Posted on 07/07/2014 6:25:47 AM PDT by cotton1706
Lawmakers are under pressure to refill the Highway Trust Fund when they return to Washington after the Fourth of July weekend or risk losing thousands of construction jobs that could set back recent job growth.
The Department of Transportation has warned that allowing the Highway Trust Fund to go broke would cost the U.S. about 700,000 jobs — more than twice the 288,000 that were created last month according to a jobs report celebrated by the administration.
The agency has said that it will have to begin cutting back payments to state and local governments next month adding to the uncertainty unless Congress prevents the fund that pays for road and transit projects from running out of money, which is predicted to occur at the end of August. Those cuts could leave drivers facing congested or damaged roads, sparking anger ahead of November's midterms.
Transportation advocates are calling for quick action to break the stalemate and avoid jeopardizing employment growth.
“The job market is steadily improving but the threat that Congress will let the Highway Trust Fund go bankrupt looms large,” BlueGreen Alliance Executive Director Kim Glas said in a statement on Thursday.
“Despite months of debate, lawmakers have failed to act,” Glas continued. “They’re putting thousands of jobs on the line.”
President Obama also warned that recent job gains could easily be lost if Congress lets the highway fund go bankrupt.
“My hope is, is the American people look at today’s news and understand that, in fact, we are making strides,” Obama said Thursday. “We have not seen more consistent job growth since the ‘90s.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
If the title of the article was "GAS TAX WILL EXPIRE IF CONGRESS DOES NOTHING," the people would cheer and would say LET IT GO!
But they call it the "Highway Fund" and try to scare people.
LET THE DAMN GAS TAX EXPIRE!!
I’d sure like to see a detailed audit report of how the money in that fund has been spent since, oh, 2006 or so.
Your pocket -> gas tax -> public employee union pensions.
I thought the stimulus was supposed to fund this...
Aren't these the "shovel-ready" projects that they earmarked for the trillion dollars of "stimulus"?
If the federal funding was paying for exactly what it was intended to fund, there would be a massive surplus and we’d have the finest interstate highways and bridges in the world.
Instead we’re paying for public transportation that only a tiny percentage of Americans use. We’re paying for greenbelts, bike paths and hiking trails. In some cities we’re paying for sensors in parking lots to monitor empty parking spaces. A few years back, Carl Levin was seeking a few million from transportation funds to save part of Tiger stadium.
The cities and states are just as wasteful with the money.
Here in Silicon Valley, three or four exits of major highway 101 are being prepped for either repair or expansion or modification while radio commercials with commie comedian Will Durst trying to shame us into badgering our politicians to keep the gravy train rolling run daily.
Probably just two coincidences, right?
Typical media lie. Increasing taxes always reduces overall job growth but MAY increase some jobs in the favored sector. Just the government distorting the marketplace again. The want the hiways to get construction? Then stop spending the highway taxes on light rail, busses and bike paths.
Yep, seeing a lot of bike lanes around here. They even reduced a high traffic thoroughfare from 4 lanes to 2, and added bike lanes on the sides.
Also, just re-paved walking trails were ripped up and replaced with concrete “accessible” paths. These things are over 6 feet wide to make them “accessible”.
The bike paths and hiking trails I had as a kid were the ones we made by constant generations of usage. They were dirt and about 18 inches wide.
It looks like they are counting being an illegal alien as a "job".
There isn’t anyone alive that can’t see through this nonsense.
“Transportation advocates are calling for quick action to break the stalemate and avoid jeopardizing employment growth.
“The job market is steadily improving but the threat that Congress will let the Highway Trust Fund go bankrupt looms large,” BlueGreen Alliance Executive Director Kim Glas said in a statement on Thursday.
“Despite months of debate, lawmakers have failed to act,” Glas continued. “They’re putting thousands of jobs on the line.”
President Obama also warned that recent job gains could easily be lost if Congress lets the highway fund go bankrupt”.
It isn’t the congress that is the problem. It is Republicans that are the problem, or Obama will blame republican’s for the problem, which means the real problem is a PR problem. Republican’s being blamed alone when there is plenty of blame on all sides.
Not to mention the “never let a crisis go to waste” action based on a manufactured crisis.
...and if that wasn’t enough, threatening States again with the money HAMMER, the only solution to which is states cutting of federal funding by not allowing direct federal extraction of dollars earned within a state. The state needs come first before it’s citizens are robbed of their means through the Federeral Income Tax. Once the State has taken what is needed, then what remains can be sent to Washington.
The general principle of financing the construction, maintenance, and operation of of highways from user fees, rather than general revenues, is a good one. Roads need to be built and maintained, but there is no reason to make non-users do this.
Does anyone out there have some hard data on the percentage of gas tax revenue that actually goes to bike trails, mass transit, and other useless projects? Any percentage is too high. On the other hand, road operation (traffic signals, enforcement, etc.) probably receives some undeserved funding from general revenues
Let’s stop installing mileage markers every tenth of a mile
This “Highway Trust Fund” is one of the biggest cons going. And the transportation reporters are willing accomplices, who like to potray the money as being needed for “crumbing” roads and bridges.
A big chunk of the money is spent on “green” nonsense projects like bike trails and walking paths. Another big chunk is spent on the mass transit boondoggle. Even a big chunk of the money that is spent on “roads” is spent on unnecessary extravagances like multi-million dollar electronic billboards and traffic monitoring systems.
The rest is wasted / stolen by the lazy federal bureaucrats and politicians.
I road a train once for about an hour. I took a trip up north on Greyhound which I believe is entirely private and I rode the people mover in Detroit once.
The People mover in Detroit is rider funded at a rate of about 7% meaning the other 93% is made up by taxpayer funding in some way or another.
The reason the “fund” is empty is because of theft by the politicians and the unions. Sort of like social security and its vaunted “lock box”. We’ve been hoodwinked by these criminals. Screw’em. Let the fund be empty.
The animal-rights crowd is getting in on the act, too. I’m sure you’ve seen those “wildlife underpass” structures that are theoretically supposed to keep deer out of traffic (but don’t make a lick of difference). To make matters worse, they add extra layers of cost - such as camera systems to document the successful use of each underpass. If this level of waste isn’t criminal, it damned well should be.
Look at the intersections in many California cities, look at the intersections of the center of small towns throughout America. They were gold plated (i.e., pavers, inlays and Handicap slopes, sidewalks to/from nowhere).
That’s where the money was spent.
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