Whether you like subsidies or not, I'm willing to bet heavily that we will see more of them. I personally view most subsidies with cautious skepticism, but we now have to consider the geo-political, economic and ecological circumstances that surround ethanol production
Both Republicans and Democrat hold extremely jaundiced views of our dependence on foreign oil. Even Hillary, who will likely be our President in 2008, is making noises about moving to ethanol in a big way.
Governments main role, if done wisely, will be to hard-start the process. For instance, there are people who would buy flex-fuel cars if they could buy e-85, but e85 is hard to find at the moment. Refiners of ethanol are loath to produce greater quantities without an assurance that there will be a demand to justify it.
This is where government can be instrumental. If, for instance, the government mandated manufacters to make flex-fuel cars only and if, for instance, the government guaranteed to buy surpluses of ethanol from refiners they would set in motion a massive and ireversible move to ethanol.
I don't suggest that subsidies stay in place beyond an interim period of time, but the plan I suggest, or something quite similar to it is going to happen. The cost of government subsidies will be minimal compared to the amount of money this country would be saving by NOT sending our dollars to the Saudis , Iranians & Venezuelans, all of whom hate us anyway.
That, and the sheer number of jobs created by an ethanol economy and the resulting ethanol infrastructure will more than make up for our tax dollars 'lost' to temporary subsidies.
JMO.
P.S. Mother Jones is a radical left-wing magazine that loves to clash horns with U.S. government policy, which in this case is ironic because most left-wing groups who still care about America would love to see America go 'green'.
Ethanol is one of the few issues that almost everybody can agree on (oil companies excluded). It's good for our economy, our security, our ecology, good for farmers, good for agriculture, good for jobs, transportation industry, huge for ethanol refiners, consumers, and is eminently doable. |
