Isn’t It Time We Did The Right Thing?

To the Editor:

Gasoline has finally reached $3 in Newtown and people are still driving, and driving big SUVs and pickups — people who really don’t need them for work or other legitimate business use. When will it change? $4, $5 or more? We Americans are the largest oil consumers in the world, so we are driving the market.

Is $4 or $5 per gallon a real potential? Oh yes, it certainly is, not only a possibility but a certainty. How soon it will happen depends on how much we reduce our oil consumption, how fast China, India, and other third-world countries develop a middle class who want to have refrigerators, lights, television, cars, and other things that we take for granted. What do those things have to do with gasoline? They run on electricity, which is generated in plants that burn oil and are produced in factories that use electricity produced from oil. An example of gasoline prices per gallon from around the world: Teeside, UK, $5.64; Newtown, CT, USA, $3; Frankfurt, Germany, $5.29; Copenhagen, Denmark, $5.08; Stavager, Norway, $5.07; Rome, Italy, $4.86; Istanbul, Turkey, $4.85; Lisbon, Portugal, $4.80; Seoul, South Korea, $4.71; Geneva, Switzerland, $4.56; Vienna, Austria, $4.50 (from CNN website “Gas prices from around the world,” April 27, 2006).

All in all, we are still the cheapest amongst countries we call allies. At $3 we are now paying an inflation adjusted price equal to the 1980s.

The world is changing. We, too, must change. We must change our wasteful ways and our entitlement attitude or have it changed for us. India, China, and other developing countries are taking the jobs and the American dream away. Why? Because they have a talented and educated workforce coupled with tax laws that are business friendly and they have an American consumer who only cares about paying less. Without solid and growing employment our children will not live as well as we did for the first time ever in America. And it is our own fault. There is no reason for a person to commute alone in a vehicle that gets less than 35 miles per gallon. They exist in Europe, they are available here. We choose to drive SUVs at 17 MPG. Is it our arrogance and ego that prevent us from making a wiser choice? Can there be SUVs that get much better mileage? Sure. Do we all need an SUV? No. Some combination of choice and legislative will can go a long way toward solving the problem.

America is a democracy in which the citizens vote for the government that reflects their priorities. Congress makes the laws. Isn’t it time they did their job? We make personal choices. Isn’t it time we did the right thing? Isn’t it time we got involved and got out and voted? They say actions speak louder than words and the 22 percent vote on the budget clearly shows how little we really care about our right to vote. Like energy conservation, we are willing to let someone else do it.

Ken Schiess

10 Watch Hill Road, Sandy Hook                                      May 2, 2006