Is Raising Gasoline Taxes Fiscally Conservative?
No...it makes no sense. In fact, it is inflationary to do so because ultimately it raises the cost of goods at the retail level. When that happens, you hit people in the wallet twice...once for fuel tax which is past on to the consumer and the other for a price increase in goods on the shelf.
Ultimately both are a negative from the economy and the loss of economic growth will not be offset by the taxes collected. WB.
They have to be paid somehow. My state uses toll booths to pay for some major roads, which keeps our gas taxes about 3 cents per gallon lower than they would be without the tolls. However the cost of collecting tolls makes it a far more inefficient way of raising transportation funds than a gas tax.
It makes no sense from an efficiency point of view. Based on your answer, I assume you did not read my Hub on this topic, as I lay out the case regarding why raising the gas tax can be fiscally conservative, when it save money versus borrowing and paying bonding fees and interest.
In a simple word, NO! Our governments, both state and federal, are far overfunded already. They just need to both learn to control their spending.
They don't need more revenue, they need some self control concerning spending.
Back in 1988, gasoline was selling for approximately $1.00 per gallon, so the gas tax as a percentage of a gallon of gasoline was approximately 10%. With gasoline currently retailing for approximately $3.35 per gallon, the same 10.5 cents per gallon is only slightly more than 3% of the cost of a gallon of gasoline in New Jersey. If New Jersey’s gas tax was a percentage of the price of a gallon of gasoline over the years since 1988, instead of a fixed 10.5 cents per gallon, there would be plenty of money to pay for transportation infrastructure construction and maintenance projects on a pay as you go basis and very little, if any, need for borrowing to pay for transportation infrastructure.
New Jersey has dug itself into such a deep debt hole that it would take a 15 cents per gallon increase in the New Jersey gas tax to make up for the nearly $900 Million being used to service the past transportation bond debt. While a 15 cents per gallon increase in the New Jersey gas tax sounds large, it would only bring New Jersey up to the same gas tax rate as neighboring New York, and New Jersey would only be in the middle of the pack in comparison to the gas tax levies that other states impose. Also, as a percentage of a gallon of gasoline, New Jersey’s 25.5 cents gas tax would be 7.6% of the cost of the cost of a gallon of gasoline at current gasoline prices; well below the percentage that was paid in 1988.
Nobody would argue that personally paying for everything on a credit card until all of one’s income is used to pay for interest on the credit card makes any sense from a personal fiscally conservativepoint of view. The same fiscally conservative principal applies to states that need to finance necessary transportation infrastructure projects to keep people and goods moving and their economies healthy. Paying for things up front is always cheaper then financing them, no matter if you are an individual or a large government body like a state.
Is raising gasoline taxes fiscally conservative? Since do so would reduce or eliminate the amount of state borrowing and future bond interest payments, the answer is "yes".
I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.
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