How to Beat the High Price of Driving
Well, you could do what I do--walk and/or take the Metro. (I drive on Saturdays or Sundays, but almost never on a weekday.) But I realize that's not an option for most folks.
What I am curious about . . . does it strikes anyone else as strange just how much coverage gas prices are getting? I know that the price of gasoline is really high, but is that really the leading story in the news, day after day? My curiosity is driven by this observation: High gas prices aren't news. They aren't new. Gas prices have been high for awhile.
Maybe for folks who drive all the time, this story is soooo important that it can be repeated time after time?
Maybe one function of the news is a kind of collective complaining?
posted by Number Three @ 7:24 AM
3 Comments:
My thought is that high gas prices are the most personal of all economic news. If we are in a recession, very few people feel it in any specific way. Rather, they are generally concerned our their economic prospects. So most people aren't getting foreclosed, haven't lost their jobs, aren't actually realizing a depression in their home or portfolio values. But almost everyone recalls $1.00 gas, which seems so quaint now. And as it approaches $4.00 (in Texas!), that as much as any other indicator puts fear into people.
Or not.
Yeah. That makes sense. It also supports my "news as collective complaining" theory. If people fill up their tanks, then they know how much gas costs. So, again, the news isn't telling them something they don't know (i.e., it isn't news). But it serves the function of giving voice to the complaints of the little man!
Apparently, I don't read to the end of your posts as I never saw the "collective complaining" line. Guess we agree.
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