Should federal tolls replace federal gas tax? (money, cost, government)

[cdelena]

Originally Posted by BLAZER PROPHET

I still don't have a problem with the idea. While I see your point, the fact remains 99%+ of those larger vehicles are driven daily. It's just the price we have to pay.

But a gas tax comprehends all... vehicle weight, engine displacement, and usage. Why substitute an inferior solution?

[70Ford]

Corvallis Gazette Times: Archived Articles

Speak of the Devil, and who should appear?

Kulongoski to pursue mileage tax
By Hasso Hering
Albany Democrat-Herald
A year ago, the Oregon Department of Transportation announced it had demonstrated that a new way to pay for roads — via a mileage tax and satellite technology — could work.

Now Gov. Ted Kulongoski says he’d like the legislature to take the next step.

As part of a transportation-related bill he has filed for the 2009 legislative session, the governor says he plans to recommend “a path to transition away from the gas tax as the central funding source for transportation.”

What that means is explained on the governor’s website:

“As Oregonians drive less and demand more fuel-efficient vehicles, it is increasingly important that the state find a new way, other than the gas tax, to finance our transportation system.”

[jimboburnsy]

Originally Posted by KevK

The gas tax should be raised. The fact is that heavier vehicles do far more damage to roads than lighter ones that use less gas do for the most part. People should be encouraged to buy more fuel stingy cars and not monster SUVs.

This is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard. The difference in "road damage" inflicted from a year's worth of exposure to a 6,000 lb. SUV and a 4,000 lb. sedan is completely negligible. Any major street, any farm-to-market road, any state highway, or any interstate is designed to tolerate decades of exposure to commercial trucking up to 80,000 lbs. per vehicle.

[70Ford]

Transportation chief eyes taxing miles driven - White House- msnbc.com

A blue-ribbon national transportation commission is expected to release a report next week recommending a VMT.
The system would require all cars and trucks be equipped with global satellite positioning technology, a transponder, a clock and other equipment to record how many miles a vehicle was driven, whether it was driven on highways or secondary roads, and even whether it was driven during peak traffic periods or off-peak hours.
The device would tally how much tax motorists owed depending upon their road use. Motorists would pay the amount owed when it was downloaded, probably at gas stations at first, but an alternative eventually would be needed.

Welcome to 1984.

[wanneroo]

Originally Posted by 70Ford

Transportation chief eyes taxing miles driven - White House- msnbc.com

A blue-ribbon national transportation commission is expected to release a report next week recommending a VMT.
The system would require all cars and trucks be equipped with global satellite positioning technology, a transponder, a clock and other equipment to record how many miles a vehicle was driven, whether it was driven on highways or secondary roads, and even whether it was driven during peak traffic periods or off-peak hours.
The device would tally how much tax motorists owed depending upon their road use. Motorists would pay the amount owed when it was downloaded, probably at gas stations at first, but an alternative eventually would be needed.

Welcome to 1984.

They'll make it seem all innocent at first, but like any guvment program it will turn into a monster and turned against us.

Say goodbye to freedom!

[pinetreecity]

This sounds like an overly-complicated way to determine your tax. How would you perform an accounting of the devices figures? Will the device be infallible?

[drjones96]

Originally Posted by 70Ford

Transportation chief eyes taxing miles driven - White House- msnbc.com

A blue-ribbon national transportation commission is expected to release a report next week recommending a VMT.
The system would require all cars and trucks be equipped with global satellite positioning technology, a transponder, a clock and other equipment to record how many miles a vehicle was driven, whether it was driven on highways or secondary roads, and even whether it was driven during peak traffic periods or off-peak hours.
The device would tally how much tax motorists owed depending upon their road use. Motorists would pay the amount owed when it was downloaded, probably at gas stations at first, but an alternative eventually would be needed.

Welcome to 1984.

OK this is stupid. There is a very low tech way of figuring out mileage driven. It's called and odometer. Every year we have to have our car inspected and one of the things they take a record of is the???....you guessed it....the odometer reading. They can calculate the tax at that point and you pay it to get your license renewed.

No need for tracking cars with and expensive GPS.

[texdav]

The gas tax is falling as the mileage goes up and it makes alot more sense to go to a drive more pay more ;based on mileage.

[gwynedd1]

Originally Posted by lchoro

Rights to revenue streams from tolls can also be sold to private firms. US public infrastructure can be sold out to foreign firms. Note also that the seller will have to guarantee the revenue stream by promising to limit improvements on competing roadways and mass transit. In the long run, there'll be more congestion.

Hi lchoro;

It reminds me of when the French monarchy sold taxing rights to the nobility. It is exactly a step towards fascism where public access becomes a privatized asset to be purchased on the world market. Wall Street and the World Bank have been doing this all over the world. Put a country on a juice loan, foreclose, World Bank structural adjustment, currency devaluation, sell the national assets like the water, jack up the prices and funnel the money out of the country.

Cochabamba, Bolivia -- Five years ago the issue of water privatization exploded here when massive public protests forced out the California engineering giant, Bechtel. Within weeks of taking over the city's public water company Bechtel hiked up rates by as much as 200%, far beyond what the city's poor could afford to pay.

Now a new Bolivian water revolt is underway 200 miles north in the city of El Alto, a growing urban sprawl that sits 14,000 feet above sea level and is populated by waves of impoverished families arriving from the economically desperate countryside.

As in Cochabamba, the public water system of El Alto and its neighbor La Paz, the nation's capital, was privatized in 1997 when the World Bank made privatization of water a condition of a loan to the Bolivian government. The private consortium that took control of the water, Aguas del Illimani, is owned jointly by the French water giant, Suez, and a set of minority shareholders that includes, among others, an arm of the World Bank.

http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/7213


BTW: A Federal toll with transmitters on every car is a surveillance system. Any fool can see that.

[oakparkdude]

Why can't we just raise the gas tax? Heavier cars/trucks, in general, are less fuel efficient and will pay more tax. Problem solved.