A Crashing Failure: The stupid tragedy of CAFE.(corporate average fuel economy program)

If the National Academy of Sciences discovered that a certain chemical was killing several dozen people a year, congressmen would rush to ban the substance. But in late July, the Academy found that a federal policy was causing thousands of deaths-and now congressmen are scrambling not to end the policy, but to expand it.

The deadly policy in question is the federal government's new-car fuel- economy program, enacted in 1975 to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. Popularly known as CAFE (corporate average fuel economy), it requires the Transportation Department to set mile-per-gallon standards. The passenger-car standard is currently 27.5 mpg, while the light-truck standard, which covers SUVs, is 20.7 mpg. A Republican proposal to make the standards slightly more stringent passed the House on August 1, and the Democratic Senate may push for a far greater expansion after Labor Day.

The real question is why anyone wants to expand CAFE at all. Two days before the House debate, a panel of the National Academy of Sciences issued a long-awaited report, which concluded that CAFE had contributed to between 1,300 and 2,600 traffic deaths in a single year, as well as ten times that many serious injuries. Since CAFE has been in full force for over a decade, its cumulative human toll is probably in the tens of thousands.

By making cars smaller, CAFE has made them more dangerous. Larger, heavier cars are less fuel-efficient than similarly equipped smaller, lighter cars, but they're also safer. Research demonstrates that this holds true in practically every type of accident. Larger cars have more mass to absorb crash forces, and more interior space in which their occupants can "ride down" a collision before striking a dashboard or side pillar. For this reason, the smallest cars have "occupant death rates" more than twice as great as those of large cars.

Critics of CAFE have been raising this issue for years. A 1989 Brookings-Harvard study estimated that CAFE caused a 14 to 27 percent increase in occupant fatalities-an annual toll of 2,200 to 3,900 deaths. A 1999 USA Today analysis concluded that, over its lifetime, CAFE had resulted in 46,000 fatalities. These findings are in the same ballpark as those of the Academy. CAFE's advocates, however, have uniformly claimed that CAFE isn't a factor in any deaths at all. A Sierra Club brochure epitomizes this view, asking: "Can we improve fuel economy without sacrificing safety?" Its answer: "Absolutely. Long time safety advocates such as the Center for Auto Safety and Ralph Nader support increasing CAFE to 45 mpg and point out that we can do so safely."

But Nader took a very different view back when large cars weren't as politically incorrect as they are now. In a 1989 interview on what type of car he'd buy, Nader said, "Well, larger cars are safer-there is more bulk to protect the occupant. But they are less fuel-efficient." Asked which cars are least safe, Nader replied: "The tiny ones." Clarence Ditlow's Center for Auto Safety took the same position. In 1972 it published a detailed critique of the Beetle, entitled Small on Safety- The Designed-in Dangers of the Volkswagen. Page after page explained how "small size and light weight impose inherent limitations" on safety. For example, the Beetle's compactness meant that "there is little space between the occupant and the windshield" and that "the gas tank is necessarily closer to the occupant than in larger cars."

Today, both Nader and Ditlow advocate higher CAFE standards.