The EPA announced yesterday that new regulations mandating fuel efficiency standards for heavy trucks will cost vehicle buyers $8 billion, but that will be paid for in fuel savings over a year or two.
Oh. Sounds like the mandate is quite unnecessary then, no? With numbers like that, consumers will demand high efficiency vehicles with or without the EPA. Unless, of course, the EPA is, umm….lying.
Lying is of course the least of their sins. It’s one thing to argue that we need to conserve fuel. It’s quite another to argue that politicians and bureaucrats are the people best equipped to decide how we should conserve fuel. A gas tax encourages people to conserve fuel in the most efficient ways they can think of. A flurry of arbitrary top-down regulations serves no plausible purpose beyond transferring power to the politicians who routinely sell exceptions to the highest bidders. Of course, what did you expect from the people who thought it was a good idea for the government to actually run a car company?
It’s a sobering fact that the EPA still has a budget, 10 months after the reformers rode into town. Won’t somebody please lock these guys’ doors and turn off their lights?
