Big 3 Petition EPA for CAFE Relief

daved9664 wrote:
As a 20 something year old Im happy to see emission regulations. Sure there are some hiccups afterword, but it puts the pressure on manufacturers to create technology that does not destroy our air quality, environment, mine and your children's and grand children's futures. Fossil fuels are an age old technology. Tesla found out how to create electricity out of thin air decades ago.... I think we can find a happy medium where these rich folks can make a few dollars while not destroying the environment. It's way over due for changes like these and Im not sorry if some older folk get upset about "scary changes" if it's for the better.

Actually many of these technology advancements are at the expense of the consumer. This is one of the major reason why vehicles have gotten so expensive over the past few decades because emissions, fuel economy, and safety regulations imposed on new vehicles have increased exponentially.

Maybe the reason why these "older folks" get upset about "scary changes" made by the government because we have been in this country long enough to know that anything a government bureaucrat regulates actually makes matters worse in many cases because government just reacts instead of looking at long term effects. For instance, take a look at LBJ's "War on Poverty" in the mid 60s where the government actually went out door to door to put people on welfare. Yeah he had "good intentions" to give the black communities an economic equality, but by doing so he de-incentivized self betterment and incentivized single parent households. The is one of the major reasons why single parent households in the black community went from about 20% in the mid 60s to about 70% today. It is a fact that a male growing up in a single parent home with absolutely no father figure greatly multiplies that child's chances of not finishing school, committing crime, going to jail, and dying from violent crime. So what LBJ thought was a great idea at the time and what he called others who disagreed with it heartless, turned out to be one of the single most devastating policies effecting the black community in modern times.

Another is government increase in policies regulating and subsidizing higher education in the 90's which is the main reason why tuition and fees have increase dramatically since then. Same with health care. Now it is healthcare insurance by the current President which is why it to has gone up dramatically in the past few years.

So you can see why we "older folks" have our doubts about "scary changes" made by the government because we have been around long enough to know that in many cases they do more harm than good. In this case with diesels, knowing how government bureaucrats operate first hand, I bet that they mostly just looked at continuously reducing emissions without seeing if the reduction in fuel economy actually made engines put out more pollutants in the long run due to having to burn more fuel to do the same work. Then there is the factor of electricity. Is the plant producing the electricity polluting more than gas or is the effect of what lithium strip mines(for batteries) have on the earth versus what is out there.