Does Constant Driving Really Make Our Country Richer?
We’ve all heard the argument that the United States economy is fueled by Americans’ love of driving. But does the data support the narrative that cars connect us to far-flung opportunities to make and spend more money — or has our country’s car-powered productivity revolution actually stalled out?
Today on The Brake, we’re talking to Todd Litman of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute about his new paper on the “mobility-productivity paradox,” and why so many economic indicators actually go down the more we collectively rely on automobiles — and many go up when we build towards a more multimodal future. And then we get into the really hard question: how to get our fellow Americans to believe it.
Litman recently contributed a piece to Streetsblog NYC’s “Car Harms” series, so check it out here.
For an unedited transcript of this conversation (with typos), click here.
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