Mileage Tax Might Be Road Bill Funding Source, Inhofe Says
Tulsa World ^ | 3/26/2009 | Jim Myers

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe said Wednesday that a proposal to tax motorists on the miles they drive is being looked at as an alternative method to funding much-needed road projects.

Conceding that such an approach could be awkward, the Oklahoma Republican said such proposals must be part of the discussion as he and other key member of Congress begin putting together the next huge transportation spending authorization bill.

"No one thing is going to do it,'' Inhofe said, citing the backlog of transportation needs and a fuel tax that no longer raises enough revenue.

As the top Republican on the Senate's Environment and Public Works Committee, which has jurisdiction over transportation legislation, Inhofe will play a major role in crafting the bill to replace the current law, which expires in September.

Inhofe spoke during an interview after a hearing with U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

Disappointing several members of the committee, LaHood once again ruled out an increase in the fuel tax as a way to generate more money for transportation projects. He cited the difficulty in raising taxes during hard economic times.

Even though the White House strongly came out last month against LaHood's suggestion that lawmakers should discuss taxing motorists on miles driven, he seemed to leave that idea on the table.

Inhofe confirmed that such a proposal is still alive.

"We are going to try to come up with something in terms of a VMT (vehicle miles traveled) approach,'' he said, agreeing with LaHood that a fuel tax increase should not be one of the options.

"On the VMT, no one has figured out how you can do that other than the honor system, which never works.''

Inhofe said one possible method could be checking a vehicle's mileage when its registration is renewed.

A VMT tax could be layered on top of the fuel tax, which might be reduced dramatically or eliminated altogether, Inhofe said.

Automobiles, especially hybrids, are not using as much fuel as they once did, he said, explaining why the fuel tax no longer can be viewed as a reliable source for transportation projects.

Inhofe said other options under review include indexing the fuel tax to inflation and limiting the use of money in the trust fund to highways and bridges.

Supporters of mass transit projects and other programs would have to look elsewhere for funding, he said.

Inhofe said the amount of the next multiyear transportation bill needs to come in at about $400 billion.

His office reported that the last bill totaled $286.4 billion.

Inhofe, who is proud of his conservative voting record in Congress, said, "I know it sounds funny coming from me, being a big spender in that area, but I am.''

He said such a dramatic increase is necessary because of the huge backlog of projects.

"It is somewhat life-threatening,'' he said of the condition of certain roads.

Oklahoma has slipped into last place among the states in the condition of its bridges, he said, citing examples of concrete falling off some of them.

Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of driving.......

And I used to like Inhofe

It's going to start with manual, annual odometer checks and then simply GPS units.

Fuck that

He wont get reelected.

Fuel taxes were meant to pay for road improvements. Until they stole the money for general funds.

I am sure they will keep this new tax for road improvements only.

Oh, will they roll back existing fuel taxes?

If they actually used the fuel tax for what it is collected for instead of just putting it in the general fund this kind of thing wouldn't be needed.

This would ruin me, i do service calls for a living, i drive upwards of 150 miles a day.

Well, we use public roads, we have to pay for them somehow.

I am a supporter of taxing consumption instead of production. So we either get taxed on the fuel we buy or the amount we drive. Neither are perfect, but we like the roads we drive on, we NEED the roads we drive on, so we have to pay to use them.

I see programmers being used for new purposes.

We already pay for them through license & registration fee's, and gas taxes among other things.


The issue is politicians creating new ways to get more of the peoples money when they are the ones which caused the problem in the first place with irresponsible spending.


If this is put into place, and the money generated is spent irresponsibly, and it most assuredly will, what new tax will be created because the previous ones werent enough to pay for the roads?

I drive a hybrid and would oppose that unless it worked out to be significantly less than I pay now. A 'flat' fee is punitive in most cases. A proportional fee would be fine.



I also agree with the sentiment that the funds from gas or mileage taxes needs to be in it's own fund, not the general fund, and not used for anything but roads and related infrastructure.

At least the polar bears will survive.

Right now the gas tax goes into a big slush fund where it is used for "the Big Dig", rails to trails, bike paths and so on.

They will waste this tax money just like the current gas tax.

I should clarify - the tax should be on fuel OR miles driven, not both. The funds should NEVER be used for anything other than road/highways and related infrastructure.

Yes, licensing and registration are taxes, but they are our 'price of admission', and without a usage rate on top of that (if there were no gas or VMT taxes), those fees would likely be hundreds of dollars.

I'd rather pay a relatively low registration fee and then pay for what I use instead of paying a huge registration fee. Wouldn't you?

He should stick to his last idea: 'Require the use of the trust fund for roads and bridges ONLY'...

If you want a choo-choo toy built in your city...

Your city should have to fund it on it's own...

LULZ... I thought Republicans were "conservatives?"

This is exactly why the party is in the shitter.

Tax,tax, and fucking tax more. Then die.

Little Child, simple get on welfare, vote Democrat and everything will be fine. Go back to sleep.

This shit just never stops. Now we have a Senator in the supposed party of low taxes advocating tax increases in rough economic times.

Its already proportional with the gas tax. I get 10MPG, and drive 100 miles Im paying about $2 in gas taxes. If I get 20MPG and drive 100 miles Im paying half, or $1.

So the people with gas hogs pay more in taxes than the people with more efficient vehicles.

Or under a mileage tax both vehicles/drivers would pay $2 per hundred miles or more....maybe 3 or 4 dollars now.



My guess why the mileage tax is being pushed for is that with cars getting more mileage on average these days the gov is getting less money off gas taxes, and also people are driving less.

This is just their way of bring their revenue back up to where it was. Same as the politicians crying over less tickets being issued due to fewer cars on the road, and how more tickets must be issued to make up for the lost revenue.


And around here they have instituted toll roads, and made the journey not taking the toll road longer than it was before thus compelling people to take the toll road. They rerouted the original roads, added lots of lights, and it now takes about twice as long as before. But they make lots of money off the toll roads now so the politicians are happy...

With most of the GOP in D.C., this has NOT been the case for some time.

The number of assholes to vote out of office just increases by the moment.

And i drive a jeep, i get 16mpg if i drive like a pussy, OH and my jeep is triple black, so im adding to global warming as well. Ill be working for free soon.

Alot of us here would argue that point Just sayin



Which will bring up another point. Probably about 25% of the mileage I pit on this vehicle is off road. How do they propose to distinguish between the two?

A sales tax on fuel IS a tax on consumption. Consumption of fuel. If we were worried about consuming the roads, we would tax vehicles based on the Gross Vehicle Weight.

Here's an idea.

Stop spending our tax money on BS, and put it where it needs to go.

Nah, it'll never work.

Yeah, this is what it is all about. The government tells us to reduce fuel usage, and when people do the government screams about lost tax revenue.

Fuck that, and fuck them.

Fuck that is right.

Pile of shit.

Yes, this sounds like it would be pretty near the top of the list of effective forms of political suicide.

Too bad it wasn't a democrat proposing this, so we might have a chance of picking up another seat when he goes down in flames.

Every time these fvckers write a check for $XXX Billion for some shithole country or goofball program then turn around and cry about funding it makes me want to puke.

ETA: Another political HACK who just doesn't get it.

They can print money to bail out the Wall Street firms that contribute to their campaigns, why not just print up more money to fund everything.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Inhofe



So this lifelong POLITICAL HACK spends a couple years in the private sector, drives a company into receivership, then turns around and goes back to politics.

We need to have some sort of GED exam to keep MORONS out of politics. They are wrecking this country.

There is already a Federal tax on gasonline. It's an excise tax, which is constitutional. The federal government has NO jurisdiction within states and therefore other than imposing excise taxes (use taxs like alcohol, cigarettes, etc) has no constitutional authority to put any tracking equiptment on you or your car within a state. Freedom of movement is a RIGHT not a privelege and since its a constant argument that they didn't have SAMs, ect when the forefathers wrote the constitution for denying people current military issue arms-they also didn't have planes and buses and automobiles but that is how we MOVE about today. So denying you your right to drive, fly, etc is unconstitutional. What they really want is to chip your car so know where you drive it has nothing to do with a mileage tax the tax on gas, registration, etc already does that.

Freedom of movement WAS a right up until SCOTUS decided checkpoints were legal.

You're not paying "your fair share". Oppose it all you want, but your "golf-cart" is still on the road. And you may even be driving more miles now. So, you need to feel the pain like the rest of us. Or is it that by being "green" the rest of us owe you something? Get over yourself.

Bingo, the sole purpose of a politican in todays world.

Heavier vehicles generally use more fuel, so that is basically what we have with fuel taxes.

Kind of like Social Security too.

Not to a proportional degree though. A vehicle might use 5 times the fuel but weigh 40 times as much. It isn't the Civics and Motorcycles that damage the roadways.

Everybody drove when I the Corps was in but only about half of us had cars.

that sounds like a user-fee tax.

We do.... Fuel Tax, The fuel tax IS a milage tax..... unless you have figured out how to drive your car without fuel?

He does feel the pain, just like the rest of you. What makes you think that he doesn't have to pay?

He, like me, has to pay a huge road tax on each gallon purchased. Even if that gas goes into generators, lawn mowers, off road vehicles, dirt bikes, camp stoves, setting fires, etc.

His current position of not owing as much tax is the result of HIS CHOICES in vehicles. You could have made the same choice. You certainly had the same opportunity.

If forcing him to pay more tax meant that your tax burden would stay the same, would that make you feel better?

Butbutbut.................. you mean they use money in the highway trust fund for OTHER purposes?

Only if they eliminated the gasoline taxes. Hybrids or EVs are riding for free right now, not paying gas taxes that fund roads. A mileage tax will be more equitable in the future once the number of hybrid or EVs gain market share.

looks like i've got to email him.
he usually has his head on straight.

Well, I emailed him.


Anyone else

An old muscle car and a new semi both get around 6 MPG... One weighs about 75,000 pounds more than the other.