Brown: Small car trend feasible only with high gas prices

Gas prices were soaring past the $3-per-gallon mark at this time last year, and… Gas prices were soaring past the $3-per-gallon mark at this time last year, and cash-strapped college students were struggling to keep fuel in their tanks.’ Now at a national average of $2.03 per gallon, gas is nowhere near the $4.11 all-time national record from July 17.

You know what that means? It’s time to hop in the car, turn the stereo up, roll the windows down and take off while the going is still good. That wasn’t really possible last year without paying a fortune.

Prefacing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the high prices stood as an unwelcome signal that our driving habits might have to change.

As Americans, we’ve traditionally enjoyed a lifestyle with little restriction. We don’t have to drive those tiny boxes with lawn mower engines that are so common in Europe and Asia. We aren’t burdened with European-style gas taxes, either. Gas prices in Norway, for example, hover around the equivalent of $7 per gallon.

And, unlike Japan, no one tells us what we can drive by means of taxes or otherwise. But that’s probably going to change.

President Obama’s Automotive Task Force, composed of 18 members — including eight from Obama’s cabinet–‘ own two American cars between all of them. Two of the 18 don’t even own cars.

It’s this team’s job to make the American automotive industry commercially viable again. I wish them luck.

The task force’s idea of viability means making two ailing automakers — Chrysler and General Motors — smaller and leaner with more fuel-efficient products. Because the government has enormous influence over the two companies from $17 billion in loans right now, it can do pretty much whatever it wants .

That ‘whatever’ consists of putting us into those tiny tin cans with wheels. Chrysler is already talking with Italian automaker Fiat to bring over some of its small cars to complement the bigger vehicles sold in the United States. Under this plan, Chrysler hopes to boost the 2012 Corporate Average Fuel Economy number mandated by the federal government that it has no hope of reaching otherwise.

Not only is this the most viable way to keep Chrysler alive according to the committee, but it seems it’s all sorts of giddy about the idea of keeping jobs in America by pumping resources into currently inactive plants for small car production.

As a car enthusiast, I love the small cars Fiat makes. But Americans certainly won’t quickly embrace them, especially with a Chrysler badge on them.

Americans are typically conditioned to scoff at the small hatchbacks, and aside from the cutesy Mini Cooper, none have gained significant popularity in the States. As Americans, we love our bigger, plusher cars with all the bells and whistles.

Some stripped-down Fiat with a badge on it that reminds the buying public of a company facing imminent bankruptcy isn’t the best way to sell a car, no matter how good the car might be.

Also, gas is cheaper at the moment, and unless the Obama administration wants to begin a treacherous process of putting an artificial floor on the market to raise prices, it’s going to stay cheap.

According to industry analyst Howard Wial at the Brookings Institute in Washington, ‘You will not get people to buy more fuel-efficient cars unless gas prices go up.’

That puts a dying industry between a Ba-rack and a hard place. While the government is trying to convince us that we want small, somewhat underpowered cars, its cries are futile while there’s cheap gas around.

Sure, we still have that sour taste in our mouths from having to choose between going out with friends last summer and paying for necessities like food and rent. But that fast-fading memory isn’t going to be the deciding factor in anyone’s new car purchase right now.

People buy cars on image, features and what will suit their needs at the moment. Small cars and hybrids will only sell if gas is expensive.

In a worst-case scenario, if the government were to raise gas taxes to get people to move toward smaller cars, all it would be doing is bankrupting an inherently flawed industry. Under Obama’s watch, such a tax would be hurting the working poor he’s vowed to defend with a regressive tax on their driving.

By adding government bureaucracy to run the private industry, all they seem to be doing is prolonging an inevitable truth about capitalism: companies fail. Whether Fiat really can fix Chrysler has yet to be seen, but if it doesn’t, we should hardly be shocked.

E-mail Jacob at jebrown13@yahoo.com

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