Cars, efficiency, and drivers

I’ve recently come across a post claiming that cars are inefficient by showing that a typical EU car is parked 92% of the time, its 5 seats only move 1.5 people, and 86% of its fuel never reaches the wheels and when it does, it moves the car, not the people.

Apart from the fact that, as Mark Baker noted, electric toasters are used even less.

The unspoken issue here is that if you ask a driver whether their car is inefficient, they won’t say “yes, because it’s parked 92% of the time.” They will say, “Of course it’s efficient, in fact, it’s the most time-efficient way to get to work, and it’s so efficient (and safe/comfortable) compared to alternatives that I’m willing to pay an outrageous amount of money on it on top of what public transport would cost me.”

This is not a defense of cars but rather an invitation to consider that the bottleneck to change is probably in understanding and addressing the reason people are so willing to use and even pay a premium for something so “inefficient.”

And, critically, forcing alternatives that people wouldn’t choose even if they look more efficient is probably a sign that these alternatives are in fact rather inefficient in at least a very significant way.

The objective should be to find a way to offer alternatives that don’t require subsidies [1] or coercion to be chosen – that’s when we will truly have something more efficient.

Notes: [1]: I acknowledge the role of subsidies in accelerating production, but that’s another story.