With the price of gas heading for $4 a gallon many are screaming that this is unfair.  How dare the price go up like this!  Revenge is called for, and we need to organize, boycott and vent.  But this is not a sudden surprise, not if you've paid ANY attention to history.  So far I've not seen lines like we saw in the 70's.  And no ration cards like in the 40's.

But what most people cannot seem to understand is that these high prices are actually the key to finding a solution.  When gas is cheap, only the few who are frugal in everything care about conserving.  Let the price get painful, suddenly everyone seems to be willing to at least listen to ideas for reducing how much they use.  And inventors are trying to find the next great thing that will make the inventor rich and create a whole new world again. 

In my area, it is not unusual for each person in the family to commute 30-45 miles EACH WAY to arrive at work.  That is 60-90 miles per person per day.  No one gave a thought to it back when gas was cheap.  But now many folks are willing to at least think about making some changes, suddenly they see a burden where before they never gave that commute a thought.

Some will sell that 8-11 mpg too-large truck, van, SUV and replace it with something that they used fuel efficiency as a yardstick when chosing the replacement.  I know from personal experience that I seemed to be a lonely only at weighing fuel use when I bought a new vehicle back in 2001.  My small SUV got 27-29 mpg back when everyone was asking me why I even cared about how the mpg worked out, I was considered odd to even include that in my criteria.  Now I'm very glad I did.  That SUV still gets about 22-24 after 165k miles.  That's a lot of gas I did not have to buy compared to the average SUV back then. 

When gas hits $7 a gallon, I may be willing to move closer to work.  I may trade my very inexpensive place to live for something more expensive that is 15 miles closer.  I have a feeling I will not be alone, gas prices may make urban homes suddenly become more valued and make the prices go up.  So that old neighborhood may suddenly become the next hot place to live if it means no need to fill a car up 3 times a week.

Gas at $7 per gallon, that would roughly be another doubling of the current price of gas.  And many will scream that they cannot afford to have a life with gas that high.  But I was buying gas at about $1.85 a gallon about 18 months ago.  So if gas doubled in another 18 months there is your $7 gas.  What if it doubled again after that?  At some point, it will suddenly make sense to switch to something other than gas to power cars.  There will be a price where the economics will kick in and some wise inventor or businessperson will see a way to sell everyone a ?? and we will leave behind the idea that is not working and move to the new thing.  We did it when we left the horse and buggy behind.  It can happen again.

 For myself, I'm carefully watching the newest innovations in solar.  I can see putting some money into making my house energy independent - it makes a LOT of sense to me.  And thanks to being frugal in a thousand small ways everyday, I can afford to spend some money to get a 20 year reward that pays me back slowly.  And who knows, maybe someday that same system may power my replacement for a car.  If 1 in every 5 homes had such a system, it might mean no need for high pollution energy generation.

But I don't want to either miss the chance or fall for a scam.  But I am watching, someday soon there will be a new innovation and there will be vast changes - again.  I was recently told that it looks like in about 2 years a solar rennovation costing $5,000 might cover 80% of your home's power needs for the next 20 years.  When I get proof of that, I'll consider it money well spent to install and use it.  And I'll have control over my access to power for my home.