OPINION: Gasoline prices fueling election nonsense

Michael Hicks, Ph.D., director Bureau of Business Research, Ball State University

It is election year, and gas prices are high.  Though this is not a mixture that is conducive to candor, the level of policy schizophrenia is amazing.  It isn't that any one policy is necessarily bad, it is simply that the nonsense spouted by the big three candidates has reached a new level. 

Senator McCain's call for a summer gasoline tax amnesty would certainly provide a bit of cost savings for American families who use this time to travel.  The problem is that Senator McCain also argues that the U.S. should be more self-sufficient in its energy use.   But lower gasoline prices (and the associated higher usage) will not increase our energy self-sufficiency. 

Senator Clinton made the same policy recommendation.  And, like Senator McCain, calls for the U.S. to take steps to be less dependent upon foreign oil.  This and efforts to address global warming are, according to her official campaign website, "top priorities."  That may be so, but it would seem that gathering votes and appeasing disgruntled motorists have edged out energy independence and global warming as top national priorities. 

Senator Obama has wisely argued that the gas tax holiday is a gimmick.  But, like a medieval physician, he made the right diagnosis but prescribed bleeding as a cure.  His proposed windfall profits tax on oil companies might make consumers feel better (though you would have to be pretty vindictive, if not downright stupid, not to choose the tax cut alternative).  One thing Senator Obama's proposal will not do is cut gasoline prices.  Indeed, it will serve to increase prices at the pump by reducing supply.  This is hardly the road to energy independence. 

We have three candidates for the most important elected office in the history of the world.  In the measure of their policy recommendations it would seem that the simplest economics of energy policy seems as difficult for each to comprehend as theoretical physics.  Here are some simple, but not easy policy choices. 

First, if you want to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil and reduce greenhouse emissions, simply raise the national gas tax.  The higher and faster you raise it, the quicker we can achieve both goals.  There is a lot of pretend sophistication about raising the fuel efficiency standards on cars and trucks.  That just serves to hide the tax in a less efficient regulatory scheme within the higher production costs of these new models. 

Second, if you simply want to make the U.S. less dependent on foreign oil, you can also increase domestic sources of energy.  A huge subsidization of nuclear power facilities and drilling for Alaskan oil would both serve to cut our dependence on foreign oil (and using the facilities would actually reduce greenhouse gas emissions).