Modern Autos Lack Efficacy/Efficiency

The ResolutionThanks to Pro for proposing a great topic, He echoes complaints we often hear these days, to the effect that there is something wrong with modern cars. Cars are now the best they have ever been. "Go back about 20 years and the number of cars delivering 40 mpg or more was greater than what we’re seeing today. Those cars, however, were lighter and did not include weight-adding safety features we take for granted today including front and side airbags, traction control and antilock brakes. Many of today’s cars are delivering the best of both worlds: excellent fuel economy and the safety features consumers appreciate." http://www.autotrends.org...The Toyota Prius is a mid-sized five passenger car that consistently gets 50 miles per gallon under both stop-and-go city driving and long trips. It does so by using hybrid technology that reuses the energy of braking, having a continuously variable transmission for efficiency, and having the lowest aerodynamic drag coefficient of any mass-produced car. It can be bought new for well under $30,000. http://en.wikipedia.org... It is extremely reliable. So what's the complaint?Cars do have bad periods. Cars of the early 1970s were less reliable and had less power than the cars of the 1960s. That was a consequence of pollution standards. So is something like that the nature of my opponent's current complaint? Not as far as I can tell. Cars are consistently better now than they were in past years.The complaint, as far as I can determine, is not that modern automobiles are no good, but rather that people do not always buy them according to the values that my opponent would like. Pro cites cars being bought to impress others, cars bought with more power than Pro thinks people need, and especially there are too many Sport Utility Vehicles (SUVs). That's a complaint about vehicle owners, not a complaint bout the vehicles. Pro's standards are by no means objective or universal. The resolutio fails because the present market includes cars that suit every reasonable requirement for efficacy and efficiency.Why aren't all cars lime yellow?Things claimed to be objective standards are really value judgements. Nearly everyone would like a car that is safe, economical, comfortable, beautiful, and low polluting, when it gets to tradeoffs among the various attributes, it's reasonable for individuals to make different choices. Scientific studies have determined the safest color for vehicles. http://kochvillefire.com... It is a lime yellow, the obnoxious color corresponding to the peak color sensitivity of the eye. It's used for fire trucks http://www.flickr.com... and occasionally for cars http://motoring.friday-ad.co.uk... A further improvement is to use fluorescent lime yellow. Fluorescent colors convert ultraviolet light to visible light, so it produces more light than the incident visible light.Objectively, fluorescent lime yellow is the safest color. The technology is available to paint every car that color. So why are so few cars lime yellow? It is because few car buyers put so large a premium on safety. Aesthetics has value. A world full of fluorescent cars would only please a very few safety fanatics. The rest of us are willing to take a small incremental safety risk.SUVsPeople buy cars of all types for frivolous reasons, but many people buy SUVs to meet genuine needs, People need to haul stuff around. That's why station wagons were once so popular. People have large families with children and dogs. They tow boats and trailers. In rural areas, they haul quantities of supplies from distant towns. They live in mountains, in places with bad roads, and in places with heavy winter snow. I live in California where the land is flat, there are good roads, and it never snows. However, there are mountains about two hours drive to the east with ski areas that get several hundred inches of snow per year. Lots of avid skiers live here in the flat lands and head up to the land of chains-required regularly. An SUV is a reasonable choice for them, usually as a second car.I have a friend with back problem, something to do with a pinched nerve. After some experimentation, he found that the chair-like posture of SUV seating suited him well, and the pain he endured from conventional car seating disappeared. He lives in Florida, where snow and mountains are notably absent. Tall people need the extra height of an SUV.Many SUVs have evolved so as to be more like cars. One auto reviewer noted "Many compact SUVs have become so car-like that I was surprised to encounter the seating position of a conventional SUV in the new Sorento. You sit high relative to the instrument panel, and the windshield is upright by current standards." http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com...SafetyPro cites an out-of-date book on SUV safety. Ten years ago, SUVs were more subject to roll-over accidents than regular passenger cars, but that's now been fixed with improved deign.The Institute for Highway Safety reports that, thanks to electronic stability control in SUVs,"someone driving a 2009 model year car is almost twice as likely to die in a rollover accident as someone driving a 2009 model year SUV. .. More stable car-based SUV designs have also played a role in decreasing SUV rollover death rates," http://money.cnn.com...considering all types of accidents, "Adjusted for number of registered vehicles, and only considering those vehicles 1-3 years old, SUVs are now far safer than passenger cars overall. For 2009, there were 39 occupant deaths per million registered SUVs—versus 82 for cars, and 94 for pickups." http://www.thecarconnection.com...A person driving an SUV is safer than a person in a regular car. That means that concern over safety is a valid reason for buying an SUV. SUVs are better than cars in dealing with poor road conditions, like mountain snow or flooding. Weight, wheel base and heavier construction provide better traction and passenger protection.Fuel EconomyThe fuel efficiency of both cars and of light trucks and SUVs has risen slowly since 1965. http://en.wikipedia.org... Cars went from about 14 to 23 mpg, and the SUV/light truck category from about 10 to 17 mpg. The US government sets fuel standards. "The [2002] standard is 27.5 mpg for passenger automobiles and 20.7 mpg for light trucks, a classification that also includes sport utility vehicles (SUVs).." http://www.policyalmanac.org.... Vehicles last about 20 years, so the fuel economy will continue to rise for another ten years as old vehicles are replaced with new ones.The average vehicle is driven only about 12,000 miles per year, which makes fuel cost a secondary issue. http://www.project.org... The average price of gasoline for the past year is about $3. http://fuelgaugereport.aaa.com... A car getting 25 mpg will use $1440 worth of gasoline. At the Truck/SUV mileage of 17, fuel cost rise to $2118, an extra $677. The total cost of driving a medium sedan 12,000 miles is $7440. Compared to the $7440 basic cost, paying $677 for the low mileage of an SUV, or saving $1059 with a 50 mpg Prius is still marginal compared to he other costs. Buying a more expensive car adds to the depreciation and insurance, but that applies whether the expensive car is an electric vehicle or an SUV.Today's cars are excellent. What's important is that there are cars available that provide the combinations off features so that each buyer gets what he wants. People are not foolish for wanting SUVs, nor are they foolish to want small economical cars. The resolution is negated.