Gasoline tax

Very possibly an annual tax at registration time based on miles driven, and would have to be proven somewhere. Some states the structure already exists to be tweaked to make this easy, in others it wouldn't work so they'd try something else.

 

They're welcome to charge whatever they want for gas, but they won't sell a drop without roads.

 

The problem has already been stated, we aren't taxing ourselves for the things we spend and want, want a huge military, pay for it, want nice roads, pay for it, want reliable water and sewage, pay for it, want decent education, pay for it, pretty simple concept. What we have currently is a pretty ignorant population, they spend trillions to protect the oil companies, yet give them tax breaks to raise prices for oil that they own.

 

Exactly.

Raise the gasoline tax to pay for the roads and the wars and the deficits and debt they have created.

As for taxing the cars that don't use gasoline, that's crazy. We should be giving them a tax credit paid for by gasoline taxes since the extra money spent on the non-gas using car to help the nation out by not using gas is contribution of non-gasoline car owners.

 

Daniel, you're wrong. In several areas.
We don't "pay less tax, but complain more about it, than the people of any other industrial nation."
Of course I can't prove it, nobody can.
Whenever this subject comes up, somebody always does a c-c-p op from the source of their choice (I like Wikipedia) but the data are valueless, since they usually don't paint a complete "tax footprint" here in America.
Whenever people get into dueling cites, they usually ramble on about income tax. This is a small part.....in some cases a very small part of the Tax Landscape.
I don't need to go down the whole list. We've danced this dance before, and to be honest nobody knows their exact tax burden...by design.

Personally? I don't bitch about taxes. I like nice paved roads, patrolled by competent LEOs. I like functional schools (as opposed to the ones that we currently have.) I like a government that is funded to the point where I can buy a pound of hamburger at the local grocery store without having to worry about which species I'm currently about to indulge in.
Where I get a little miffed is when I spend upwards of half of my total income (some say more than that.....nobody really knows!) to pay for taxes, and then the government says "that's not enough, you lousy selfish b--tard!!! We demand MORE!"

How much is enough???
70-percent?
80?

Europe's a few years further down this road than we are now. Take a good long look, and tell me how the EU is currently illuminating a path that we should follow.

I don't know how it is where you live, but here you can't drive for more than an hour in any direction here without bumping into a road construction project. I suspect that America is also paving new roads at or near a record pace.
The problem isn't revenue....it's management. Road taxes should be spent for.....(you gotta wait for it!) roads.
A few months back, I was listening to LOE and I heard a Congress Critter shrieking about the fact that they wanted to restore state control for money from the FHTF for things like bike paths, and other "alternative transportation".
It seems that some states actually want to use road taxes to build roads of all things!!!
I like bike paths too...since unlike most Americans, I actually own and use a bike. However (comma!) this seems like an area that individual cities, counties, and states can manage far more efficiently than some 'crat in D.C.
Besides....there's a nice symmetry in using road taxes to actually build and maintain......roads.

 

Actually it is easily demonstrated fact using reliable, OECD and World Bank numbers. US has the lowest tax rate of all the developed industrial nations. It's another nail in the coffin of the argument that raising taxes makes US uncompetitive or that all the rogue millionaires will flee to Barbados taking their tax free status with them depriving us of...their not paying taxes?



OECD Tax Database

This actually understates the low US tax rate for many reasons, the two main understatements are:

1. Most US corporations (Apple, GE, Goldman) pay no taxes at all due to loopholes.

2. European countries have high sales tax in addition to income tax.

US taxes are known and can be figured out. US taxes are much lower than other developed nations. It explains why our health care system cost us 50% more than other developed nations, why US is 50% less energy efficient than other developed nations, why US budget deficit and national debt exploded over last 30 years starting in 1980.

Specific to this topic, why US gasoline costs $4 gal while Europe it is $10 gal and why US has $14T in unfunded oil war debt.

 

^ Thanks.
It took less than a half-hour for somebody out there to prove my exact point!
Graph and all!!!

 

The points proved were Daniel was correct. US has lowest tax rate. That numbers are not unknown or unknowable.

 

This is just special pleading: Tax everyone else, but not me.

We all have to do our part. Cars that don't use gas are better than cars that do. But rather than taxing gas to give hand-outs to people who buy EVs, we should tax ALL cars to provide public transit and safe bike lanes. Because both of those are more environmentally responsible than private cars.

My state (WA) is a bit schizophrenic in this area. I got a state sales tax exemption (worth close to $8,000) when I bought my EV, on top of the federal $7,500 tax credit. But now I'll have to pay a $100 annual EV fee on top of regular vehicle registration. What they're going to charge me is peanuts compared to what they gave me.

I drive an EV and I think EVs should pay our fair share.

I think you and I probably agree that borrowing from the rest of the world to pay our bills, and leaving the debt to our kids, is mean and irresponsible behavior.

As far as the government misusing our money, we elect our government. We elect crooks and charlatans and demagogues, and we're paying for it. What's worse, is that future generations are going to pay for it as well. We could have chosen to pay our own way and left them an economically strong country. But we chose to rob them of their patrimony by spending more than we're willing to pay in taxes, and borrowing the difference.

Debt is a devil's bargain, whether it's personal or governmental. But our greed is stronger than our common sense. People who demand lower tax when their government is in debt up to its ears are just greedy, selfish <self-censored> <self-censored>.

Don't like the way government is spending out money? Vote the b******s out of office. But pay your debts. Because your children shouldn't have to pay your debts.

The above three paragraphs are addressed to all of us, not to ETC(SS).

 

Also point being, the military has been a black hole for taxpayers, spending trillions to protect the assets of the oil companies, from protecting their shipping, their pipelines, their equipment, their leases, and on and on, well over $10 trillion and counting, all for corporations that do everything possible to not pay taxes.

 

No. It is smart public policy. Using taxation to discourage actions that are against the national interest and encourage actions that promote the national interest.

In this case, using less gasoline is in the national interest so tax it and give tax rebates to people who spend money on technology that replaces gasoline with alternative fuel.

 

^ Don't worry Daniel. My skin isn't that thin. You don't usually resort to low-rent, useless, insulting posts.
I was simply pointing out that IMHO, there isn't strictly a shortage in revenue, and that when you (if you could) tabulate all of the "fees" and taxes that are collected on the population in addition to income taxes, that we're not lightly taxed by anybody's yardstick, even if you exclude city, county, and state taxes.
Just the gas tax (the original point of the thread) is something like ten percent of its overall cost, which is pretty reasonable.
I'll pay it.
If EV's ever get to the point where they begin to supplant ICEs for personal transportation, well.....they'll probably be spreading rock salt on the sidewalks from where HELL has frozen over...but you don't really believe in HELL, so it's all a moot point for right now.
We're already heavily subsidizing EV's without the benefit of the revenue stream that ICE's supply in gas taxes.
Oh waitaminute!!!
I think I might be mistaken about that.
Taxes on electricity.
Oh yes.....you can bet that the government is licking some milk out of that bowl as well!

So...in the end, they're going to get some taxes out of you.
They always do.
They always will.

 

Worst than that the oil companies get $18B in tax subsidies.

 

Problem with the over taxed people is, that they are the ones that support all the spending, they just don't want to pay for it.

 

The under taxed people who stole all the money say the same thing.

Solution seems simple enough, whoever makes the most, pays the most.

 

Giving tax rebates to wealthier-than-average people while the country is running a massive deficit is idiotic public policy.

Non-oil-burning vehicles still cause road congestion, so still need to pay their share. Assigning them a somewhat lighter share than the dinosaur burners should be plenty of incentive.

 

But giving tax subsidies for vehicles that don't use oil, the cause of the massive trade and budget deficits, is smart policy.

We are subsidizing technology, less oil imports, less oil wars. All good stuff.

When US energy efficiency has improved and we no longer import oil or spend trillions on military to secure oil, we can revisit the issue.

Right now the No. 1 priority is increasing US energy efficiency and reducing US oil use. We should encourage that with big subsidies vs. $18B subsidy to the oil companies.

It's a matter of timing and priorities.

 

It happens all the time. Companies like GM, GE and Apple post profits in the billions of dollars, yet pay no taxes.

 

Our financial house won't survive long enough for you to be ready to revisit the issue. Adding yet another selfish Reverse Robbing Hood scheme will hasten our collapse. Then no one will be able to pay for the roads.

That is a shameful excuse for piling on yet another Reverse Robbing Hood scheme.

Part of the corporate tax issue needs to be fixed by getting the taxes from the shareholders, not the company itself. And we need to change our existing corporate tax structure so it no longer encourages multinationals to pay much of their taxes in other countries instead of here.

 

Increasing gas tax would help pay for the deficit and debt that oil use created. It also encourages using less oil so we don't run up more trade and budget deficits and debt.

All good stuff.

Well sitting in alternate universe where corporations are people, we'll have to settle for taxing corporations like we used to when Debt/GDP was declining, income rising, jobs growing.

But more relevant to this topic, US gas taxes should match Europe's. $10 a gallon has resulted in Europe being 50% more energy efficient than US. A goal to strive for as it would eliminate 50% of US trade deficit, 50% of US military spending and 50% of US green house gases.