NYTimes gas tax poll

Context matters in survey questions (Americans are cautious ...):

Americans are overwhelmingly opposed to a higher federal gasoline tax, but a significant number would go along with an increase if it reduced global warming or made the United States less dependent on foreign oil, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

The nationwide telephone poll, conducted Wednesday through Sunday, suggested that a gasoline tax increase that brought measurable results would be acceptable to a majority of Americans.

...

Eighty-five percent of the 1,018 adults polled opposed an increase in the federal gasoline tax, suggesting that politicians have good reason to steer away from so unpopular a measure. But 55 percent said they would support an increase in the tax, which has been 18.4 cents a gallon since 1993, if it did in fact reduce dependence on foreign oil. Fifty-nine percent were in favor if the result was less gasoline consumption and less global warming. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

I wonder what the results would have been if people were told that a gas tax might reduce global warming, dependence on foreign oil, congestion, and local air pollution. Plus raise revenue for research into alternative fuels (or raise revenue to offset lower income taxes [or raise revenue to pay off those maturing 10 year T-notes so we don't have to continually refinance our national debt because we stopped selling the 30 year T-bond in 2001 because we had a temporary budget surplus, gasp]).

Comments

[Tim Haab]

I think you need one more parenthetical remark in the last sentence so you can use squiggly brackets {}.

[John Whitehead]

More on my long bond monomania:

Brackets: {Following the long bond} {February 2006}

Absolute value: |The long bond| |May 2005|

[PaulS]

Economics should teach us that it doesn't cost anything to give a silly but politically correct answer to a loaded poll question, so we shouldn't rely on such answers.

Reality is that the more than doubling of gas prices over the last few years has had negligible effect on consumption. People continue to drive further and further - "drive until you qualify".

In order to make a real difference to foreign oil dependence, we'd have to cut consumption radically; a few percent simply doesn't matter. While urging people to buy unaffordable hybrids might feel good, the replacement rate is just too slow to allow for a timely difference; people would simply have to drive less. Since Europeans - at $6 a gallon - still drive like there's no tomorrow, I'd have to suppose we'd need $10 or $15. (I think the German Greens lost their electoral shirts a few years ago by proposing something like $11.)

In addition to a huge tax, it would help to eliminate the mortgage deduction, which is, well, the driver of much of that driving, as well as the driver of a tremendous amount of fuel consumption above and beyond it.

That's the trouble with polls. The pollee will blithely and oxymoronically assume that a small tax or other change that would not alter his or her lifestyle one iota would suffice to make a real difference. The pollster will never correct that mad assumption.

In the end, we get to read polling reports amounting to little more than packs of lies feeding the hobby horses of poll funders.

"I'd have to suppose we'd need $10 or $15."

That's one hell of an elasticity measure you're implying in your head! Have you thought about putting it to the test with (real) data?

[Leif]

"I wonder what the results would have been if people were told that a gas tax might reduce global warming, dependence on foreign oil, congestion, and local air pollution."

In the pdf report they ask some of these questions:
68. What if the increased tax on gasoline would reduce the United States' dependence on foreign oil, then would you favor or oppose an increased federal tax on gasoline?
favor: 55 oppose: 37
69. What if the increased tax on gasoline would cut down on energy consumption and reduce global warming, then would you favor or oppose an increased federal tax on gasoline?
favor: 59 oppose: 34

Too bad they didn't ask "what if it did all of the above" as would likely be the case.

[Leif]

I also wonder if the first question made some respondents feel like they should put the responsibility on the car manuf. directly through regulation - as it reads:

32. In order to cut down on energy consumption and reduce global-warming, which would you prefer -- requiring car manufacturers to produce cars that are more energy efficient OR imposing an increased federal tax on gasoline?

Just curious, as it comes before all of the tax questions.

Or a more obvious question about the results: do you think the fact that the respondents answered more than 70 questions over the phone made the results a bit less than reliable?

[John Whitehead]

Leif,

Those individual questions were in the NYT article. I'm wondering what the results would be if the question including ALL of the gas tax impacts at once.

John

[Leif]

John,
I see that's what you were asking now. Whoops. I also wonder how many of those 30%-holdouts would ever switch even if they had said the gas tax would cure cancer.

Hello, nameless, who wrote, "'I'd have to suppose we'd need $10 or $15.' That's one hell of an elasticity measure you're implying in your head! Have you thought about putting it to the test with (real) data?"

Econbrowser cites a CBO elasticity estimate that perhaps amounts to 0.2 or so
http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2006/02/cognitive_disso_1.html

In view of the null effect of the hurricane price spike on consumption, that must be a very high estimate, maybe 0.1 or 0.05 would be more realistic. But let's use 0.2. To cut demand for gas in half, we'd have to raise the price by a factor of 8, to $18. Since only around 50% of oil is converted to gasoline, cutting demand in half would cut oil demand by 25%, still leaving us highly dependent on foreign oil, i.e. imports.

For the short to medium term, "energy independence" is simply a fatuous pipedream.

[jimbo]

Anyway, what Paul S said about polls like this.