Posted on 08/06/2010 10:30:51 AM PDT by george76
The federal government would have an additional $10 billion a year to spend on crucial highways if it stopped diverting federal fuel tax money to projects with no national benefits...
The federal gas tax was supposed to be used to build and maintain the Interstate Highway System. Today auto and truck drivers pay federal gas taxes that are diverted to ferryboats, trails and mass transit programs...
The 18.4 cents a gallon federal fuel tax should be refocused on rebuilding and modernizing vitally important Interstates...
It is time to rethink and refocus the federal transportation role more on core federal purposes and less on peripheral concerns. Congress could dramatically increase funding to reduce the large backlog of cost-effective highway projects by shifting non-highway programs either to states or to general revenues. This would restore the users-pay/users-benefit principle of the Highway Trust Fund by focusing on rebuilding and modernizing the Interstate system.
(Excerpt) Read more at thetrucker.com ...
In 1956, the Highway Revenue Act established the federal Highway Trust Fund to pay for the construction of an Interstate Highway system .
State gasoline taxes span a wide range, from 37.5 cents per gallon in Washington to eight cents in Alaska (as of July 2010).
http://www.ehow.com/about_6701226_diesel-taxes-vs_-gas-taxes.html
It’s no different than any other program that the Feds have. Social Security money is always diverted to other projects. Every tax that is collected for specific projects should be used only for those projects. It should never be put into the general fund and spent on whatever the politicians want to spend it on. The people are being lied to if this isn’t done.
This is just a small part of the massive changes our country needs.
State diesel taxes are much wider-ranging than those for gasoline.
While Alaska is also the state with the lowest diesel tax at eight cents per gallon, Connecticut extends a much higher diesel tax at 43.4 cents per gallon (as of July 2010).
Other Dept Transportation Projects with no national benefits:
1) Diversity Sensitivity Training
2) Gay/Lesbian outreach programs
3) Multicultural Awareness seminars
4) Tolerance in the workplace conferences
5) Sexual Harassment programs
How about repealing the federal gas tax entirely and making states deal with roads instead.
I am a BIG believer in this principle. Government functions should be paid for, to the maximum extent possible, by the people/entities needing the service. Gas taxes/tolls for roads, property taxes for local police/fire/schools, low income taxes/tariffs for military, legal judgements for courts, etc.
Didn’t a bridge collapse in Minnesota as a result of state officials raiding their federal highway money and using it for social programs instead?
ht Joe Boucher
Any tax money, once it reaches Federal hands, will be spent to ensure continuation of progressive/liberal/socialist/democratic hands.
It has been that way since LBJ (1963-1969) discovered that he/they could raid SS and other earmarked taxes for the Great Society progressive/liberal/socialist/democratic program to eliminate poverty in the nation.
Any tax money collected will be spent anywhere EXCEPT what is supposed to be spent on.
We need to start asking questions and don’t give up until you get answers. Then publish the answers. Our people just seem to go about their lives and have their libertys taken away from them on a daily basis.
Another good example is the land grabs going on in just about every state by the feds. Why? What is the real reason?
Gov. Ed Rendell today called it a “distinct possibility” that he would again dip into federal highway funds to support mass transit .
The state needs $475 million just to fill the gap left by the federal government’s decision not to toll Interstate 80, but Rendell told a Senate panel the actual need is more than $3 billion a year. “I’d like to do the whole shooting match,”
In 2005, Rendell flexed $412 million of federal highway money for transit.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_691361.html
Perhaps it’s time to stop diverting gasoline tax dollars away from roads.
Want a bike path? Then bikers should pay taxes to build it.
Want to ride the bus? Then let bus fares pay for it.
Want to hike the trail? Then let hiker taxes pay for it.
Want to ride the ferry? Then it’s only fair to pay a ferry fare that covers the cost of operating the ferry.
It’s time to stop treating taxes associated with motor vehicles as a cash cow to fund the latest leftist/whack-job project. Gas taxes are for ROADS.
Likely over 25 percent of gas-tax funds are diverted ?
The gubmit specializes in diverting money.
The "benefits" are that they supply leftists with lavish consulting gigs a fraction of which then winds up back in Democrat political coffers. Just think of it as an "outreach program" for the useless product of our rotten universities.
“Didn’t a bridge collapse in Minnesota as a result of state officials raiding their federal highway money and using it for social programs instead?”
I think you are right. At first they tried to blame Bush, and the mediots everywhere were all over it. Then they back away as the reality of rats looting tax $’s for their scams started to come out.
They needed a study for this? Don't take the money away from its intended purpose and you can actually do the stuff its intended for! Morons.
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