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From down thread:

> Yeah i don't think the common American household can handle $5-6 gal

Interesting how incentives work. Elsewhere countries are seeing $8/gal, had $6/gal before this all happened. But you consequently have more fuel efficient vehicles[1] & people reducing miles driven[2]

(& don't tell me the US is big; Canada is bigger. There's plenty room for improvement)

1: https://morningconsult.com/2019/07/31/united-states-risks-la...

2: https://internationalcomparisons.org/environmental/transport...

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I've lived in Europe for a few years total without ever owning a car and rarely feeling the lack of one, which would be effectively impossible outside 2-3 cities in the USA.

I would be highly in favor of completely overhauling US infrastructure into medium density walkable towns and cities and switching the ~300 million cars on the road to more fuel efficient models, but jacking up the price of gas by 3x in 18 months will just impoverish and immiserate millions of Americans who will have to choose between paying for gas vs. food, rent, health care.

It's like saying this gym rat can squat 450 lbs and is much healthier for it, so you ought to get off the couch and squat 450 lbs tomorrow.

The US is way more spread out than Europe, and our current infrastructure gets a D+ rating. Necessity is the mother of invention, but we are seriously behind in terms of transit. This is going to hurt the US more than people expect. This is why I would be shocked to see a ban on Russian oil. We simply cannot absorb that shock to our economy.

https://www.thecivilengineer.org/news-center/latest-news/ite...

> I've lived in Europe for a few years total without ever owning a car and rarely feeling the lack of one, which would be effectively impossible outside 2-3 cities in the USA.

If one picks where they live carefully, I think most people could go car-free much easier than they believe.

I have never owned a car and mostly ride a bike for transportation. I have lived in rural Maryland, the DC suburbs, Austin, Baltimore, and Buffalo. Of those places the only one where I found a car was necessary was rural Maryland. I would use a ride-sharing service periodically in the worse cities like Buffalo.

Yes, the particular neighborhood may be more expensive, but in my experience having a car costs a fair bit more than the increase in rent from living in a more expensive neighborhood.

(Note that I'm saying that a small number of individuals can go car-free more easily than they believe. Once a huge number of people start doing this, however, I'm sure it would run into problems.)

>I've lived in Europe for a few years total without ever owning a car and rarely feeling the lack of one

You lived in a big European city. Feel free to tell someone living in rural France, or Ireland, that they must live without an automobile.

It’s not impossible. Public transport is generally good in most European towns and cities. I have lived in second tier European cities for 12 years without needing to own a car. I still occasionally rent cars when I need to transport a lot of stuff.

Feel free to tell someone living in rural France, or Ireland, that they must live without an automobile.

Well, I didn't.

I lived in European towns/cities from ~10k to 350k people. Rural areas exist obviously but compared to US suburbs or even most US urban areas we're talking far far smaller % of people who need a car for most aspects of day-to-day life in Europe.

For the most part I agree. Gas subsidy cuts / carbon tax needed to start years ago to gradually align incentives. As per usual those without wealth will be the most impacted by these price increases, because they're the least capable of adapting in short order

Could Americans do it?

Yes, if you don't mind crushing the economic lower classes.

Inflation in general, and gas prices in particular, are devastating to the lower rungs of the economic ladder. They shouldn't have to pay for economic policies implemented by the yacht class.

Populated Canada is significantly smaller in population and area, uses fuel & emissions standards from the US (NA auto market), and also has very cheap $4 gas.

In Ontario, how about 6.65$/gallon right now... The price of oil, the increased demand, suspected price gouging, transport, unrest, ... Worldwide.

I used the numbers they didn’t bother to check from their [2] link.

I checked my [2] link. The gas prices are from 2019. I think Canada also has room to improve. The Toronto commute radius is wide

How are house prices at $400k and the average American can’t handle an extra $40/mo in gas?

I think you just explained it. That $4k/mo mortgage and income tax leaves very little for food and gas.

I think people are just lying.

I think you don’t understand that when you add more expenses in one area like housing, it leaves you with less money to spend in other areas.

Houses are notorious for poor gas mileage.

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