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Higher gas prices are actually great for the climate (lemmy.world)
submitted 4 days ago by to c/showerthoughts@lemmy.world
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[–] 16 points 4 days ago (4 children)

I want gas prices to keep going up to insane levels as quickly as possible. A major acute pain will cause change.

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  • [–] 6 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    There's only so much you can change urban sprawl. In the US especially, high gas prices just mean people who are middle-class or below can't afford to get to work. Last summer, 6% of my salary after tax went into the commute to and from the office.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 days ago

    You can change a ton. Especially in an urban sprawl environment.

    Urban sprawl means it's comparatively easy for people to get PV, heat pumps for heating/cooling and EV chargers at home.

    With that, you make yourself completely independent of high gas prices.

    Yes, it has high up-front costs, but the long-term benefits are massive. And with enough pain comes political momentum, which can be used to get state subsidies for that kind of stuff and that way you and your country can become independent of importing fossil fuels while at the same time reducing harm to the climate.

    And yes, it needs to hurt quite bad first to cause such a big systematic change.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 days ago (1 child)

    You're asking for even more financial stress for probably closer to a billion people who are already struggling. The rich do not care what the fuel costs.

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