You go, girl!!
The basic problem with the gas tax is that it would depress the economy even more than it is right now. Remember, high oil prices nudged us into this recession, whatever the other problems may be, so hiking gas prices further might not be that smart, Ray.
Instead, how about we cut taxes on green clean renewable energy? We need to boost this economy, Ray, and the only way to do that is with smart tax cuts. Jimmy Carter pretty well proved that raising spending and taxes leads only to stagflation. If you want to shift this economy away from oil and to renewable energy and a smart grid, to more energy efficient, alt-fuel vehicles and equipment, just make all the good stuff tax free.
And I do NOT mean phoney-baloney tax credits that subsidize failures, like ethanol. I mean real tax cuts (sales, corp. income, interest, dividends, cap gains tax cuts) tied to the amount of revenue from green energy, vehicles, infrastructure, efficiency. That way, we promote success, not failure, because the best green businesses get the biggest tax cuts, without the chance for politicians to waste the money on more boondoggles.
That is also how we save Detroit AND get them to shift green: piles of private money will pour in for tax free investment in plug-in, flex-fuel hybrids, etc., without the need for a bailout. Exxon itself will diversify into green investments if doing so can decrease corporate and shareholder taxes.
One of the best things about a green energy tax cut, Ray, is that energy is such a fluid commodity, so the tax cut benefit flows right through to the rest of the economy in lower energy prices and efficiency saving. Not only can it supercharge investment in green energy, efficiency, infrastructure and advanced vehicles, it can help supercharge the whole economy.
But if your gas tax make the economy tank, Ray, general tax revenues will also tank, and then the gas tax funds will be raided for general expenses, and your pet project will be unfunded. On that you can bet your pants.
You can learn more about this proposal at www.greenenergytaxcuts.com
The basic problem with the gas tax is that it would depress the economy even more than it is right now. Remember, high oil prices nudged us into this recession, whatever the other problems may be, so hiking gas prices further might not be that smart, Ray.
Instead, how about we cut taxes on green clean renewable energy? We need to boost this economy, Ray, and the only way to do that is with smart tax cuts. Jimmy Carter pretty well proved that raising spending and taxes leads only to stagflation. If you want to shift this economy away from oil and to renewable energy and a smart grid, to more energy efficient, alt-fuel vehicles and equipment, just make all the good stuff tax free.
And I do NOT mean phoney-baloney tax credits that subsidize failures, like ethanol. I mean real tax cuts (sales, corp. income, interest, dividends, cap gains tax cuts) tied to the amount of revenue from green energy, vehicles, infrastructure, efficiency. That way, we promote success, not failure, because the best green businesses get the biggest tax cuts, without the chance for politicians to waste the money on more boondoggles.
That is also how we save Detroit AND get them to shift green: piles of private money will pour in for tax free investment in plug-in, flex-fuel hybrids, etc., without the need for a bailout. Exxon itself will diversify into green investments if doing so can decrease corporate and shareholder taxes.
One of the best things about a green energy tax cut, Ray, is that energy is such a fluid commodity, so the tax cut benefit flows right through to the rest of the economy in lower energy prices and efficiency saving. Not only can it supercharge investment in green energy, efficiency, infrastructure and advanced vehicles, it can help supercharge the whole economy.
But if your gas tax make the economy tank, Ray, general tax revenues will also tank, and then the gas tax funds will be raided for general expenses, and your pet project will be unfunded. On that you can bet your pants.
You can learn more about this proposal at www.greenenergytaxcuts.com
Sorry, problems with figuring out your comment feature. Duplicate posts. Delete this one above, if you wish, please leave the reply to richardxeon.
This seems to coincide with how we can repair our economy. Your right, 50 cents is nothing if we tack it onto the current price. And Ray, you really went far with the high speed train thing. Although it may a bit far fetched for the times. More power to you ray.
Dear Ray,
While your suggestion of a $.50/gal. tax on gasoline is a good idea, I’m afraid it won’t work.
When have known Congress to create a trust for a certain purpose, and keep their promise?
We already have a highway trust fund which they fund every other pet project but road and bridge construction. Other examples of trust funds that have not just been used for their intended purpose are social security, medicare, medicaid, etc.
As you can see, your fund will probably used for everything but what you said. Therefore, we should let the private sector develop technology with gov’t incentives.
Richard Gullo, Ph.D. Professor Emeritus, Accounting ,CCAC, Monroeville, PA 15146
As a Brit now living in California, I was amazed at how little tax there is on gas. In the UK the government tax is over half the total cost of a gallon, which currently is around $9 a gallon, albeit a larger gallon than in the US, but still a lot of money! As here, the government claim to use the car tax for roads, but as has already been said, in reality the cash goes elsewhere.
However, to get my state out of the mess it is in financially I DO believe that they could well afford, say 10? a gallon extra state tax.
Extra federal tax? To be honest, despite concerns, I do think they should increase the tax, and the federal government should be mandated to use the revenue to improve the entire road transport infrastructure. For starters there are far too many neglected bridges out there!
Your suggestion for a 50 cent/gallon gas tax is right-on! Though the hair on my neck tends to bristle at the thought of sending more tax $$ to the government, in this case, I support it. It certainly couldn’t be as bad as the $$ we have squandered on other programs (Iraq, to name one), and we need to move away from fossil fuel energy to more sustainable energy in order to keep the planet from overheating, reduce the $$ we send to petrodictatorships (read Thomas Friedman’s “Hot, Flat & Crowded”, if you haven’t already-Mr. Obama has-and that really gives me even more hope for this country!), and generate new jobs in the new clean energy economy. The problem we have now is a failure to recognize the true costs of dirty energy. If we were to quantify the public and environmental health costs associated with childhood asthma, exposure to mercury in fish, etc., CO2 and other air pollutants from our fuel and energy generation, it would certainly exceed a 50 cent/gallon gas tax. And we should be outraged that this is a by-product of what many see as our birth-right to use and waste energy without regard (as V.P. Cheney once stated in paraphrase, “We don’t need to conserve energy, we are Americans”.) This is the time for the United States to reclaim it’s leadership role in innovation and at the same time restore our global reputation that has been so badly tarnished of late. We can and must do better, because if we don’t, we better be prepared to answer the question from our children and future generations: “How come you didn’t take action when you saw what was happening to the planet?”.
There are a lot of reasons why 50 cents makes sense.
- Transportation feeds the economy.
- In 1950s the interstate highway system was a bold idea
- Benefit of the system peaked in 1980/90s and has been going downhill since.
- We need a new bold idea, see wwww.americastransportationnetwork.com
- Rebuild with separate car and truck lanes
- integrate with high speed rail, air and water ports
Some people don’t like taxes. but
- we are stuck with government running our transportation systems (hgihways, etc)
- there are better ways of doing it, but that is a MAJOR change
- 50 cents a gallon is a fee for using the system, not a tax.
- and in the U.S. gas tax is dedicated to roads by law (most people dont know that)
- ideally, we need to change from a cents per gallon of fuel to cents per mile used
- contact me and I will share some ideas with you.
All the stuff about sending money overseas for oil and reducing CO2, is absolutely true
- we have more ability to genterate electricity than we have oil
- even with Alaska and the wild life refuge, etc we are number 14th in the world for oil reserves
- best use for oil is to make things from it instead of burn it
- we WILL shift to electric cars (fully electric using fuel cells)
- question is when? 10 years from now? or 40 years from now?
- the longer we wait, the greater the pain.
- $4 per gallon started to cause change.
- $15 per gallon will cause us to change.
Dear dudes,
There I was, listening to the local government radio station on my portable walkdude while on a 2 mile walk to my local car repair place, my pockets weighted down with the weight of the cash only that they demand towards their monthly boat bill. To add insult to the injury of actually having to pay to have my car repaired, one of the mechanics at that local repair place was being interviewed on the govenrment station about his retrograde support for a gas tax increase.
Of course when I arrived at the repair place I launched into a screed about being subjected to that anti worker sentiment. And, of course, the employees at the repair place responded as they always do to anything I say; they snickered, sneered and and laughed at me with contempt. So I am writing to you.
In a place like Boston, average working people are being forced to live further and further from their places of employment inside Boston (where they often work for virtually the minimum wage). They are driving long distances just to get to work because working people can not afford to live in or near Boston. Additionally, many are forced to drive on the mass pike and pay ridiculous tolls. And, most can only afford very old, used cars so that any increase in fuel efficency will not trickle down to them for ten years or so. And, of course, there is nothing approaching affordable public transportation, espically for those forced to live outside Boston.
So whatever social good an increased gas tax might bring about, like every other cost in Amerika that cost would be borne by those least able to pay for it (and who usually get the least benefit from it).
Working people’s cost of living, espically the working poor, is astronomical. It is so astronomical that many, many working people are actually eligible for public benefits designed for people unable to work. And those benefits are being cut because of the need of the ultra wealthy to take for themselves more and more of the wealth produced by working people.
I agree that the whole auto tranportation system, espically the consumption of oil, is entirely out of hand. But the solution cannot be to disportionately put one more burden on the backs of working people who have been suffering a decrease in their actual earnings for decades.
Thanks,
GR
I have only 1 problem with a large increase in the National Tax on Gasoline, my problem is THE GOVERNMENT. They have been so untrustworthy with the money we have already sent them. The idea is good, but implementation is tough.
I think alternative fuels would be the best use of this money electric cars, solar, wind power, tidal electric generation. I am even for coal and nucleal electric generation with environmental safeguards. Hydrogen powered and compressed air may be other ways to go green. $1.00 a gallon would be OK with me, but what do we do if Oil shoots back up to $4.00 a gallon?
Yes, increase the gas tax! Economics 101. It’s a long-term market based solution versus a short-term short-sighted lets keep making the same mistakes over and over mentality. There are externality costs (e.g. polution, health effects, exporting money to countries who then fund terrorists, etc.) that aren’t captured in current fuel prices … thus rational decisions are not made … i.e. market failure. Public desperately needs to be educated. Unfortunately, politicians will not do the right thing without public outcry, given lobbiest etc.
Agree; Obama’s Energy Secretary and Environment Csar will eventually doiscover what most developed countries are already doing. Make something expensive and consumption will go down. All you have to do is provide tax relief to low income citizens and busineses who can’t cut back.
The new CAFE standards will spur good tecnology, but the concept of the “Efficiency Paradox” will cut in; when you make something more efficient in its utilization, people will use more of it.
A higher tax will also begin to pay for the external costs of automobile operation, such as infrastructure, law enforcemnt, medical costs for those uninsured, environmental damage, etc.
Great idea to conserve energy, fund needed climate protection actions, and SAVE THE CAR INDUSTRY. The tax shopuld be set to keep gas prices constant at $4.00 per gallon, instead of letting it bounce around. Then the car customers would CONSISTENTLY shop for fuel-efficient cars and car manufactures could plan for the models that would be in fashion three years from now when they actually hit dealers’ floors.
As for the government wasting the money, hey Mr. Voter and Letter-Writer, the government is us. If you are not putting constant pressure on your elected representatives to do what’s right, don’t comnplain about what they actually do.
I agreed to a higher gas tax back when Ross Perot introduced it when he ran for president. I still support it. One point though, if there is a higher gas tax, then we need to get rid of tolls. Backups at toll booths create frustration, danger as people weave in and out for the shortest line and cause us all to burn more fuel (and increase carbon emissions) as we slow down and wait to pay the toll. Increase the gas tax AND eliminate tolls… I’m all for that!
I wouldn’t vote for Ray for Dog Catcher for fear he’d want to tax dogs.
We have enough taxes as is now, too damn much government. We need significantly less of both.
Skipper
Problem with raising gas taxes is there is no responsibilty placed on the government to reduce waste and cut budgets. You want give them more money with no budget discipline?..wow. I’m amazed there is no mention of budget savings by Ray as opposed to just raising taxes. It’s as if the Dept of Transportation has no overhead waste to cut. I am proud we use more energy than every other country except China. We are extremely productive nation and use energy more efficiently making more efficient products every day in every way. No one needs to tell most of us to save energy, it’s our money!!
More taxes to government only encourages more waste by government. It’s a given and assume additonal taxes would be used for other purposes outside road maintenance. $0.50 is a lot of money for each gallon for an entity which does nothing to produce the product. How 'bout eliminating the Department of Energy which was set up in the 70’s to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. DOE does a great job producing energy too don’t they. The $20 billion saved eliminating this useless department could be used for roads. Not even a mention? We’re dependent on foreign oil because of Government decades long restrictions prohibiting energy resource recovery on public lands on and offshore.
Regarding carbon dioxide cited in several of these responses, CO2 performs extremely positive life giving properties on earth. Plants use and need CO2 for photosynthesis. Green house gases are a good thing. The amount of energy trapped by photosynthesis is immense, approximately 100 terawatts per year which is about seven times larger than the yearly power consumption of human civilization. In all, photosynthetic organisms convert around 10,000,000,000 tonnes of carbon into biomass per year."
Climate scientists allied with the IPCC have been caught citing fake data to reinforce global warming propoganda. NASA?s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), run by Al Gore?s chief scientific ally, Dr James Hansen, announced that October 2008 was the hottest October on record. NASA had used temperature records from the naturally hotter month of September and claimed they represented temperature figures in October. They wouldn’t lie to us would they!
“I talk to many groups, large and small about how global warming is just bad science. I tell them that study results are hand-picked and modified to fit a pre-determined conclusion.” -Mark Johnson, Meteorologist AMS CBM/NWA.
Our free-market system responding to the demands of a free people is the best answer proven over the past two centuries. A government planned economy always produces shortages, prohibitive costs and misery. Government(taxes)is/are not the solution, higher taxes are the problem.
Your British pleasure of paying taxes are the reason we ran the ancestral tyrants back across the Atlantic. Many of your socialists friends are being duplicated right here in America in our government schools anesthetic programs teaching crab mentality or they’re imported. Your logic defies common sense. “Despite concerns” of enslavement? Look at the British economy, ain’t it great! “We pay $9gal in England” That’s what I’d brag about. Europeans are envious of Americans lower taxes. You dummy Americans need to raise gas taxes higher so we don’t look foolish burdoning ourselves with a bunch of government stupidity.
You’re very ignorant to believe government will spend your money smarter than you, or maybe it will. Higher taxes will not lift California out of its budget mess. All you need to do is build a state border wall to keep corporations from crossing into Nevada. Stop voting for politicians who vote to expand Government programs and give-aways. Budget cuts and getting rid of expansive state programs you can’t afford will balance the budget.
Heck, I know people here that would gladly raise Cal gas tax twice your measly $9/gal tax and really make Europe look bad!! Keep electing them and make it so. AYHHHEEE!!!
I think it is a terrific idea, but I would add one suggestion. Do it at 5 or 10 cents a month until the increase is in place.
Hell, we see a fluctuation of 10-20 cents a week at our local gas station, and nobody says boo. 5 cents a month wouldn’t be noticed. I do agree though with a previous post that it would be nice to somehow guarantee that the revenues would be truly dedicated to ONLY transportation needs.
This is a great idea. Heck, why don’t we just take 5 or 10 cents extra out of your paycheck every month until I’m satisfied. You’ll never notice and you’re ripe for hoodwinking. Politicians already do what you’ve suggested and that’s why we know they’re bunch of deceivers, cheats, thieves and liars!! See what they always do with our taxes. YOU CANNOT MAKE THEM, NOR WILL THEY GUARANTEE ANYTHING!!!