Chip Taylor

More state-to-state redistribution

This is another case in which reporters conflate states with the indivicuals who really pay taxes, although it is truly states that are on the receiving end. From an AP article in the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

WASHINGTON -- The question of which states pay the most in gasoline taxes and which get the most money back is rekindling a perennial battle as Congress and the White House scuffle over a massive bill to fund highway and mass transit programs.

Drivers long have helped finance road construction and repair by paying 18.4 cents in federal tax for every gallon of gas they buy, money that goes into the highway trust fund. And 56 percent of Americans would be willing to pay even higher gasoline taxes if the money were used for significant road and mass transit improvements, according to a poll by The Associated Press.

However, about half the states say they aren't getting what they pay for, with their drivers sending more money to Washington than what is returned in highway grants.

The last six-year highway program, worth $218 billion, expired in September. It has been extended provisionally because of an inability to settle two key questions about its successor: How much? And who gets the money?

...

Even if the amount is settled, there won't be a bill unless the so-called donor states, meaning those paying more into the trust fund than they get back, are satisfied.

"It's the No. 1 priority for many of us," said Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas, whose state over the past six years received about 90 cents in highway funds for every $1 its motorists paid in gasoline taxes. "It goes to the heart of the fundamental fairness that is currently lacking."

Nevada gets back $1.11 for every dollar of gasoline taxes that its motorists pay into the federal highway trust fund.

Here's a map that show which states give and which state get:

Donor states are largely in the South and Midwest, with donees in the West and Northeast.

Of course, if every state got back exactly what its residents paid in, the main purpose of the federal tax and trust fund would be to allow the feds to dictate highway-related laws: drinking ages, BAC levels, open-container laws and the like. Come to think of it, that is likely the main purpose now.