When I was young and nearly everyone I knew smoked, they would all bemoan the regular extra taxes that would drive up the cost of a package of cigarettes. "When a pack of smokes goes to a dollar," I first recall them saying, "then I quit smoking." The magical price reached $2 before I stopped believing them, and came to appreciate the human talent for complaining without consequence.
So it's hard to believe that the current caterwauling about gasoline going above $1 a litre (the national average on July 12 was 95.7 cents, according to MJ Ervin and Associates of Calgary, with many cities already nearing $1.05) will have much affect on the kinds of cars people buy.
Well, there may be people who are buying hybrid-powered vehicles from Toyota, Honda and Ford who think they're actually saving money as a result, but they apparently can't do math. While they may save a couple of hundred bucks a year if they do lots of the kind of city driving that hybrids favor, it will likely never be enough to recoup the premiums the car companies pay. If you doubt this equation, consider that Toyota charges over $6,000 extra for a hybrid SUV that might get a 10 percent improvement in highway fuel economy.
For the most part, though, people will remain happy to be unhappy with the price of gasoline and continue to buy the types of vehicles they actually want or maybe even genuinely need, like big SUVs.
This has seemed clear in the sales results of many years, and now comes a more comprehensive look at the subject from a man who gets paid by car companies and others to provide more detailed examinations of such questions.
That would be Dennis DesRosiers of Dennis DesRosiers and Associates of Richmond Hill (a small city north of Toronto).
His overall opinion is that "when you look at the market changes over time, you find that consumers, at least in the short term, do not adjust their vehicle buying habits because of higher gas prices."
They do adjust their buying habits in the longer term, DesRosiers says, "but how much is because of higher gas prices is hard to pin down."
Indeed, when you look at the overall market from DesRosiers's point of view, it seems that most Canadians have already made the move to more fuel-efficient vehicles, can't move to more fuel-efficient vehicles, or don't care about more fuel-efficient vehicles.
DesRosiers divides the Canadian market into "four buckets" by size of vehicle from 1990 to 2004 -- entry-level vehicles, mid-sized/family vehicles, large/luxury vehicles, and vehicles primarily for commercial use. Or, DesRosiers add, "you could say the four buckets should be called fuel-efficient, less fuel-efficient, not fuel-efficient, and not fuel-efficient but no choice."
Entry-level fuel-efficient sales now account for about 40 percent of the Canadian market, he notes, which is up from about 30 percent a decade ago. "Consumers are obviously moving toward entry level vehicles and gas prices are likely one of the reasons," he says, but there are a lot of others.
As examples he mentions higher taxes that leave less take-home pay, better technology, more choices, and better availability. "But the point is that it is not gas prices alone that are moving consumers down market."
Family-sized vehicles now account for a third of the market, DesRosiers notes, down from 45 percent a decade ago. "Consumers are very clearly moving away from this size of vehicle, and most are buying smaller vehicles."
So it's hard to believe that the current caterwauling about gasoline going above $1 a litre (the national average on July 12 was 95.7 cents, according to MJ Ervin and Associates of Calgary, with many cities already nearing $1.05) will have much affect on the kinds of cars people buy.
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For the most part, though, people will remain happy to be unhappy with the price of gasoline and continue to buy the types of vehicles they actually want or maybe even genuinely need, like big SUVs.
This has seemed clear in the sales results of many years, and now comes a more comprehensive look at the subject from a man who gets paid by car companies and others to provide more detailed examinations of such questions.
That would be Dennis DesRosiers of Dennis DesRosiers and Associates of Richmond Hill (a small city north of Toronto).
His overall opinion is that "when you look at the market changes over time, you find that consumers, at least in the short term, do not adjust their vehicle buying habits because of higher gas prices."
They do adjust their buying habits in the longer term, DesRosiers says, "but how much is because of higher gas prices is hard to pin down."
Indeed, when you look at the overall market from DesRosiers's point of view, it seems that most Canadians have already made the move to more fuel-efficient vehicles, can't move to more fuel-efficient vehicles, or don't care about more fuel-efficient vehicles.
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Entry-level fuel-efficient sales now account for about 40 percent of the Canadian market, he notes, which is up from about 30 percent a decade ago. "Consumers are obviously moving toward entry level vehicles and gas prices are likely one of the reasons," he says, but there are a lot of others.
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Family-sized vehicles now account for a third of the market, DesRosiers notes, down from 45 percent a decade ago. "Consumers are very clearly moving away from this size of vehicle, and most are buying smaller vehicles."