Might as well face it, we're addicted to cars

It was while browsing the US Bureau of Labor Statistics website (http://www.bls.gov) for a little careers advice that I picked up on the following:

"Motor vehicles - passenger cars, sport utility vehicles (SUVs), pickup trucks and vans, heavy-duty trucks, buses, and other special-purpose motor vehicles ranging from limousines to garbage trucks - play a central role in our society.

"Most U.S. residents rely on them daily to travel to work or school, shop, or visit family and friends. Businesses depend on motor vehicles to transport people and goods. The United States is the world's largest marketplace for motor vehicles because of the size and affluence of its population."

It didn't strike me at first; but later, while I was writing a piece about traffic wardens, the deeper (and quite possibly unintentional) meaning of these words impressed itself on me.

We're taught to believe that after 120 years of faithful service (for all you buffs, 1886 was the year Karl Benz unveiled his ‘Patent Motorwagen', widely regarded as the first automobile), the motor car is here to stay. The motor industry in the UK may be in decline, but the demand for motor insurance certainly isn't - and any job which involves servicing, repairing, policing or just driving cars is thought to offer that rare kind of security otherwise enjoyed by midwives and undertakers (it's a job for life, in other words).

However, reading those paragraphs on the US Labor site gave me rise to question the ‘central role in our society' apparently played by the motor car. Don't we have something to worry about if ‘most' Americans can't meet any of their social, financial or dietary needs without putting pedal to metal? And if this is the case, why is the US population's ‘size and affluence' made to seem responsible for this dependency?

A short stroll down the sidewalk in most US towns and cities will confirm that there really is no trip short enough to leave the car in the garage. Pavements in the States are the peopled by the odd child or grandparent, but everyone of license-bearing age stays well clear. They may well get phased-out altogether some day, vanishing unexpectedly like handy local stores do in the UK - everyone (in both countries) shops at out-of-town outlets anyway.

Now it would be unreasonable of me to say that a 45-minute hike in the noonday sun beats a ten-minute drive in air-conditioned comfort, but why have we ended up organising our lives so that all the good stuff is 45 minutes away?

In a one-horse town at the turn of the century, you rarely needed to walk further than the end of the street for your shopping and socializing, and work was round the corner. But in 107 years of progress, we have succeeded in putting all these things so far away that man is no longer capable of living under his own steam.

Buying one of these automobiles (thanks, Karl) was supposed to bring everything closer to hand, but in fact it's done just the opposite.

Cars - and the illusion of freedom that comes with them - have thus become a dangerous addiction for the world's most affluent countries. Their benefits are essentially short-lived (i.e. lasting only until the world started moving further away), and their effects massively habit-forming. But would going car cold turkey bring a developed nation to its knees, or back to its feet?

The question is moot, of course. The only thing a traffic warden need fear in terms of his job security is the advent of robot traffic wardens. There is simply too much industry - and too much oil - riding on car sales and servicing in the States and elsewhere to threaten the continued success of the horseless carriage.

Like the traffic warden's, my job at a UK car insurance company is hopelessly dependant on the assured fate of the motor car. I work here alongside a team of motor insurance experts, who earn their wage by betting against the chance of cars crashing or disappearing.

It's funny, but if they offered that kind of wager at the bookies I'd put on every penny I had.

Author - Mike Page (Hoot Car Insurance)
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