The following interviews were conducted by FS Circulation Coordinator Waheeda Francis in Seattle and by FSP Organizer Stephen Durham in New York City. The questions they asked: How do rising oil prices affect you? And what do you think should be done about them?
Amber Thompson, Seattle: I had a car that only takes premium and I had to put the middle grade in there and that was very expensive. I’ve been paying $4 for a while and I’m very unhappy about it.
I had to sell my car. I plan on getting a smaller car that is more gas efficient.
I don’t go out as much as I used to. I just go to work, do the things I have to do, the necessities. Anything extra I don’t do any more. I try to get rides with friends, and carpool.
I don’t do the bus. I don’t like the bus.
The government puts taxes on the gas. So they can take their taxes off the gas and have their conversations and talks with whoever we get the gas from.
Before we got into war, gas was cool, the gas was at a reasonable price.
But now, four or five years after the war, the price has skyrocketed. That is what the war is about.
Veronique Bond, New York City: A lot of my friends are carpooling. My friends in Statten Island won’t even bring their cars into Manhattan now. And I’ve been helping them learn the transit system in New York.
We’ve had mass cooking sessions during the week — like bringing all our food together in one spot instead of using different ovens. We pool our resources and save money that way.
Some people are getting three-bedroom apartments and living together to save costs.
The prices make me not want to get a car. I took Drivers Ed 10 years ago but didn’t get a license, because living in New York City you can get around without a car. Even more people are going to take public transportation now.
But they’re raising subway costs! And the more they do that, it seems like the worse the service gets. I’ve been getting stuck in the subway more often and having more problems, like the trains being late or backed up, or someone pulling the emergency brake.
A lot of people are complaining about rents going up too, because of the oil prices. It affects people who got into these rent-stabilized apartments — a lot of them elderly, people who can’t afford high-rise rent costs.
Drilling more oil is just going to make more of a mess. I sort of like the electric cars, all that new technology will lessen oil use.
The oil companies are making a lot of money that comes out of people’s pockets, hard-working people who have to pay more to get to work. It just keeps going up and up and up. It’s ridiculous.
Price control would be nice. I don’t know how we’d go about doing it.
Why do those oil companies have to raise the prices so high when they’re making so much money in the first place? Low-income people are suffering the most.
Robert Kay, Seattle: I try to combine errands I run. I walk more. I’m taking the bus more too.
But Seattle doesn’t have a real transit system. It’s not built to get people where they are going. I like the idea of dedicated rail. You’ve got to get off the road, because when you’re on the road, you’re subject to the same delays that all drivers are.
I’m looking for a new job right now and once I get it, depending on where it is, I’ll look for the mass transit right away. I’ll probably do that more quickly than I would have in the past. The thing is to figure out how to best get there without driving.
The solution is to expand the construction of inner-city trains. The idea of Sound Transit in Seattle is good but it has to be expanded as fast as possible.
There should probably be some windfall profits tax that could be levied against the oil companies and the money should be put back into mass transit. Because they’re probably getting a lot of profits beyond what they normally get.
I personally think we should have a wealth tax on the wealthiest people and have a national investment bank and buy out controlling interests in one of the auto companies and develop electric cars right away, as a transition until we have good mass transit systems. I don’t know if they will go that far, but that type of thing is important. We’ve got to get away from fossil fuel.
