Or a few goats/sheep/pigs that I can raise organically for meat/dairy/wool. When the government gets involved in this sort of wealth distribution it seems to me that they mess more things up than they fix.
What do you think? Please disagree!
David Korten's Keynote Presentation Now Online
15 years ago
Nor will I accept a reward from the government for it.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that public perception is that this is anything BUT an auto bail-out. What I find annoying about the auto bail-out process is that companies that had more vision like ford and now are in a better place financially are effectively being punished by not being rewared with tax dollars.
ReplyDeleteHowever, a program like this that encourages spending and consumption is a little more fair, as ford is likely to see more benefit that GM because people will have more faith in their company, yet everyone will likely see some benefit. This is in effect giving the tax dollars back to the consumers rather than straight to the auto CEOs.
I am all about reducing consumption, but for the auto industry, right now, I would rather see a national increase in consumption even if that means your neighbor swaps in an SUV for a lexus (which I would consider a net benefit, anyways).
It is not a perfectly fair process but it is one of the better ones out there, IMO.
How can we truly reduce consumption if we would rather increase consumption to support a failing industry (presumably for the social benefits?)?
ReplyDeleteThese concepts are mutually exclusive. If one were to believe that sprawl and excess consumption were unsustainable, then one has to believe that there is a point at which it has to stop. Maybe that point is now. It would be great if we could transition to a sustainable lifestyle easily and without the pain of economic collapse, but apparently we can't. Programs like this try as hard as possible to cling to unsustainable ways, even as the market tries to correct itself. GM was a failing company for one reason - they did not make products that were priced in such a way that they could be sold and generate enough money to make a profit. They did not have the flexibility to adapt their business model to a changing market that rapidly began to seek a change in the status quo.
Companies exist for their own profit. So..., consumers should buy more crap for the sake of a companies profit as well??
There are better ways to give tax dollars back to the consumer. The best way is to not take them away in the first place.
All good points that I do not disagree with. Perhaps I am accepting of this admittedly imperfect policy because I see it as a compromise. If it works it will be a small step in the right direction. And this is the only way to introduce lasting change: slowly.
ReplyDeleteIf we let the natural order of things progress, it is conceivable that we experience a depression. Dire times give rise to extremists (nazism). We have learned that there is a better way: compromise. While I agree with your ideas, there are just as many people with a strong opinion FOR auto bailouts. Therefore, our leaders can not possibly support only one side, they can only compromise to move forward.
Historically, its the only thing that works. Perhaps, in the end, all the american auto companies go belly up. But it is worth the effort to prevent it, because that is a huge chunk of our GDP.
A compromise between what? Giving $9k rebates for any car and giving nothing? A planned centralized economy vs a free market? If it does work, and is presumably a small step in the right direction, which direction is that - more of my money going to my neighbor's SUV? More government intervention?
ReplyDeleteEveryone has an opinion. Doesn't make it right or useful. My opinion is that compromises over matters of opinion have gotten us to the unsustainable place that we are in right now.
Should we have a guiding philosophy and morality for how we run our government, based perhaps upon some core principals, or are values able to be compromised away for the sake of expediency as it becomes necessary? If we are not guided by any particular value system, how do we determine when such compromises are most in the public interest? At that point, it probably isn't a compromise anyways. What is the public interest in maintaining a high GDP anyways? I think it would be a lot of fun to deconstruct that question at length...
I agree that moving towards Nazism is bad. That is what I am most afraid of.
I would think that the way to avoid that course would be to not repeat the actions of the Third Reich, which we are most definitely doing right now. Their early economic policy was quite Keynesian, Ben Bernanke would probably have approved. We are on the same economic path that the Nazis were on in the 1930s.
We already have our depression, and have already lost the chunk of our GDP. The best way back to where we were is to allow new profitable enterprises to flourish. Hard to do with government dictating the terms of the economy and spending mass resources on directing our national efforts to filling potholes, buying cars, and otherwise regulating, favoring and influencing what we can and can not do.
I'd rather take a quick 35% GDP hit than see the rise of a new National Socialist Party-like group. I'd like it if people were able to cope with the ensuing recession/depression as well, but we've pretty much seen to it that most people can't. Pretty spiffy how we managed to do that.
Exactly, yes, a compromise between a free market economy vs a planned central economy. Just like so many other modern countries that seem to do just fine by it. Maybe these countries use more means than consumption to elevate their standard of life (perhaps another interesting question to deconstruct), but here in America happiness is directly tied to GDP. Why oh why would we expect anything other than unruly mobs if we were to let our GDP take a 35% hit. As you pointed out people can barely cope with what we have now. I don't believe we have yet sunk into a depression or taken that kind of hit.
ReplyDeleteI also don't believe we are in any danger of a National Socialist Party, but if enough people do then it is likely a new form of McCarthyism will spring up and bring extremist politics back to popularity. EXACTLY why we need compromises.
It would be great to have a core set of principles to guide government by. In fact, I think the Constitution is a pretty good one. Whats in there is probably the maximum we could get a majority to agree on. And if we didn't have that as a pre-established basis we wouldn't be able to agree on that much. So, the question then becomes a matter of interpretation of those core rules, and thats where opinions come in. They may not be right but they are in fact useful, because thats the basis of democracy. Uncompromising leaders who believe in their "core" interpretation of our values will be left by the wayside, as George W Bush found out. I don't really care what economics the nazis were working on it was their despotism that was the problem, and Bush brought us closer to that than anyone since Lincoln.
For clarification, by National Socialist Party, I am referring to Hitler's Nazis, not communists or actual socialists. I'd rather have a severe depression with unruly mobs than Nazis.
ReplyDeleteLet me ask you this - It is ever a good thing to be uncompromising? When are opinions unwelcome? Who might get to determine what opinions to be uncompromising about? If our opinions are the basis of democracy, how is one to determine if they are right or wrong? If 90% of the country wants to embark on a new McCarthyism-ish endeavor to rid the country of Mexicans or some such idiocy, then are they in the clear to do so? Does anyone have the right to stand against overwhelming popular opinion? With such overwhelming opinion, I see no motivation for the majority to compromise. I can understand the importance of obtaining a compromise in such a situation, but an unsure of the means through which a compromise can be obtained. The minority would require some significant leverage, I suppose. How does one stand against despotism without taking an uncompromising stance against it? If I extend my interpretation of your comments about opinions, compromise, and democracy, I do not find a logical basis for maintaining any personal rights or standards that I would be unable to obtain from the majority of voters through compromise, and since I have essentially no leverage over the majority to obtain such a compromise, what recourse do I have but to be at the mercy of the will of the people?
Would you be uncompromising about any of your own perceived rights?
Yes. I am uncompromising on my opinion on guns, abortion, capital punishment and separation of church and state. And those mostly are not my perceived rights but someone else.
ReplyDeleteIf 90% of the country wanted to get rid of Mexicans tomorrow, then yes, it should happen. If we were really sure that was the true wish of those people. Does this rhetorical question serve to highlight an avenue of injustice? I think not, this obviously would never happen.
But if our core values say that everyone has the right to keep and bear arms, and the majority opinion is that means we get to carry concealed weapons then by god and our forefathers that is what is right. Same goes if majority of opinion is that handguns are illegal.
The checks and balances I feel, in the end, come from the fact that at some point everyone is part of a special interest group, and will be in the minority. And so everyone understands the true value of personal freedom.
The sad cases are when an individual does not really care about many issues, or when our pols misinterpret the true intent of the people.