Letters to the Editor
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@ Williedigital
You make several excellent points, particularly with respect to housing planning policy.
It makes me ill to think of all the housing stock (granite countertops and all) produced over the past 10 years in locations distant from employment centers and with poor public transportation. Many of these homes are oversized for the reasonable space needs of the families who purchased them; these new homes will require a lot of energy to heat/cool. Developers' willingness to build and buyers' willingness to purchase housing of this type was an arguably rational response to a couple of decades of cheap oil.
Unlike cars which have a useful life of maybe 12 years, these homes were built with an intended life of 50+ years. A stunningly wasteful allocation of capital as well as a long-term commitment to the profligate use of fossil fuels.
Senator McCain's "plan" to suspend the gas tax proves that he was right when he admitted to not knowing much about the economy. Apparently, he also doesn't know much the environment or urban planning.
In all the talk about the "mortgage meltdown", I haven't heard much discussion of what type of housing Americans really need. I know, somewhat far afield from the original topic of the gas tax...but it's all interconnected.
It's hard to have a serious public debate about something this complicated when we're busy talking about flag lapel-pins.