My Question

Should we raise the tax on gasoline?

This change neither favors the left or right political sides, everyone has to pay gas pries even the real wealthy. Could this harm the development of new jobs or businesses? The more one uses the motorways the more one pays. Is this the fairest way to keep money flowing for road projects and to help chip away at our national pile of debt? Is this fair for middle and lower class citizens that need to commute to their jobs and will begin to not afford to be able to get to it? Could this support the development of a healthier life for Americans and the creation of more gas efficient cars or other modes of transportation?  Global warming? Alternative energy?


I personally believe we should increase the price of gas to roughly twice the cost it is now over a 10 year period. This statement alone makes me sound most probably twisted and crazy to the average American. Even paying 4$ per gallon is insane! "We need cheaper, there is so much corruption in the selling of gas!" some may say. But lets take a closer look at the cost of gas around the world and the amount of taxes.


In Canada gas prices are 5.56$ per gallon, 38% of which is only taxes. Now thats about 1.75$ in taxes for every gallon you buy for your car. Lets assume you buy 15 gallons, thats 19.25$ alone paying for taxes. But thats not even the tip of the iceberg. In France gasoline costs 8.29$ per gallon! Taxes there are staggering compared to ours, they pay 4.50$ in taxes for EVERY. SINGLE. GALLON. The money the government makes from this helps them maintain the high speed train systems that interlock the country and help fix the roads and freeways. So this system, although very dramatic is what I believe the United States should being to do so that we can grow forward and more green with transportation, like France although this is a far off hope.


"One should also note that these higher prices, caused by speculators, play right into the hands of Russian "President" Vladimir Putin who benefits from the high oil prices, and Iran itself. Has anyone ever wondered why Iran keeps announcing its nuclear progress to the world, or threatens the Straight of Hormuz -- every time it does, the price of oil is driven higher by speculators even in the face of higher supplies and weak demand."  


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-abrams/gas-prices-oil-speculators_b_1359666.html


We need to ween ourselves off of, not only foreign oil, which I agree should be first priority, but also off of our own oil eventually. Oil is a resource that will eventually run out and even if it doesn't happen this year or the next, we are depleting our supply of it and this is negatively affecting our ecosystem both underground and in the skies.

"The big increases in fuel efficiency standards announced recently by the Obama administration for automobiles—and on Wednesday for trucks—will only make matters worse in terms of funding for highway maintenance and construction. 

The sensible response would be to raise the tax, which even Mica correctly regards as a user fee rather than a tax. But he and all but one of his 32 Republican colleagues on the committee have signed the Americans for Tax Reform pledge to oppose any and all tax increases — even something that is clearly a user fee.

More money is desperately needed for highway construction and maintenance to reduce the economic losses due to the country’s inadequate infrastructure. A new report by the American Society of Civil Engineers said that glaring deficiencies in America’s surface transportation systems drained households and businesses of nearly $130 billion last year, including about $97 billion of increased costs to operate and repair vehicles and $32 billion of increased travel time because of congestion and delays. Within a decade, the economic costs to the country of a deteriorating infrastructure will increase by 82 percent, to $210 billion annually, the report states.

Rep. Nick J. Rahall of West Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the House Transportation committee, said in a statement, “The report paints a disturbing picture of how America’s small business and middle class family incomes will be affected by our nation’s deteriorating surface transportation systems.” Cutting spending by a third, as Mica proposes, would make the economic impact “even worse than the grim predictions by the economists in the report,” Rahall said.

Rahall, however, did not suggest funding the needed extra spending by increasing the gasoline tax. Politically that’s a non-starter, but it shouldn’t be in a world of austerity. It would be a fair user fee because it is paid by motorists, and the more one uses the highways, the more one pays."

http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08-17/markets/30032066_1_tax-increases-gasoline-tax-highway-trust-fund#ixzz1wvJPNM7I

So in short, yes I believe we should raise the gas prices, raise them so high that it scares people from the pump. But we should do this in a timely manner so that those who may not be able to avoid buying gas have enough time to cope with the changes and begin to develop more environmentally friendly and healthier life styles.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/raise-the-gas-tax/2012/05/25/gJQA46siqU_story.html