Nov 04 US Hybrid Sales

Listen to this bit from the Green Car Congress

Robert Bienenfeld, Senior Manager of Automobile Product Planning for American Honda, noted that Honda has found over the years that sales of its hybrids closely tracks to the stimulus of increased gas prices. Price up, sales up. Price down, sales down. In other words, in the aggregate, the hybrid sales still reflect a short-term reactive response on the part of consumers, rather than a longer-term, more measured change in buying criteria.

Clearly, there is some irrational behavior on the part of consumers going on here, but hey, who said that the car buyers are rational individuals!