Several years ago my father-in-law told me that his annual income from owning a body shop in Glendive dipped significantly when Montana passed tougher drunk driving laws. Certainly, none of the lawmakers who passed that law intended for owners of body shops to suffer. What they wanted was fewer drunks on the road, but the unintended consequence was less "fender-benders" and thus less work for body technicians.
This law of unintended consequences has been on my mind again with the rising price of gasoline. In Mandan, the price of regular is now $3.69 a gallon and expected to go higher.
So here are some things that I foresee as unintended consequences of higher gasoline and diesel prices:
- Higher prices of almost everything from food to merchandise because of the higher price of diesel. Since the trucking industry, which is an inefficient mode of transportation compared to railroads, brings most of the food and dry goods to American stores, we can expect to pay more for everything -- not just things that are petroleum-based.
- More people staying at home, eating at home, etc., to save money to buy gasoline means there will be more of market for durable things you can do at home, such as games, puzzles, books and DVDs. There might also be more people interested in visiting with their neighbors than their relatives or friends who simply live too far away to spend the money for gasoline to visit. People working in libraries may see a resurgence in the number of books being loaned because we won't have enough money to drive to Barnes and Noble for a caffe latte and BUY A BOOK.
- There will be a significant drop in the number of people living in small towns who want to travel to bigger towns to shop. We used to think that good roads spelled the end to small town commerce, however, it will be proven that it was good roads and low fuel costs. Once people start adding in higher fuel costs, paying a little more to shop locally will look like a better option that driving 60 miles to shop at Wal-Mart.
- There will be additional deaths and injuries suffered in car accidents because people will be driving smaller and lighter cars, which by their design provide less protection to occupants than larger cars.
- And one other potential consequence might be that people drive a little slower because driving slower will save fuel....no, that's probably not going to happen.
If you have any other thoughts on the subject, please post a comment.
1 comment:
I keep trying to see where the "cost of living" increase shows up on the next pay check. There haven't been any substantual raises in income since gas has skyrocketed,a can of soup has doubled,and the dollar has lost half it's value.I think I'm making about one third the dollar to market value I was making 10 years ago.This reminds me of living in a boom-town where folks could charge more money because people were making more money.Sometimes alot more money than outside the boom area.Now we're being charged more but we aren't making up the difference by making more wages.Get used to staying at home!When the economy gets caught up to these rapid increases in fuel costs, life will be different.I don't like the fact that our dollars are going to middle east countries at this rate either.This is happening so fast even economy watchers can't agree on the outcome.
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