Akkam’s Razor

Conventional wisdom is that Americans are slow to change their lifestyle in the face of adversity.   This evidence from USA Today suggests otherwise:

Americans drove 30 billion fewer miles from November through April than during the same period in 2006-07, the biggest such drop since the Iranian revolution led to gasoline supply shortages in 1979-80.

[…]

“It’s not a blip,” said Marilyn Brown, professor of energy policy at Georgia Tech, citing data showing surging transit ridership, dropping sales of sport-utility vehicles and sharply increased demand for gas-efficient vehicles. “I think the difference between now and 1979, when prices were comparable when you adjust for inflation, is there’s a sense of sustained pain. There’s a sense that the era of cheap energy is a thing of the past.”

Krugman says:

[The] gas tax holiday is not, in my view, a good idea. But the furor over what is, when all is said and done, a small and temporary policy proposal is entirely disproportionate. What’s going on?

[...]

[E]conomists talk much more about trade than they do about health care policy, because they think they know something about it in a way the laity don’t.

The gas tax holiday is in this category. Economists really do know something about tax incidence that the laity don’t. So when a presidential candidate says something that conflicts with economistic wisdom, it becomes THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE EVER. Except, you know, it isn’t.