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Freakonomics: Q&A With the Author of $20 Per Gallon

25 points by paulgb 17y ago

JacobAldridge 17y ago
Nice combination of freakonomics with hypothetics. I can understand a discussion of $8 and $18 gas prices without factoring in the effect of new technology and energy sources over the next decade or so - it's just adding made-up stuff on top of made-up projections. But not factoring for more predictable things like inflation and wage rises over that time? It's a recipe for scaremongering or, worse still, an article so far-fetched nobody takes any notice of the serious underlying issue.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- tokenadult 17y ago
  I think the predictions assume "real" dollars (dollars adjusted for inflation) in all cases, but check the book to be sure.
mynameishere 17y ago
My expenses would increase by 5 or 6 dollars a month. Seriously, if gas actually hit 20/gallon people would adjust by moving closer to their jobs (over the space of decades, this would cause very little pain.) Problem solved. Am I the only one who finds easily-solvable problems really quite annoying?
- trafficlight 17y ago
  I'm glad you're on the case. How about curing AIDS while you're at it.
  - mynameishere 17y ago
    The cure for AIDS is: A reduction in the quantity demanded for unsafe sex and dirty needles. AIDS is a trivially-avoided disease and a stupid example, even if you're just being snide. The cure for 20/gallon gas is: A reduction in the quantity demanded for >25 mile commutes, which is an incredible historic anomaly. Neither cure works 100 percent of the time, just like every other single cure in the whole wide world.
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
ken 17y ago
Interesting, but avoided the one question I really wanted asked: "I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of people who didn't end up looking stupid when they predicted 50 years ago what life would be like today. What can you say to convince us that you'll be one of the 5 of this generation who got it right?" Technology has a way of surprising everybody.
- old-gregg 17y ago
  You're right, the future may surprise you! Just go and watch "Back to the Future 2" again and then ask yourself: "Where is my anti-gravitational skateboard and a self-drying jacket, self-tailoring jeans?" Or even something simpler: "Where did 24-bit true-color laptops go?"
- baddox 17y ago
  Most "true predictions" from 50 years ago are simply random likely occurrences given the number of "predictions" made. I use quotes around the word because most of these accounts aren't actually people saying they believe the future will be a certain way. Most depictions of the future are in fiction, and even fiction hailed as being quite accurate has many more inaccuracies that are simply ignored. If someone was really trying to predict was the future would be like, then it wouldn't be that impressive that they would get 5 or even 10 percent of their predictions correct, due to chance.
adamt 17y ago
I don't buy into this. He talks about a world of $8 per gallon bringing on drastic behavioral and economic changes. A world where by school busses would have to stop running etc and private motoring is massively reduced and restricted to hybrid cars. In the UK (as with most of Europe) due to heavy government taxes on petrol (gas) we pay over £1 per litre. This equates to over $6.35 per US gallon (and at peak prices, it would have passed $7 per US gallon in 2008. Have our school busses stop running? Has private motoring disappeared? Do well all own hybrids? The answer to all these questions is an obvious no. Sure - we care a bit more about MPG - the average out-of-town MPG of cars on the market in the UK is 47MPG (admittedly only about 39 miles per US gallon) for extra-urban (out of town). Source; http://www.fuel-economy.co.uk/stats.shtml http://www.fuel-economy.co.uk/stats.shtml. Similarly, car ownership per capita across western Europe is broadly similar to North America (http://www.swivel.com/data_sets/spreadsheet/1003604 http://www.swivel.com/data_sets/spreadsheet/1003604) I think the author confuses what happens when prices spike (and school districts exceed their budgets) versus what happens when prices rise steadily over above inflation over a number of years.
- dejb 17y ago
  I agree with your sentiment but I think the differences between the UK and the US due to fuel prices are quite noticeable. Here some that I noticed - UK cities and towns are built more for people. In the US they feel like they are built more for cars. - Pretty much everything is more expensive in the UK than the US - Pedestrians take more 'right of way' in the UK whereas in the US it's 'watch out or get hit'. - The UK has much better public transport than the US - UK cars are tiny and US cars are huge. - Some people in the UK people do tend to think it was a big deal to drive 100 k's to go somewhere. I guess this is partly because the UK is geographically small. So I'd say that there would be some good and some bad changes but they'd certainly be noticeable. Of course technology will adapt so most likely the impact on the cost of living will be reduced.
  - sho 17y ago
    "Some people in the UK people do tend to think it was a big deal to drive 100 k's to go somewhere." Maybe so, but in Australia they'd also think it's a pretty big deal to drive 100kms. And yet in the USA, I remember one guy I used to know who drove 6 hours, two ways, every weekend to see his girlfriend, seemed to think nothing of it. Trust me, that is never going to happen in Australia. Americans just love driving, it seems. They seem to like being in their cars more, almost seems like a second home. I don't know why. Another thing I've noticed about Americans is that they equate their cars with freedom, whereas in many other countries cars are a necessary evil which, far from making you more free, is actually a millstone around your neck. If I drag a car somewhere I have to worry about it, pay for parking, can't drink, etc etc. Give me a train anytime! But Americans seem to see it the exact opposite .. go figure.

25 points by paulgb 17y ago

Nice combination of freakonomics with hypothetics. I can understand a discussion of $8 and $18 gas prices without factoring in the effect of new technology and energy sources over the next decade or so - it's just adding made-up stuff on top of made-up projections. But not factoring for more predictable things like inflation and wage rises over that time? It's a recipe for scaremongering or, worse still, an article so far-fetched nobody takes any notice of the serious underlying issue.

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
tokenadult 17y ago
I think the predictions assume "real" dollars (dollars adjusted for inflation) in all cases, but check the book to be sure.

mynameishere 17y ago

My expenses would increase by 5 or 6 dollars a month. Seriously, if gas actually hit 20/gallon people would adjust by moving closer to their jobs (over the space of decades, this would cause very little pain.) Problem solved. Am I the only one who finds easily-solvable problems really quite annoying?

trafficlight 17y ago
I'm glad you're on the case. How about curing AIDS while you're at it.
- mynameishere 17y ago
  The cure for AIDS is: A reduction in the quantity demanded for unsafe sex and dirty needles. AIDS is a trivially-avoided disease and a stupid example, even if you're just being snide. The cure for 20/gallon gas is: A reduction in the quantity demanded for >25 mile commutes, which is an incredible historic anomaly. Neither cure works 100 percent of the time, just like every other single cure in the whole wide world.
  - deleted 17y ago
    [deleted]

ken 17y ago

Interesting, but avoided the one question I really wanted asked: "I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of people who didn't end up looking stupid when they predicted 50 years ago what life would be like today. What can you say to convince us that you'll be one of the 5 of this generation who got it right?" Technology has a way of surprising everybody.

old-gregg 17y ago
You're right, the future may surprise you! Just go and watch "Back to the Future 2" again and then ask yourself: "Where is my anti-gravitational skateboard and a self-drying jacket, self-tailoring jeans?" Or even something simpler: "Where did 24-bit true-color laptops go?"
baddox 17y ago
Most "true predictions" from 50 years ago are simply random likely occurrences given the number of "predictions" made. I use quotes around the word because most of these accounts aren't actually people saying they believe the future will be a certain way. Most depictions of the future are in fiction, and even fiction hailed as being quite accurate has many more inaccuracies that are simply ignored. If someone was really trying to predict was the future would be like, then it wouldn't be that impressive that they would get 5 or even 10 percent of their predictions correct, due to chance.

adamt 17y ago

I don't buy into this. He talks about a world of $8 per gallon bringing on drastic behavioral and economic changes. A world where by school busses would have to stop running etc and private motoring is massively reduced and restricted to hybrid cars. In the UK (as with most of Europe) due to heavy government taxes on petrol (gas) we pay over £1 per litre. This equates to over $6.35 per US gallon (and at peak prices, it would have passed $7 per US gallon in 2008. Have our school busses stop running? Has private motoring disappeared? Do well all own hybrids? The answer to all these questions is an obvious no. Sure - we care a bit more about MPG - the average out-of-town MPG of cars on the market in the UK is 47MPG (admittedly only about 39 miles per US gallon) for extra-urban (out of town). Source; http://www.fuel-economy.co.uk/stats.shtml http://www.fuel-economy.co.uk/stats.shtml. Similarly, car ownership per capita across western Europe is broadly similar to North America (http://www.swivel.com/data_sets/spreadsheet/1003604 http://www.swivel.com/data_sets/spreadsheet/1003604) I think the author confuses what happens when prices spike (and school districts exceed their budgets) versus what happens when prices rise steadily over above inflation over a number of years.

dejb 17y ago
I agree with your sentiment but I think the differences between the UK and the US due to fuel prices are quite noticeable. Here some that I noticed - UK cities and towns are built more for people. In the US they feel like they are built more for cars. - Pretty much everything is more expensive in the UK than the US - Pedestrians take more 'right of way' in the UK whereas in the US it's 'watch out or get hit'. - The UK has much better public transport than the US - UK cars are tiny and US cars are huge. - Some people in the UK people do tend to think it was a big deal to drive 100 k's to go somewhere. I guess this is partly because the UK is geographically small. So I'd say that there would be some good and some bad changes but they'd certainly be noticeable. Of course technology will adapt so most likely the impact on the cost of living will be reduced.
- sho 17y ago
  "Some people in the UK people do tend to think it was a big deal to drive 100 k's to go somewhere." Maybe so, but in Australia they'd also think it's a pretty big deal to drive 100kms. And yet in the USA, I remember one guy I used to know who drove 6 hours, two ways, every weekend to see his girlfriend, seemed to think nothing of it. Trust me, that is never going to happen in Australia. Americans just love driving, it seems. They seem to like being in their cars more, almost seems like a second home. I don't know why. Another thing I've noticed about Americans is that they equate their cars with freedom, whereas in many other countries cars are a necessary evil which, far from making you more free, is actually a millstone around your neck. If I drag a car somewhere I have to worry about it, pay for parking, can't drink, etc etc. Give me a train anytime! But Americans seem to see it the exact opposite .. go figure.