CA gas prices to rise $0.20 to $1.30/gal. January 2015?

A friend recently emailed me a Fox News article (8/27/14) which states that due to a carbon-reduction law passed by former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, gasoline taxes will rise $0.20 to $1.30/gallon in January.  Much of the article portrays that as a terrible thing, of course.  Toward the end it points out that, "Revenue from the auction is deposited into California's greenhouse gas reduction account. There it is used not just to reduce emissions or the cost of pollution controls for business, but also to build low-income housing near mass-transit hubs and support construction of the state's high-speed rail project."

That got me thinking--and writing my friend a long reply which I decided to post here (in case anyone's reading this blog, which I strongly doubt since I virtually never post to it)...
-------------------------
    Interesting indeed.  I had no idea gas prices were going to jump up as this predicts they will next year (by $0.20 to $1.30).  Wow... Glad I'm not still commuting to La Jolla High--or worse, Lincoln High 30 miles away.  Makes me think twice about continuing to sub--mostly at Lincoln--for a whopping $16.89/hr., or about $120/day take-home after withholding.  Now I'll have to subtract $11 instead of $8 for the 60-mile round trip (my Honda Civic averages about 32 mpg).  Hmm... on that second thought, $3/day isn't really going to change my behavior.
    See, that's the problem.  As long as the cost of continuing business (more accurately, personal and commercial transportation) as usual only creeps up incrementally over time--even jumping 33% in January ($1.30 increase to current $4.00 price) I don't think is going to force that much change in behavior.  And, to be fair, what choice do most of us have?  Very few can afford to replace their current vehicles with new EVs, and public transportation--in SoCal at least--isn't even close to what it needs to be to provide a viable alternative.  You work mostly from home and I don't have to commute anymore (though I do make the 70-mile round trip about once a week to visit my mom & stepdad in Chula Vista), but for most people not driving their own car would mean giving up their current jobs.  Heck, I once tried to figure out how to get to LJ High via Coaster and buses and figured I probably couldn't get there by 6:30 a.m.--when I needed to arrive--in any case, and the combination of train, bus(es--I'd have to transfer at least once), and walking would probably take over two hours each way given their schedules.
    I'm all for this tax, because it will definitely get people's attention and it will cause some folks to modify their behaviors... more car-pooling, use of public transportation, some  buying new vehicles may decide they really will forgo the truck or SUV in favor of a smaller, higher-gas-mileage option, etc.  But I don't think it's until gas is $8-$10/gallon that we'll really see anything like the kind of change the solution requires... and maybe not even then.  At that point I'll have to sell my 16 mpg VW camper (which will be worth next to nothing 'cause no one will want it) and we'll have to change our lifestyle considerably... no more jumping in the car to have lunch with friends, several shopping trips a week to multiple markets to buy the foods we prefer, maybe drive to CV once a month instead of once a week and/or take the Coaster and tram and bus--and about five hours travel time--to do it.  And probably no more subbing in SD Unified schools.
    Use of this revenue?  I think building more low-income housing near mass-transit hubs is a good idea--it's the poor who increased fuel prices affect the most (relative to their income).  But building a high-speed rail system?  No!...  This benefits mostly only people who travel between SD and LA (etc.) on a frequent basis, and most of them are not low-income.  Better use would be funding research & development of better (more convenient and available) mass transit and alternatives to fossil fuel-powered vehicles and the necessary (and low-to-non carbon-producing) infrastructure to support them.
    A lot of people are going to be very angry when gas prices jump (and I'm hardly thrilled at the prospect).  But IMHO they're not really getting the big picture.  And as global climate change's effects continue to be more and more drastic and immediately-felt, they're really going to be angry--and blaming it all on everything and everyone else, of course.
    Oh, and by the way, if I'm not mistaken Big Oil is still getting Big Money (deductions, subsidies, etc.) from the federal government while continuing to make Big Profits.  What's up with that?  How about we quit giving them all that Big Money and make them take the increased carbon taxes from their Big Profits instead of passing it on to consumers?  Given the money-and-politics situation I know, that'll never happen--makes too much sense and hurts the 1% too much.

Think Before You Post

The Permanence of Posting Online is a sobering article worth a read from long-experienced technology observer and writer John C. Dvorak. Yes, he's a self-admitted curmudgeon (and I guess my cross-posting this makes me one, too), but he's a smart guy and--especially for party-loving young people who are (or will be) looking for jobs--his point is worth considering.

Sure, you can limit who can see your Facebook pages and photos to just your Friends, but what if a prospective employer (the person in HR in charge of screening applications) makes Friending him/her a requirement before he/she will even consider your application? If I were an employer I certainly would.

Tablets strong contender for etextbooks platform

The iPad really kicked the tablet (as opposed to "tablet laptop") into the mainstream as a highly portable, eminently usable, and very capable device for "consuming media"--including text. With its decent screen size, good color and resolution, and ability to easily handle ebook-embedded sound and video, the modern tablet has finally brought us that thin slate we saw everyone using on the Starship Enterprise instead of books, paper pads, pamphlets, clipboards, etc. So it's no wonder it's getting a lot of attention as a major contender for the ideal platform for etextbooks.

I'm not the only one who thinks so.  Take a look at 6 Reasons Tablets Are Ready for the Classroom on Mashable.  And thanks to Tom Kaun who revealed it to me.

John C. Dvorak on ebooks

In his 4/21/11 post "The End of the Printed Book?" Dvorak seems to agree with me:  ("I don't like the idea that the printed book might be killed off by a combination of the Kindle and the iPad, but I think, on a short-term basis, we may see what looks like a trend in this direction.")

But he also points out a couple caveats about the move from printed to digital books:  1) We really don't know whether or how we perceive and retain information differently between the two formats, and  2) ebooks don't have any "collectors' value" as printed books do.


Re. the latter, I don't for a moment believe all print books are going to disappear, or even that publishing of new ones will cease altogether.  There will always be (well, "always" is a very long time) people who collect printed books and thus have a personal print library, and I suspect that even after it is no longer profitable for publishers to publish new books in print, print-on-demand will be in place to allow those few who wish and can afford to purchase them in print to be able to.

Finally: library ebooks on your mobile device

I love to read but I can't afford to buy books at anything like the rate I read them. I also live in a pretty small flat and simply don't have room for a growing personal library. These are just two of the reasons I love public lending libraries. However, now that I have a good mobile ebook reader (an iPod touch, perhaps someday an iPad or its equivalent), I'm becoming hooked on  1) the convenience of downloading books directly to my device (no trips to the library to check out/in), and  2) the convenience of being able to take my book with me whenever I'm "out" in such a small, light form factor.

I've been waiting years for this to happen, and it looks as though it may actually come to pass: we may be able to check out ebooks from our public library and read them on our mobile devices. Actually, that's been possible for a few years now. But between the ebook "format wars," the variety of mobile devices and their capabilities (supported formats, displays, downloading techniques, etc.), and the relative dearth of ebooks available in the libraries, it hasn't really been much of a viable alternative to driving to the library to check out--and in--print volumes.

It looks as though that's about to change. Amazon has announced that it's partnering with Overdrive (which has already been working with libraries to enable ebook lending) to make Kindle ebook lending by libraries possible: "Amazon Kindle to open up to library lending." (LA Times) This matters primarily because, as the Christian Science Monitor puts it, "With an estimated 7.5 million Kindles in the US, Amazon enjoys a two-thirds share of the $1 billion digital-book market, according to Forrester Research. Amazon’s new Kindle Lending Library feature will open the floodgates to e-lending." Kindle books--readable via the Kindle app on non-Kindle portable devices, too (thank you Amazon!)--are sort of the 800-pound gorilla of ebooks these days.

Oh, I'm not going to get too excited yet. This has only been announced, not implemented, and according to the LA Times article, Amazon "...did not specify when its "Kindle Library Lending" program would start."  It may be some time before my San Diego County Library system has it in place, and awhile after that before they start buying new books in Kindle format--assuming, of course, they have the money in these days of decimated budgets. (Which brings up another conundrum for libraries: how to allocate pittance new-book budgets between print and digital, not to mention between book and media.)


But eventually there will be enough ebooks you can download to your portable device for free from the public library system that more people will be doing that than will be physically visiting the libraries and checking out (and in) dead-tree editions. When that tipping point has been passed, there will be increasing pressure to close libraries. For a number of reasons the prospect greatly saddens me, but unfortunately I won't be surprised to see it happen in my lifetime.