As Gas Prices Continue To Drag On Family Budgets, Obama’s Solution Is More Taxes And Less Production
“The White House Says President Barack Obama Will Talk About Plans For Dealing With Rising Gas Prices When He Travels To Indianapolis On Friday For A Postponed Visit To An Auto Parts Manufacturer.” (“Obama Reschedules Indianapolis Visit For Friday,” The Associated Press, 5/1/11)
INSTEAD OF LOOKING FOR WAYS TO MAKE TRAVEL CHEAPER,
OBAMA PROPOSES TAXING AMERICANS BY THE MILE
The Obama Administration Has Proposed A Car Tax On Miles Traveled. “The Obama administration has floated a transportation authorization bill that would require the study and implementation of a plan to tax automobile drivers based on how many miles they drive.” (Pete Kasperowicz, “Obama Floats Plan To Tax Cars By The Mile,” The Hill’s “Floor Action Blog” Blog, 5/5/11)
The Plan Would Install Electronic Trackers On Vehicles And Charge Drivers At Filling Stations. “Among other things, CBO suggested that a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) tax could be tracked by installing electronic equipment on each car to determine how many miles were driven; payment could take place electronically at filling stations.” (Pete Kasperowicz, “Obama Floats Plan To Tax Cars By The Mile,” The Hill’s “Floor Action Blog” Blog, 5/5/11)
The VMT Would Require Every American To Attach A Meter To Their Car. “The problem is in the implementation: it’s hard to have a compulsory VMT tax, since that involves attaching some kind of meter to every American’s car, and Americans are not going respond well to that idea. Hell, even New York cabbies went on strike to protest GPS devices being put in their vehicles to track their every movement.” (Felix Salmon, “The Problems With A Nationwide VMT Tax,” Reuters’ Blog, 2/11/10)
“There Really Is Something Quite Creepily Big Brotherish About Trying To Track Every Single Vehicle In America” (Felix Salmon, “The Problems With A Nationwide VMT Tax,” Reuters’ Blog, 2/11/10)
The VMT Would Be More Complicated And More Expensive To Implement Than The Current Fuel Taxes. “However, collecting VMT taxes in this way would be more complicated and more expensive than the current system of collecting fuel taxes.” (Congressional Budget Office, “Alternative Approaches To Funding Highways,” March 2011)
People With Used Cars, Or Cars Bought Before The
System Is Put Into Place, Would Be Paying High Costs For The Necessary Meters. “For users, capital costs would be high if older
vehicles had to be retrofitted with the equipment used to meter travel and
communicate data, and the potential for technical problems and tampering could
be high as well.” (Congressional Budget Office, “Alternative
Approaches To Funding Highways,” March 2011
Rep. Dan Boren (D-OK) Warned President Obama That Repealing Domestic Energy Incentives Will Kill Jobs And Reduce Energy Production. BOREN: “We lose thousands of jobs not only in Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, and places like Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia. These aren’t just traditional oil and gas producing states. And these tax breaks do not go to the big, major oil companies. They go to small independent companies, like we have in Oklahoma.” (Fox News’, “Your World With Cavuto,” 4/27/11)
Boren: “Did you know a vast majority of the production in the United States comes from small independent oil and gas companies? And the new rigs that are drilling right now in the United States, they are not Exxon Mobils of the world. They are the Devons, the Chesapeakes and even smaller companies that are based in Oklahoma that are employing, by the way, a lot of Democrats, blue-collar jobs. And the president needs to understand that.” (Fox News’, “Your World With Cavuto,” 4/27/11)
POLITIFACT: “So Independents Accounted For Between 62
Percent And 67 Percent Of Domestic Oil And Gas Production In 2010.” (Louis Jacobson, “Rep. Dan Boren Says Most Domestic
Oil Is Produced By ‘Small Independent’ Companies,” www.politifact.com
, 5/3/11)
- “Ultimately,
Boren Makes A Valid Point That A Majority Of U.S. Oil Production Comes Not
From The Biggest Multinational Oil Companies But From Independent Firms.” (Louis
Jacobson, “Rep. Dan Boren Says Most Domestic Oil Is Produced By ‘Small
Independent’ Companies,” www.politifact.com
, 5/3/11)
