Reply #30: You make a good point

[skepticscott]

and if the higher cost of gas forces people to think hard about their driving and car-buying habits, over the long term, that's not necessarily a bad thing, considering that oil is a limited resource that may have already reached its peak of production capacity. I'd wager that only a small minority of drivers in this country are as economical with gas as they could be..we have a very long way to go in that regard. Not to mention that too many people are, as you point out, extremely self-indulgent and short sighted when it comes to economizing. When the price of gas dropped after last summer, sales of gas guzzling SUVs and trucks went right back up, even though every sensible person knew that gas prices were going to spike again when this summer rolled around.

The other side of that, however, is that the price of fuel hits people's pocketbooks in many ways other than just the cost of gas for their personal vehicles. Higher fuel prices drive up the cost of everything that get shipped by car, truck or plane (in other words, just about everything), and you can only economize so much on some of those things, especially food. I fear very much that when gas hits 4 bucks a gallon again this summer, any small recovery in the economy is going to be smacked down hard.