Conversation

Notices

1. Embed this notice
   Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️ (xgranade@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 05:58:15 JST Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️

   So there's a thing I reasonably believe to be true about politics because of what data and analysis I've seen, but that I've never understood: why in the fuck are gas prices so incredibly important to US elections?

   • Embed this notice
     Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️ (xgranade@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 06:00:52 JST Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     On one hand, I get it: gas is a major expense in people's lives. On the other, I really don't! Rent or mortgage, healthcare, child care, education, and food all seem really important too. But it's always gas that seems to get disproportionate attention, and with zero allowance for relief in terms of more efficient cars, better public transit, or more walkable neighborhoods.

   • Embed this notice
     Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️ (xgranade@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 06:07:06 JST Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     • JackieM

     @Jackiemauro That's a good point, yeah. It's important and really easily observed, thanks to those giant signs.

   • Embed this notice
     JackieM (jackiemauro@fosstodon.org)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 06:07:07 JST JackieM

     in reply to

     @xgranade I sort of wonder how much of it is just as you’re going about your life you see gas prices going up and down prominently all over and all the time.

     There are no giant signs with the cost of a mammogram or apartment all around. Maybe it’s just this really present reminder that stands in for like the state of things.

   • Embed this notice
     MidsouthMouth.OctaviaKeats (fkaoctaviakeats@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 07:59:32 JST MidsouthMouth.OctaviaKeats

     in reply to

     @xgranade
     Manifest Destiny in the streets, Toxic Individualism in the sheets?

   • Embed this notice
     Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️ (xgranade@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 08:11:39 JST Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     • Glyph

     @glyph Either, really. More of an idle musing about what all I don't understand about the world.

   • Embed this notice
     Glyph (glyph@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 08:11:40 JST Glyph

     in reply to

     @xgranade are you interested in speculation or just hoping to hear from actual experts here? :)

   • Embed this notice
     Glyph (glyph@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 10:33:54 JST Glyph

     in reply to

     @xgranade 7. gas prices also disproportionately affect rural and "red state" voters, because things are much farther apart in those areas, and those areas are overrepresented in political institutions, so this concern is given more weight. Some of this is self-inflicted conservative policy bullshit (not building infrastructure, etc) but a lot of it is legit: on a farm you have an order of magnitude more need for portable energy than in an apartment building

   • Embed this notice
     Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️ (xgranade@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 10:33:54 JST Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     • Glyph

     @glyph All of that makes sense, yeah. With respect to (7), though, there's some definite weirdness that seems to come through from the right-wing habit of adopting the trappings of farming without any meaningful solidarity. E.g.: pickups moving from being essential farm tools to $100k luxury vehicles, or bespoke Carhartt fashion products, etc. Very rich people pretending to be strongly affected by gas prices may, and this is more wild speculation, play into that as well.

   • Embed this notice
     Glyph (glyph@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 10:33:55 JST Glyph

     in reply to

     @xgranade okay so here's some informed speculation then:

     1. as others have said; it's more highly visible than other prices
     2. energy prices affect the prices for pretty much everything, and gas prices are a strong proxy for that
     3. fluctuations in gas prices are rapid, allowing people to react to them before acclimatizing
     4. longer-term solutions to this problem are *very* longer-term (building a rail line in the US takes like a decade)
     5. cultural memory of rationing in the oil shock of 1978

   • Embed this notice
     Glyph (glyph@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 10:33:55 JST Glyph

     in reply to

     @xgranade 6. also, per 5, gas prices are also more directly and immediately affected by politics than other prices; that's true in reality due to foreign policy but even moreso in the popular imagination, due to the aforementioned memories of '78

   • Embed this notice
     Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️ (xgranade@wandering.shop)'s status on Sunday, 08-Dec-2024 10:39:21 JST Cassandra Granade 🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     • Glyph

     @glyph (To be clear, if someone wants to wear bespoke Carhartts, no shade! But that's not solidarity in and of itself.)