What Car Would You Buy?
There is no such thing as a free market. Not in the United States, at any rate. You are free to buy what they (the people who comprise the apparat of government) allow you to buy.
Nothing more – and nothing less.
But what might we be able to buy if we did have a free market? Or even a more free market than the one we’ve got right now?
Almost certainly, we’d have access to new cars that are much more fuel efficient – and much less expensive – than the current crop of government-mandated cars.
These cars – the government-mandated ones – are both expensive and not particularly fuel-efficient because they must be designed and built to satisfy two at-odds directives: That they be “safe” – i.e., meet the government’s crashworthiness standards (which now include making the car “safe” for a pedestrian in the event the car strikes one). And that they be economical – i.e., they must meet the government’s fuel-efficiency mandates.
But the former puts the arm on the latter – and vice versa.
It’s a case of demanding to have one’s cake and eat it, too – which is the sort of thing the government specializes in.
Government-mandated cars (all types) are heavy cars. Because adding structure (steel, typically) is the only economically feasible way to make a car physically more resistant to impact forces. This, however, means increased curb weight. And the more a car weighs, the more fuel it takes to get it moving – and keep it moving. Especially if a minimum level of performance (and here we still have some free market influence on the thing) is necessary. People – generally – will not accept a car that takes 15 seconds (or even 12) to get to 60 MPH. The “bar” – the slowest most people will accept in a new car – is about 10 seconds, about what it takes a Prius hybrid. Most 2015 model year subcompact economy cars get to 60 in 8 seconds or so. They also weigh well over 2,000 pounds (the ’15 Toyota Yaris I reviewed recently weighed just under 2,400 lbs.) which is hundreds of pounds more than subcompact economy cars once weighed – in the era before government got heavy-handed with the “safety” mandates.
For example, a 1975 Honda Civic weighed about 1,900 pounds – about 500 pounds less than the ’15 Yaris. Which tells us why the ’75 Civic – a car 40 years older than the ’15 Yaris and lacking direct (or any other kind of) fuel injection (it had a carburetor) or a computer to precisely meter the fuel, and which came with a four-speed manual transmission without overdrive (a fuel-saving feature all modern cars have) nonetheless achieved nearly 30 MPG.
The Yaris tops out at 36 MPG.
Not much to show for 40 years’ work.
But what would a car like the Yaris – with fuel injection, an overdrive transmission and all the benefits of the past 40 years’ engineering advances – be capable of if it weighed 500 pounds less?
Probably 50 MPG. Possibly more.
Especially if it weighed 1,000 lbs. less – which is almost certainly doable given advances in manufacturing, metallurgy and the availability of plastic and composite materials.
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