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America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

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Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#241

Post by grandalf »

lisper wrote: post #225
grandalf wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libertarians are not anti-regulation, they just believe that the good and bad consequences of regulations should be understood. Often, those who are not libertarians will support a regulation simply because they agree with its stated aim... things like "the patriot act" or "the affordable care act". Those names are chosen to sound good, not because they reflect the intent of legislation or the outcome of it. To give…

> Libertarians are not anti-regulation Yes, they are. See https://www.lp.org/issues/the-economy/ "Libertarians believe that the only proper role of government in the economic realm is to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected."

First, the Libertarian Party is not "all libertarians".

Second, environmental regulation falls out of property rights, since pollution spreads onto people's property. If you pollute a stream, the stream carries the pollution to someone else's property and damages it.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#242

Post by waqf »

grandalf wrote: post #239
comicjk wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like a "motte and bailey" argument to me. It's common sense that "the good and bad consequences of regulations should be understood." That's a position that's trivially easy to defend. Libertarians usually argue for a great deal more than that: civil liberties, non-interventionism, laissez-faire capitalism and the abolition of the welfare state. But these things are not obvious simply from understanding t…

Just as patriotic and humanitarian rhetoric is used to justify certain polices that are far from patriotic or humanitarian, libertarian rhetoric is also sometimes used to justify lax regulation, crony capitalism, etc.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/No_True_Scotsman

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#243

Post by vvanders »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #190
YSFEJ4SWJUVU6 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You forgot oil changes in you calc. Are you, perhaps, being sarcastic with your comment? Anyway, there are few countries (if any) on Earth where EVs make financial sense for an average person. Their time will come, but buying into it now is not investing – indeed, as the GP commented, you do it for altogether different reasons.

No, he's not being sarcastic. Are you? EVs don't require oil changes. Or muffler/exhaust service. Or transmission service. And their brakes last longer.

Small nit: The cooling system still requires service, however it's only every 50k miles and runs about $800.

That said last time I broke down my per-mile costs new tires at $1k every 40k was my highest cost by far.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#244

Post by vvanders »

darrylb42 wrote: post #180
vvanders wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forgot oil changes in you calc. Also your $8.70 is only $4.19 in Washington :). Costs are dropping on EVs and will continue to drop as economy of scale picks up. They may not make sense today but there's a good chance they will tomorrow.

Interesting. In Vancouver in CDN$ $5.15-$7.72 to charge and $25.80@1.369 per liter to fill up. https://www.bchydro.com/accounts-billing/rates-energy-use/el...

Yup, hydro is awesome for cheap renewable electricity.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#245

Post by ericd »

lisper wrote: post #225
grandalf wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libertarians are not anti-regulation, they just believe that the good and bad consequences of regulations should be understood. Often, those who are not libertarians will support a regulation simply because they agree with its stated aim... things like "the patriot act" or "the affordable care act". Those names are chosen to sound good, not because they reflect the intent of legislation or the outcome of it. To give…

> Libertarians are not anti-regulation Yes, they are. See https://www.lp.org/issues/the-economy/ "Libertarians believe that the only proper role of government in the economic realm is to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected."

The Libertarian Party in the US does not represent the values of all (or maybe even most) libertarians. At its core, it just means not restricting people wherever possible, it doesn't necessarily mean having as little government as possible. Not all libertarians equate "freedom" with "low taxes" and "starving the government". You'll find that libertarians are a very varied group in terms of their beliefs.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism :

"Some libertarians advocate laissez-faire capitalism and strong private property rights,[7] such as in land, infrastructure, and natural resources. Others, notably libertarian socialists,[8] seek to abolish capitalism and private ownership of the means of production in favor of their common or cooperative ownership and management, viewing private property as a barrier to freedom and liberty.[9][10][11][12]"

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#246

Post by UnoriginalGuy »

dangrossman wrote: post #170
Someone1234 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electric vehicles are a tough sell now though. The Chevy Bolt EV has a 60 kWh Lithium-ion battery; to charge that fully costs $8.7 in Utah (14.5 cents per kWh). Per the EPA's measure that gets you 238 miles. Gas costs approx $2.24/gallon in Utah. A Prius has a 11.3 gallon tank and a 540 miles range (again, EPA standard). That means that $11.15 would get you the same distance as a full Bolt EV charge in gas. Now, befo…

> The Bolt EV costs $36,620, the Prius $23,475. The Chevy Bolt has a $7500 electric vehicle tax credit, many states have rebates of $1000 to $3000, and some utility companies offer their own rebates and incentives. That narrows the price difference quite a bit, and drops it well below the average new car selling price. You're also not going to be producing gasoline at home, while a lot of people buying these expensiv…

> are also early adopters of solar panels.

Solar panels which are paid for themselves by sending money back to the grid. If you redirect it into your vehicle, then you've just transferred the cost from the power company to your solar panel loan.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#247

Post by grandalf »

ajross wrote: post #216
grandalf wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libertarians are not anti-regulation, they just believe that the good and bad consequences of regulations should be understood. Often, those who are not libertarians will support a regulation simply because they agree with its stated aim... things like "the patriot act" or "the affordable care act". Those names are chosen to sound good, not because they reflect the intent of legislation or the outcome of it. To give…

You spend a lot of words there describing what libertarians don't do and defending them from what I'm guessing you'd call a straw man. So... am I right that you, as a presumptive libertarian, support the fuel efficiency regulations passed in the 70's and 90's, as witnessed by the evidence in the linked article? If someone expert told you that similar regulation passed today would have a similar effect, would you supp…

> am I right that you... support the fuel efficiency regulations passed in the 70's and 90's

No I would prefer a carbon tax charged per vehicle based on miles driven per year and the pollution emitted from the vehicle.

> If someone expert told you that similar regulation passed today would have a similar effect, would you support it?

What effect did it have? Do you think automakers would have continued to use 1960s era engines?

The question to be asked is not whether I support it but whether a different policy might have been far better. I think a tax would have had a far less distortionary effect on the economy and potentially a more beneficial effect on the environment.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#248

Post by exclusiv »

valuearb wrote: post #177
exclusiv wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. Part of the problem is that we use the word "accident" when it's almost always someone's fault. Everytime I see someone driving terribly I know there's a 50%+ chance they have a sizable dent on their car from a car crash or from them hitting some inanimate object. It's actually a game I play - I'll see someone driving poorly and then say "where's the dent" and look for it. Sometimes I'll even switch lanes to…

Except that statistically car injury accidents are so rare, they probably haven't.

I was talking about those that get dropped by insurance (usually multiple crashes) and also - you can get injured and not report it.

But anyway, 4.6 M injuries isn't rare. "But there are also millions more who are seriously injured — an estimated 4.6 million in 2016 according to NSC" [1]

[1] http://fortune.com/2017/02/15/traffic-deadliest-year/

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#249

Post by grandalf »

waqf wrote: post #242
grandalf wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just as patriotic and humanitarian rhetoric is used to justify certain polices that are far from patriotic or humanitarian, libertarian rhetoric is also sometimes used to justify lax regulation, crony capitalism, etc.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/No_True_Scotsman

I love these rationality links. :)

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#250

Post by tealdeer »

grandalf wrote: post #197
azinman2 wrote: post #165

For all the talk by liberatians and their ilk that regulation is bad and unnecessary, that chart of median fuel effeciency due to government requirements should give them pause. Wow. Well over a decade of non-progress until a path forward is mandated. Suddently the needle starts moving, with car owners, the environment, and energy import needs as big winners here.

Libertarians are not anti-regulation, they just believe that the good and bad consequences of regulations should be understood. Often, those who are not libertarians will support a regulation simply because they agree with its stated aim... things like "the patriot act" or "the affordable care act". Those names are chosen to sound good, not because they reflect the intent of legislation or the outcome of it. To give…

> Why not charge a tax that increases for every year a car gets older, so that the person driving the smoke-emitting clunker has an incentive to upgrade into something that is cleaner and safer.

Seems like this tax burden would fall disproportionately on the poor who couldn't afford to upgrade their old clunker in the first place.

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