Deval Patrick is no Pigovian

A reader emails me a story about the new Massachusetts governor:

GAS TAX HIKE CLASHES WITH TRANSPORTATION, ENERGY GOALS, PATRICK SAYS
By Michael P. Norton and Jim O'Sullivan
STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE
BOSTON, WEDNESDAY, DEC. 20, 2006

Raising the gas tax, an idea contemplated by a state commission eyeing ways to address a huge backlog in transportation maintenance problems, runs counter to the push for energy efficiency and independence, according to Gov.-elect Deval Patrick, who nonetheless backed off a campaign pledge against such an increase.

"We need to be much, much more efficient in the use of hydrocarbons for energy reasons, for reasons of independence, for reasons of our dependence on foreign oil and gas, on hydrocarbons generally," Patrick told the News Service during an interview at the waterfront law office he is using as a staging area for his administration, which moves into power on Beacon Hill in two weeks.

"If we're trying to cultivate here in Massachusetts an energy-smart economy, then the notion of relying for additional revenues on something we're trying to break our dependence on doesn't seem to me to be a formula for long-term success."

Okay, let me get this straight: It is important that we reduce our consumption of oil. Therefore, we should not tax it.

Hmmm....Governor Patrick was Harvard class of 1978, and it's a good bet that he took ec 10. I wonder what they taught about the slope of demand curves back then.