Editorial: Give drivers what they want

Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2005 | 7:55 a.m.

A rental car business on Paradise Road near McCarran International Airport is beginning to offer hybrid vehicles to its customers. The first 20 hybrids arrived this month at US Rent A Car from a distributor in California. Within a month the business hopes to have 100 hybrids on the lot, and ultimately it hopes to have 500 available.

There is a problem, however, in quickly achieving that ultimate goal. As reported Monday by Las Vegas Sun business reporter Richard N. Velotta, hybrids are in such demand that it is hard to get large quantities.

Also in the news Monday was the announcement by General Motors Corp. that it would close nine plants in North America by 2008, an act that will trim 9 percent of its workforce, which amounts to 30,000 employees. Rick Wagoner, chairman and chief executive of GM, told the Associated Press, "These actions are necessary for GM to get its costs in line with our major global competitors."

At a Spring Hill, Tenn., plant that is slated for closing, a local auto workers' union president told an AP reporter, "They (GM leaders) need to design cars that sell." It is obvious that a sea change is under way in the auto industry and that American manufacturers failed to anticipate it. General Motors is reported to have lost nearly $4 billion already this year, partly because demand for its specialty -- gas-guzzling SUVs -- has plummeted.

Meanwhile, Toyota and Honda are taking orders for their hybrids faster than their manufacturing plants can produce them. Hybrids achieve far greater gas mileage because electricity is an added source of power.

It is obvious where demand is heading and GM should go with it. Instead, it seems intent on clinging to its 20th century model of car making, even as the country becomes more dependent upon hostile countries for oil. The Ford Motor Co., which is also laying off thousands of employees in the face of staggering losses, has begun a hybrid program but has a lot of catching up to do.

A bipartisan bill in the U.S. Senate, introduced by Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., aims to have hybrids or other alternative-fuel vehicles account for 50 percent of all sales in the country within seven years. We agree with this goal, but the bill, in part, would offer generous tax breaks to GM and Ford as incentives. In our view, the overwhelming demand for fuel-efficient cars should be all the incentive they need.