Managerial Economics 2nd Edition by William Boyes

Exercise 39

Conspiracy
Driving home one evening listening to talk radio, I heard somebody claim that a solar-powered car had been developed that was ready to go and was as cheap and as safe as an average family car. The car would need only a few dollars worth of fuel per year to get it started. The talk host asked when were we likely to see it in the marketplace, and the engineer coolly replied "probably never. The oil companies will buy us out and throw the blueprint for the car away." The next time I heard about special energy saving innovations that were mysteriously not available to the general public was a car that ran on water. The story went that the inventor ended up committing suicide and no one knows where the plans for the car ended up.
Why are such myths so enduring?