Let me start off by saying that BP is directly to blame for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill gusher. I think my comments here are totally clear on that point.
However, Americans as a whole are also to blame at some level, even if indirectly. We are just addicted to "cheap" oil. It is as simple as that. Oil companies love nothing more than massive windfall profits. So if they could drill for oil in places not located miles from the shoreline and/or water surface, get it with less effort and charge the same price they would.
Alas I'd say the "easy to get oil" has already been used up. So I'd say Deepwater Horizon is just what might be the first of many environmental nightmares we're going to see as we search for oil in harder to reach locations.
With that little intro, the "meat" of this Diary is my suggestion for how to change our behavior. I'd do realize it might be short term political suicide for our party, but I see no other way to change the behavior of my fellow Americans. We should add a massive, several dollar a gallon tax to all gasoline. Period.
Below the fold just a story or two and then let me tell you how this would work.
Earlier in this decade when gas where I live topped $4/gallon I saw drastic changes in the behavior of my friends and family members. Both my brother and his wife drove huge SUVs. They had no children. No need for an SUV. None. But they liked them.
At the time my brother was going back to college to get a Masters in Cisco networking. It was an 80 mile commute to the campus. His wife was the top salesperson at a liquor wholesaler. She lived out of her car 9-5.
It didn't take a math whiz for them to realize that their SUVs getting 15 miles to a gallon, and not 30 MPG was taking huge sums of money out of their paycheck each week.
I don't know what was the exact "tipping point" for them, but it must have been somewhere around $4/gallon. Around that point the pain of filling up their SUV a couple times a week for $80 a pop became too much.
They now drive a Honda Civic and Accord. The price of gas had such a powerful affect it drastically changed their behavior (for the better I might add). Taxes and economic pain can tend to do that.
Now I mentioned in the intro that if Obama did this, suggested say a $2.50/gallon tax, he'd maybe be a one term President. But I honestly see no other way we can affect a change in our behavior. And the longer we wait, the harder it will be to achieve and the more disasters we'll see as we drill in deeper and more remote areas.
But this is where I think Obama, as one of the best communicators of the last couple generations, can hopefully educate the public cause I can see a tax structure put in place that works.
It would operate at several different tiers with both taxes and tax credits:
- Tax credits for small business owners. I now live in a rural area and many folks do use their huge trucks for work. I mean you need a good sized truck if you are a roofer. And if your costs for gas double, all your costs will increase. No different if you are a small farmer or construction company. These people employee and lot of people and they need to be protected from a gas tax with tax credits.
- Modify, expand, and extend a program similar to "Cash for Clunkers." My brother and even my parents when they got rid of their huge SUVs thought they'd hate their new "smaller" cars. Well they have come to love them. My brother's Honda Civic is wonderful and my cousin who got a VW couldn't be happier. I have another friend that couldn't imagine life without his big truck. Now if you get him talking about his Toyota Prius you better have a lot of time to listen cause he'll rave about the benefits of the darn thing for as long as you listen.
- Greatly expand tax credits to any business, regardless of size, that actively promotes their employees using current public transportation. Do that same for firms that move a percentage of their employees to telecommuning centers in the burbs or work from home.
- After the above programs are paid for with the gas tax take every other penny and invest in renewable energy research and retooling closed factories. I can only really speak for where I live, but in St. Louis and Peoria, IL there have been some world-class factories that recently closed. An educated workforce that are either underemployed or unemployed. I can't believe my camping buddy that was a wielder for 17 years at a John Deere plant couldn't, with a little bit of training, do the same job making wind turbines or lithium batteries.
Now I realize, and maybe I should have said this closer to the top of this Diary, but I know I am nothing close to the first person to mention stuff like this here. I am also pretty sure there is a zero percent chance it will happen.
I mean heck, I have some issues with even using taxes to change the behavior of Americans. But I am just not sure how much more crystal clear it has to be that oil (and even coal) is causing more harm then good. And with each passing month, year, decade we wait to take any meaningful actions, it just keeps getting worse.