What's wrong with Obama?
Obama has said that raising the gas tax would place another burden on the American people in a time of hardship. He couldn't be more wrong. It is what the American people most need.
Then the price of gas dropped, in large part because of the bad economy. It fell to around $1.50. This was only temporary. The wise thing to do was to raise the gas tax immediately. But Congress, thanks to years of propaganda, is afraid to do that. It would take courageous leadership, and there isn't any to be found.
Why raise the gas tax? Here are some reasons:
- Driving is down, so gas purchasing is down, so the Federal Highway Trust Fund is broke. For the first time, it has been necessary to put appropriated funds into it to keep projects going. If we are to repair all our bridges and tunnels before another one fails, there must be a lot of money put into the fund.
- Deficits are growing rapidly. There must be some revenue. We can't count on the world continuing to buy our bonds. We need to pay for some things ourselves.
- The price of gas is moving up. People are starting to buy gas guzzlers again. We'll be back where we were a few months ago unless we reverse this trend.
- Record numbers of people have turned to mass transit, which is the most fuel-efficient way to move people. What is the effect of this trend? All over the country, over-stretched transit systems are looking at service cuts and fare increases, discouraging transit use when we most need to encourage it.
We can't wait. These increases must come immediately, There is no question but that the price of gas is rising and will get much higher. Cheap gas is gone. The only choice is between paying the extra money to ourselves, or paying it to OPEC and the oil companies.
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Seems a whole lot smarter to raise them now while prices are low doesn't it? Democrats missed the boat on that the last time around too. But, hey, go a bit easy on em, let's give them a chance eh wot? After all, it's difficult to claim you're for the people and their best interests while kow-towing to every business interest's demand.
January 12, 2009 4:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sad but true. If the Democrats had been tougher on Wall Street during the Clinton years, we might not be in as bad a mess as we are now.
I think that's one of Obama's mistakes, bringing back the people responsible for much of this, like Rubin and Summers. Rubin, in particular, was nearly ciminal in his use of public office for personal gain.
January 13, 2009 2:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Raising taxes will tend to depress economic activity further and raise consumer prices (transportation costs etc).
That said, I think that an increase in the gasoline tax is necessary in the long run. It's a question of 1) timing and 2) how much (both as to how much tax to charge and how much can a weak economy handle at what consequential cost)?
January 13, 2009 1:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think that the argument about depressing economic activity has been disproved. We went from gas prices around $1.50 to $4.00, and all the while the economy was chugging along nicely. It was the financial disaster that brought it all down, not gas prices.
As I said in the post, gas prices are going up again anyway. The choice is this: bring them up by taxation, which will help finance all the things we need to do or
let OPEC, the oil companies, and financial speculators bring them up, and export all that wealth which could otherwise stay in this country and do some gooe.
January 13, 2009 2:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
"all the while the economy was chugging along nicely"
Uh, not in this world. The economy has been weakening for years, and officially in a recession since Dec 2007, 9 months before Sept. Maybe Sept. crisis was the birth of a baby of the recession!
But as I said, for reasons OTHER than immediate recession fighting, I favor an increase in taxes on oil products incl. gasoline.
January 14, 2009 12:19 AM | Reply | Permalink