Gas Prices
Re “U.S. Opens Probe of Gas Price Hikes,” May 1: Given the numerous and high cost of the many Justice Department and congressional investigations and the budget deficit, the only way to pay for the Justice Department’s probe of gas prices would be an 8-cent-per-gallon federal tax on gas!
GREGORY P. WILLIAMS
Long Beach
* We’re getting nowhere with complaints about gas price gouging by the big oil companies. Why don’t we simply nationalize them, as other nations have done? Then we could run them to benefit ourselves, the consumer-taxpayers, instead of a few greedy fat cats.
LINCOLN HAYNES
Rancho Palos Verdes
* What is it with American drivers that they think they are entitled to low gasoline prices? It seems to be such a hot-button issue that Congress and the president are treating it as if it’s a major crisis: release strategic stockpiles, repeal the gas tax, etc. Let’s have a little perspective: It’s a cost fluctuation, not a plague.
Gasoline prices are lower now in real dollars than they have been in decades. In fact, gas is so cheap that Americans rarely even think about the massive quantities of the stuff they burn every day. Oil and gas are not water. They are not crucial to survival. One need not consume as much as possible to live a healthy life. Indeed, quite the opposite. The environmental problems caused by the burning of petroleum products are well- known.
MARC EVANS
Los Angeles
* Perhaps the Reason Foundation can’t figure out the reason that motorists would subsidize public transportation with a gas tax (Commentary, May 1), but let me give you some ideas: 1) reduce the number of autos on the streets and freeways rather than build additional extremely expensive new freeways. 2) Reduce air pollution. 3) Reduce uninsured motorists by allowing the working poor to afford public transportation.
Kenneth Green may not understand the concepts of impaired markets and oligarchy, but industries such as airlines and the gas and oil producing corporations are realistically associated with these concepts as opposed to classical (academic) free market concepts.
PHILIP R. WALDMAN
