Is the cost of gasoline affecting your driving habits?

[AndysDaddy]

Here in West Michigan, the cost of regular (87) has skyrocketed to $2.90 per gallon (with appologies to every other place in the world for complaining about it). Despite this, I have not really altered my driving habits at all.

How about you? At what level do you think it would?
--
Scott

[jakethebake]

No. Much much higher.

[Patrick del Poker Grande]

It doesn't change my habits, because I work from home. It does affect my wife's choice of car when she drives to work, though. Unless it's snowing, she takes the 29mpg Mazda instead of the turbocharged 24mpg premium fuel WRX. I still floor it in the WRX up the mountain, though.

[stabn]

No.

It would have to be somewhere north of $5 before I even though about changing my driving habits.

[Warik]

The cost of gas has had a 0.0% effect on my driving habits. The only time I think about gas is when the gauge hits 50%.

Gas price should really start to affect your driving habits and your life when your weekly disposable income is in the 2-digit range... I don't think many people here have that problem (although, not having that problem myself, nor knowing anyone who does, I don't really have a big enough sample size to make a determination).

[Hamish McBagpipe]

It has hit a buck a liter here in Toronto. About three US dollars a gallon. This has not affected my driving habits but I have gone from the premium unleaded to whatever I can get out of my neighbour's minivan and lawnmower with a hose.

[RunDownHouse]

I carpool to work with one coworker. We started this when gas was about $2/gallon, but its also pretty convenient geographically. Its not like either one of us is going way out of our way to buy less gas.

[MrTrik]

No, not yet, but it is annoying me every time I fill up.

[meep_42]

No, I still have to get to work in the morning.

-d

[Indiana]

Its not affecting my driving the car, but I havent taken the boat out in a while.

Indy

[manpower]

Gas is still really cheap, and I don't mean that in a 'compared to europe' way. You're going to be spending something like 3-4 times the cost of gas by simply owning the vehicle. So it shouldn't really matter that gas has jumped from $.08 a mile to $.11 per mile when you're paying like $.50 a mile in overhead and insurance. linky. (http://www.ptbus.pierce.wa.us/rideshare/costs.htm) Factor in all your costs and you'll see actual cost of travel has probably gone up less than 10 percent even if gas prices have doubled for you. So no, I haven't changed my driving habits at all.

[jakethebake]

It hasn't affected my driving habits, but my neighbors are becoming annoyed at finding their gas tanks siphoned every week or so.

[touchfaith]

Doesn't bother me.


http://www.alibaba.com/photo/50087327/Children_s_Musical_Bicycle.jpg

ding-ding ding-ding. Out da way mutha fo's

[MrTrik]

[ QUOTE ]
Gas price should really start to affect your driving habits and your life when your weekly disposable income is in the 2-digit range... I don't think many people here have that problem (although, not having that problem myself, nor knowing anyone who does, I don't really have a big enough sample size to make a determination).

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not buying that. Disposable income is relative to the person. I'd choke if I was down to two digits. Why? Because my lifestyle is such that I'm used to much more. I suspect when it gets to $4/gal here I may think about my driving habits, but I never have before.

[Benal]

Nope. Living 2 minutes from the office helps. /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[Gallopin Gael]

ah...thanks to everyone for showing what anyone that's taken a basic micro econ class should have learned: Gasoline is an inelastic good.

[AndysDaddy]

[ QUOTE ]
ah...thanks to everyone for showing what anyone that's taken a basic micro econ class should have learned: Gasoline is an inelastic good.

[/ QUOTE ]
If I remember my ECO101 class, then by inelastic you mean that consumption does not change appreciably with changes in price. And over a wide range of prices, I'll agree. But at some point ($4? $5? $10/gallon?) things will start to change. And don't fool yourself into thinking that those costs are ridiculous. $4.00 gas strikes me as a very real possibility next summer.

On another note, the consuption of the gasoline itself may be inelastic, but the price of gas can have very large effects on *other* products. Who here is old enough to remember the death of the muscle cars and birth of gas sipping imports in the 70's and early 80's? The sale of large SUVs is already starting to be affected. At $4/gal you don't think the large car & truck market will be killed, and hybrid technologies skyrocket?

That said, people and the economy do seem to be absorbing these price hikes much better than the last (and only other) time we saw prices like these. In inflation adjusted dollars, gas peaked at about $3.00 (2004 dollars) in the early 80's and people freaked out. We're almost there again, and no one seems to care about it enough to do more than whine. Historical gas prices (CA) (http://www.energy.ca.gov/gasoline/statistics/gasoline_cpi_adjusted.html)
--
Scott

[Warik]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Gas price should really start to affect your driving habits and your life when your weekly disposable income is in the 2-digit range... I don't think many people here have that problem (although, not having that problem myself, nor knowing anyone who does, I don't really have a big enough sample size to make a determination).

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not buying that. Disposable income is relative to the person. I'd choke if I was down to two digits. Why? Because my lifestyle is such that I'm used to much more. I suspect when it gets to $4/gal here I may think about my driving habits, but I never have before.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh... what is it exactly that you're not buying?

I know disposable income varies by the individual - that's why I said "when your weekly disposable income" not "when my weekly disposable income." If Mr. Jones makes $1,000 per week and after expenses has $300 left, I'm sure his driving habits will be less affected by the price of gas than Mr. Smith's kid who bags groceries for $300 per week and has $50 left after everything... if at all.

The price of gas has a long way to go before it puts me in the 2-digit per week range... the only thing that realistically has a chance of changing my habits is probably a gas shortage.

[dabluebery]

Same for me. My wife and I have a large Jeep Grand Cherokee with a V8, and a smaller Dodge with a 4 cylinder that gets at least 10 MPG over the Jeep.

It's her Jeep, but anytime she does "extra" driving, it's in the Dodge.

It's not because of the gas, primarily. It's mostly because we're trying to keep the mileage on our Jeep down, before we drive right out of it's value. The gas savings are a perk.

Rob

[Nathan183]

I haven't changed my driving habits yet, although if it gets significantly higher, the $200 round-trip drives from school to home and back might become less frequent.

[ChipWrecked]

I will jump in this thread, to (again) pimp bicycle commuting. Trim your belly, save some cash, starve a Saudi, bike commute!

(it will give you metros an excuse to shave your legs) /images/graemlins/cool.gif

[swede123]

There are three car choices in the family. Honda Civic (33mpg), Ford Expedition (14mpg), and Chevy Nova (~10mpg). Being that I drive 110 miles every day my standard choice is the Honda, whether the gas is two bucks or five bucks per gallon. Needless to say I don't drive the Nova much right now, but that's got as much to do with the pain to fill it up (can't let the pump fill it up automatically) as it has to do with the price of gas.

Swede

[casinogosain]

No change in my daily routine. But when I go to the casino I make somebody else drive. We split tolls.

-Ash