Quote:
Originally posted by Sidd Finch
Increasing the net cost of cars that are not fuel-efficient does not increase their marginal cost? Explain.
Relying on gas taxes only is inherently regressive and punishes the people who can afford it least.
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Once you've bought the car and paid the tax, it has done nothing to create marginal incentives for your use of fuel. It may discourage purchases of such large cars, but once people have them, they face no incentive not to drive them. Moreover, it does nothing for all the cars on the road.
We've been down this road before. It's not an inherently regressive tax. It's a tax that's inherently more expensive for people who use more gas. If the objective it to get people to use less gas, then higher taxes will help do that.
Cigarette taxes are "inherently regressive" by your standard. Do you take the same view there that they are problematic, and that we should instead require all smokers to purchase a $5000 smoking license in order to buy cigarettes, which will revert to lower taxes?
[ETA:] If you really want to fix the regression problem, make it revenue neutral and increase the standard deduction or something. But, really, people bellyache, but if you have a decently fuel efficient car, say 20mpg, and drive 12k miles per year, a $1 gas tax is only $600. Not chump change, but not earth shattering. And, for comparison, current federal gas taxes are 18.4c, IIRC.
