I couldn't decide between "Gas Boycotts Don't Work" and "Oh Crap, Here We Go Again"

There's a new--or should I say updated--gas boycott e-mail that's going around:

Let's make this happen!!!

If you need gas, get it the day before or the day after! Remember Friend: Don't Pump Gas NO GAS...On May 15th 2007. Don't pump gas on May 15th.  In April 1997, there was a "gas out" conducted nationwide in protest of gas prices. Gasoline prices dropped 30 cents a gallon overnight.

On May 15th 2007, all internet users are to not go to a gas station in protest of high gas prices. Gas is now over $3.00 a gallon in a lot of places. There are 73,000,000+ American members currently on the internet network, and the average car takes about 30 to 50 dollars to fill up.

If all users did not go to the pump on the 15th, it would take $2,292,000,000.00 (that's almost 3 BILLION) out of the oil companys pockets for just one day, so please do not go to the gas station on May 15th and lets try to put a dent in the Middle Eastern oil industry for at least one day.

Three reactions...

First, no such thing occurred in April 1997.

Second:  "If all users did not go to the pump on the 15th, it would take $2,292,000,000.00 out of the oil companys pockets for just one day" and put it back in the day before or the day after.

Third:  Gas boycotts cannot, will not and do not work, and here's why from last April.

Comments

[odograph]

I'd say the boycotters are improving. Last year it was don't buy from a single oil company. This year they get that it has to be across the board.

All they have to do now is stretch out the duration and build the consistency .... until it becomes "drive less."

[Johnny Chimpo]

I feel sorry for everyone who jumps on this bandwagon. . . though it's kind of funny to watch from the sidelines.

[rafa engel]

This is a great idea. I'm in. I have come over another great idea not so long ago on a web. /How to get the multis to lower fuel prices and am further working on a project called The CleanFuture Web Project where I have a blog and forum as well as a very detailed site about our worlds problems and how we can solve them.

[Ville]

I'm confused. How is this not like the famous "Drive less!" idea advocated here (if I remember correctly) to e.g. lower gas prices? If people wouldn't buy any gas they'd take the "Drive less" idea to it's perfection by not driving at all... or are you just cynically assuming that people will, in effect, cheat their way through the boycott?

[Johnny Chimpo]

Ville,
The proposal isn't saying don't drive on a certain day - but instead just don't buy gas that day. The day you choose to fill up your car doesn't have any effect if you don't alter the miles driven . . .

[Fight Economic Illiteracy]

To "confused", and others who fall into the error of viewing the boycott as a great idea to help lower gas prices or take money from the petro-greedheads:

Boycotting gas stations for 1 day, and driving less (or: refraining from driving for 1 day), might sound all but identical. But in fact they are hugely different.

If a large number of people plan in advance to buy no gas on a single day, they will make certain their tanks are gassed up enough beforehand so they can do whatever driving they need do that day, without having to fill up until at least a day later. The effect on cumulative gas consumption will be nil.

The effect on gas prices, however, could be significant on a temporary basis -- AND THE EXACT OPPOSITE of what the "boycott gas stations for a day" crowd of teenagers thinks it will be.

The gas distribution system will face added costs due to selling less gas than they'd planned on boycott day, and selling correspondingly more gas in the days before and after. In response to such heightened day-to-day fluctuations in demand for gas at the pump, retailers (gas station operators) would tend to take various hedging or preventive measures -- such as boosting the amount of inventories they hold going forward (i.e., buying and holding MORE gasoline than they were in the habit of doing prior to the boycott day). These measures will tend to exert upward pressure on gasoline prices, at the margin.

In contrast, if everyone refrains from DRIVING for one day, then the total amount of driving (and gasoline consumption) over the week or so that brackets the "no-driving" day, WILL show a net reduction. That's because many tasks that require driving can't be shifted from one day to another, anywhere near as easily as the simple act of filling up at the pump can be moved to a different day. Therefore, while some of the driving that people otherwise would have done on "no-drive" day will get done the day before or the day after, there also will be some car trips that won't be made up on a different day. So, overall gasoline demand during the period around the boycott will dip. Moreover, the timing of when people fuel up won't change much; so the volatility effect (and attendant upward price pressure) associated with redistributing gas-buying times in the gas-station-boycott scenario described above, won't happen in this, second scenario.

Why, then, are the green airheads calling upon their minions to boycott gas stations for a day (which won't do any good, and might even do some harm), instead of to cease driving for a day or longer? Simple: the latter course of action involves some inconvenience, while the former involves virtually none.

So, either calling for or observing a one-day gas-purchase boycott lets people feel they're doing something for the environment (or against Bush and his pals); without having to actually DO anything. Refraining from driving for a day, on the other hand, will be a real sacrifice for some. So it's less compatible with the feel-good, achieve-nothing agenda that uneducated liberals and greens find so gratifying.

A footnote: You have probably surmised that I believe a one-day driving boycott might be a good idea. I do; however, I doubt it would attract enough observance to make a concrete impact on prices (by even 1 penny a gallon for even 1 day), absent public support from some very loud and very visible bully pulpits. Like a few of the biggest state governments. The governors especially, but let's not forget their aides and PR people and bureaucrats.

Best of all would be if the White House used its power of moral suasion and press access to promote such a program, on a nationwide stage. In fact, such an idea feels quintessentially Jimmy Carter. Too bad he isn't president these days. (Obviously, this could never happen with the present administration. But with the next, Democratic administration, perhaps it might.)

[Monty Cassel]

Should we Stop breathing that day to reduce Carbon emissions, or just walk around all day with our favorite house plant? Prices will just bounce back within a few days correct? How about we take OPEC off of their game and drill everywhere, increase supply through several major sources. Yes alt fuels Keep the money in the USA and not send it to the Middle East. Somebody please prove concretely the connection between "Bush and his pals" and oil prices. anybody can buy stock in these companies. If you are that disturbed over profits buy stock and make some money and buy a new bike.

[Monty Cassel]

PS Isn't Jimmy Carter a Socialist/ When did this become the Socialistic Republic of the United States? Where has Socialism proven to be an superior economic policy? i would like to read about that country