December 08, 2011
If the Washington Post managed the development of computers the way it reported on the administration’s efforts to promote green cars, I would be writing this piece on a typewriter. President Obama has been in office less than 3 years. It would be absolutely astounding if his administration’s efforts to promote cleaner cars had already produced marketable results.
The effort to get affordable electric cars will inevitably be a long process involving many cost-saving and efficiency-enhancing innovations. People who know technology understand this fact. People who don’t should not be writing on this issue for major news outlets.
It is also worth noting that in a period in which the economy has widespread unemployment, as is the case now, there is very little opportunity cost to this sort of spending. In other words, if the government did not spend this money we simply would have had more people unemployed. This may make deficit hawks happy, since it would mean a somewhat lower deficit/debt, but there is no obvious advantage to the country from this situation.
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