How not to lower gas prices
August 7, 2008 | By Nathaniel Ward
All too often, the left sees government as the solution to today’s problems.
For example, liberals in Congress have long supported misguided policies that would make energy more expensive—in the name of making it more affordable, of course.
Just this week, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) outlined several big-government measures to deal with record-high energy prices. Most of these policies are non-starters, as Heritage Foundation energy expert Nick Loris explains.
- Energy “Rebate.” One proposal is to give individuals $500 or families $1,000 of taxpayer money to offset the cost of energy. Such a policy “would reduce supply, increase the demand for gas, and rely on windfall profits taxes on big oil, which have been tried and failed miserably.”
- Tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Another plan would sell oil from America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve. While “an extra 3 million to 4 million barrels per day would lower prices” somewhat, the SPR is of limited size and could “maintain that pace for no more than six months.” The plan could also impact our national security, as reported on Heritage’s blog, The Foundry.
- Cracking Down on Speculators. Even though peculators aren’t at the root of high energy prices, another “solution” would impose new restrictions on their investment activity. “Ultimately, speculators do little to affect supply and demand.”
- Capping-and-Taxing. The proposal to curb greenhouse gases with new regulations and taxes is also unhelpful. A similar proposal “would have imposed a $4.8 trillion hit to GDP by 2030 and nearly 1 million jobs lost in certain years.” And it would raise prices at the pump.
- Renewable Fuels Mandates and Fuel Economy Standards. Imposing mandates for the use of renewable energy sources has already proved a failure. For example, the ethanol mandate that has made both gasoline and food more expensive.
Fortunately, many liberals seem to be coming around to the common-sense solution: open up America’s vast domestic energy supplies to exploration and extraction. Some liberals have offered lukewarm support for limited offshore drilling. Nevertheless many on the left remain adamantly opposed to opening up ANWR in Alaska, which is estimated to contain ten billion gallons of recoverable oil.
Conservatives push for expanded drilling
While some liberals are now open to domestic energy exploration, many are not, and Congress left for its summer recess without voting on offshore drilling.
Citing recent estimates, Heritage energy expert Ben Lieberman reports that off-limits coastal areas contain “19.1 billion barrels of oil and 83.9 trillion cubic feet of natural gas—approximately 30 years’ worth of imports from Saudi Arabia and enough natural gas to power America's homes for 17 years. It should also be noted that these initial estimates tend to be low.”
Even though Congress is formally on recess—the lights are off in the House of Representatives and the C-SPAN cameras are off—several hardy conservatives remained in Washington to press for a vote on offshore drilling. An amateur video of the informal proceedings on the House floor has been posted to Heritage’s Foundry weblog. Heritage’s Rob Bluey reported from the scene that “the debate is going to continue all week on the House floor.” Follow his reporting on Twitter.
Our legacy of debt
When we started our ten-year Leadership for America campaign to get the nation back on track, The Heritage Foundation recognized that lawmakers and ordinary Americans alike need to be made aware of the problem of runaway government spending—and how to solve it.
To achieve this goal, our budget experts and media specialists teamed up to produce A Legacy of Debt, a new 12-minute video on the spending problem.
You, too, can help get the word out by using the tools at ALegacyOfDebt.com.
Feminism and freedom
Thanks to a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation, the American Spectator is publishing a ten-part series of articles on the components of individual liberty as it evolved in the West and the state of individual liberty in the future – not only in the West but in the rest of the world.
In the sixth article in the series, Christina Hoff Sommers explores how modern feminism has abandoned freedom and distorted history to advance its radical agenda. The Heritage Foundation is pleased to offer the article, which appeared in the July/August, 2008 issue of the American Spectator, for free download.
» Download the article in PDF format
Other Heritage work of note
- Family and Religion. The number of unmarried couples living together has surged to 6.4 million, up from just one million three decades ago. “It used to be called ‘shacking up,’” Heritage Vice President Rebecca Hagelin writes on Townhall.com. “Now it’s just another lifestyle choice.” She points out that growing bodies of social science research reinforce what has been understood for millennia: marriage is the bedrock of society, providing a solid social foundation not just for the husband and wife but for their children as well. “Society needs a critical mass of intact families to function effectively,” she concludes. “That’s why the debates about same-sex ‘marriage’ and cohabiting couples merit more than a shrug of the shoulders.” Find out more at Heritage’s FamilyFacts.org.
- Protect America. “In an age of guerrilla warfare and counterinsurgency operations, many U.S. officials appear content to overlook the importance of conventional weapons such as the aircraft carrier,” Heritage defense expert Mackenzie Eaglen writes. “That’s a serious mistake.” Lawmakers have allowed the carrier fleet to drop from 12 to 11—and they may waive even this minimal requirement in the future. Carriers, which play an essential role in the ongoing war on terror, are “not weapons platforms from a bygone era, but rather flexible tools of national security that can offer a vast array of capabilities.”
- Family and Religion. Private civil society institutions like churches can and do play a vital role in providing social services—though big government has often pushed these effective organizations aside. In a new report, Heritage’s Ryan Messmore examines the work of the First Baptist Church in Leesburg, Florida. Their work to provide clinics, shelters and addiction treatments does more than meet spiritual needs, Messmore explains. FBC’s success demonstrates that “a restricted view of the church’s social responsibility does not provide effective answers” and that “entire communities can benefit when faith is exercised in public.”
In other news
- A military jury has convicted Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Laden’s driver, of supporting terrorism.
- Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick has enacted a law allowing the state to grant same-sex “marriages” to out-of-state couples. Marriages had previously been restricted to state residents by a 1913 statute, which has now been repealed.
- Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn, best known for his book Gulag Archipelago, has died. Heritage’s Lee Edwards and Ariel Cohen provide retrospectives on his life.
- Britain’s socialized National Health Service continues to fail its patients. A new investigation reveals that hospitals are invested with vermin. What’s more, British patients are expected to face delays in getting government-sponsored dental treatment after an onerous new contract led more than 1,000 dentists to quit. And, in an effort to rein in runaway health care spending, government bureaucrats have decided to deny certain expensive but lifesaving drugs to cancer patients.
- USA Today reports that state and local governments are spending far beyond their means. These jurisdictions have boosted spending by almost eight percent over last year, while revenues are up just 2.5 percent. State and local government spending is expected to total 13 percent of the national economy this year, or more than $2,000,000,000,000.
- San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has proposed a scheme for mandatory recycling and composting. Under the plan, trash collectors would inspect refuse left by residents and businesses, who could face fines or suspension of service if the trash is deemed insufficiently well-sorted into the prescribed categories.
- The commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has threatened to shut the Straits of Hormuz, the narrow waterway connection the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean through which much of the Middle East’s oil is transported, the New York Sun reports. Heritage’s experts have conducted a “war-games” analysis of what would happen in such circumstances.
- Alaska’s government is suing to overturn the federal government’s ruling that the polar bear is an endangered species because of the potential risk from global warming. Protecting the bear, whose populations have grown, could hamper efforts to expand domestic energy supplies.
Coming up at Heritage
To attend these or any other events at Heritage please RSVP at Heritage’s website. Or you can view these events live online. All times are Eastern.
- On Wednesday, August 20 at noon, Gen. Victor Renuart joins Heritage to discuss future challenges for Northern Command, which he oversees.
Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation.
