As mentioned, the end of cheap oil is one of those concrete, society-wide phenomena that causes the masses to “wake up” and see a looming danger, and thereby let go of quaint political (and other) ideals. Permanently high gas prices have, today, led the Wall Street Journal to declare that “poor Americans” will abandon automobiles as if they were Europeans, once fuel inevitably hits $7/gallon. Which poor Americans?
The 57 million American households that have both cars and access to something resembling public transit. Gasoline at $7 begins to approach prices Europeans have paid for years, meaning that chunk of America “will start to act more and more like Europeans,” Mr. Rubin says. Not soccer moms in a minivan—soccer fans, searching for tokens…
But the dumping of the car for mass transit is only the beginning of the story. Such a shift will place a massive burden on the poorly-designed and indequately-managed transit systems of US cities at a time when the very cause of people’s behavior change, high fuel costs, will be draining government coffers because of the resulting recession/depression. So there’s that.
Worse still, what happens to all the folks who don’t live within the service range of mass transit and are too poor to move to a place that is? Do they begin bum-rushing the cities anyway, creating squatter communities and shanty-towns that are currently a symbol of the failures of the developing world?
The loss of the viability of cars is being hailed by some in the privileged class as a boon to everyone. But the ripple effects of this phenomenon on societies which are fundamentally predicated upon the existence of cars and cheap oil cannot be understated. They will be obvious and radical. And on top of the nightmarish logistical clusterfuck, will be the actions of inept governments local and federal to step in and try to “do something,” which will only exacerbate the crisis (or fulfill it, if you’re in the camp that sees all this as pre-determined given the loss of our key energy source).
Originally published here.
