Giulio Mattioli Profile picture
Aug 25, 2019 10 tweets 5 min read Read on X
As the Johnson government plans to cut the fuel duty, we hear the usual arguments that this will help "hard-pressed families".

But how much truth there is in this argument? A thread (with evidence) thesun.co.uk/news/9793144/b…
Do low income people use the car a lot? No, actually they don't.

People are often surprised to hear this, but individuals in the bottom 20% of the income distribution drive *less than half* than those in the top 20%
One of the main reasons for this difference is that actually, a lot of households *don't own cars* (24% in 2018 in England). And this gets to 46%(!) in the lowest income quintile.
So roughly *half* of 'hard-pressed families will not benefit from a fuel duty cut.

They would probably benefit benefit from a cut in bus fares - but since buses are privatised and deregulated in most of the UK, cutting bus fares is not even on the agenda...
What about the other half of low-income people though?

Well in our @TranspPoverty study we have found that roughly 9% of the UK population has low income, high motoring costs, and inelastic fuel demand
@TranspPoverty In a separate study we found that 7% of UK households are in 'forced car ownership' = they own a car despite being in absolute poverty.

(although another 11% is 'car deprived' = does not own + cannot afford a car)
@TranspPoverty So the 7-9% of households with high motoring costs + low income will actually benefit from a fuel duty cut, at least in the short term.

BUT there is another, possibly larger group of 'hard-pressed families' who will not benefit from it. These are usually not mentioned at all
@TranspPoverty This is a common fallacy: assuming that
1) everyone has/uses cars...
2) ...and we all use them pretty much in the same way...
3) ...but some of us are poor, so making car use cheaper will be good for them.

Even Jeremy Corbyn falls for it
@TranspPoverty More broadly, there are good reasons to think that the benefits of cutting the fuel duty would be short-lived, and the longer term effects undesirable.

See the conclusion of our paper below (doi.org/10.1016/j.tra.…)

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More from @giulio_mattioli

May 14
To me the most striking thing in this chart is how much the Italian saving rate has *declined* over time: from nearly three times as much as the UK in 2000 to less than the UK today
And if you know the Italian social system, you know how much of it is based on household savings. Middle-class parents save their whole life to buy a dwelling for their children one day. Young people stay home & save for said dwelling rather than renting, etc.
Parents (and sometimes grandparents) use their savings to support children & grandchildren who find themselves unemployed - because no, many/most of them have no right to unemployment benefits or minimum guaranteed income.
Read 6 tweets
Apr 16
So the German government has now officially agreed to ditch sectoral emission reduction goals.

Does this mean that transport is now off the hook?

In the short term, maybe, in the long term I believe the opposite will happen (THREAD)
In Germany as in the rest of Europe, we are reducing emissions in other sectors while not reducing them (and sometimes even increasing them) in the transport sector.

So each year transport accounts for a higher share of total emissions ⬇️
I think this means that the climate debate and the transport debate will progressively become *conflated*. Most of the climate debate will be about cars and planes.

Excuses such as "Let's pick some other low-hanging fruit!" or "Let's do nuclear instead!" won't cut it.
Read 5 tweets
Feb 14
Fascinating from last week

#Dortmund Police tweets that elderly woman died after being ran over twice on pedestrian crossing

Gets asked if they intend to introduce more controls / cameras

The reply is something out of a textbook on car dependence. Or on how not to do PR Image
You can see the exchange for yourselves here
It gets worse: when asked whether they intend to implement measures to prevent such deaths from happening in the future, this is the police's reply. Note that the woman died *on a pedestrian crossing*
Image
Read 7 tweets
Nov 8, 2023
The astonishingly rapid rightward & xenophobic lurch of the German political debate over the last few weeks

A THREAD to which I am afraid I will keep adding

1) 20.10.23
2) 22.10.23

The leader of the Conservatives (first in the polls) Image
3) 05.11.23

A Liberal MP proposes to drastically reduce the rights to political participation, right of assembly / freedom of association for non-EU foreign residents
Read 5 tweets
Sep 20, 2023
Every time car fuel prices go up - whether for taxes or wars - everyone seems to know exactly who suffers the most.

But which areas of Germany are most vulnerable to fuel price increases?

THREAD on my contribution to the Agora Verkehrswende & DLR report on transport poverty Image
(the report is available here) agora-verkehrswende.de/veroeffentlich…
We built on an established approach that sees vulnerability to fuel price increases as the product of:

1⃣ (high) exposure = high car use
2⃣ (high) sensitivity = low income
3⃣ (low) adaptive capacity = lack of alternatives to car use, car dependence
Read 14 tweets
Jun 20, 2023
Incredibly ill-informed take on car dependence & inequality by "the leading progressive political and cultural magazine in the United Kingdom"

DEBUNKING THREAD
[disclaimer: the full article is behind paywall so I am commenting on what's in the thread. There's more than enough wrong stuff there already though]
Are low-income and ethnic minority groups more car dependent than others?

This argument would be misguided for most countries, but it's *particularly wrong for the UK*. Let's see why
Read 20 tweets

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