This would be a decline of about $10 billion a year for highways and $5 billion for transit – from spending levels that transportation advocates argue already falls short of needs. Jeff Davis, a senior fellow at the Eno Center for Transportation, suggested that if the government isn’t willing to increase taxes on highway users, it should reduce spending from the Highway Trust Fund to about $39 billion a year for highways and $5 billion for transit that the current taxes generate. ![]() “Washington has failed to keep up its portion of the deal.” “It is absolutely hindering American competitiveness and economic growth,” Bradley said. Neil Bradley, executive vice president and chief policy officer at the business group, notes that state-level lawmakers from both parties have raised gas taxes even as Washington refused. Chamber of Commerce continues to argue that user fees are the way to pay for the nation's deteriorating roads, bridges, transit and water systems. ![]() Under that plan, which went nowhere, the federal government would have paid for 10% to 20% of a highway's cost instead of the usual 80%. In 2018, Trump proposed moving over $200 billion from other federal programs, as well as shifting some of the financial burden onto states and local governments and to private groups. Trump's long-promised "infrastructure week" became a running punch line. Chamber of Commerce proposed phasing in a 25-cent-a-gallon increase in the gas tax over five years to generate nearly $400 billion over a decade.īut that wasn't enough political pressure – or cover – for Congress or President Donald Trump to embrace the idea. Congress set the taxes of 18.4 cents a gallon for gasoline and 24.3 cents a gallon for diesel fuel in 1993. The problem is that the gas tax, which is the primary contributor to the Highway Trust Fund, isn't indexed for inflation and hasn’t kept pace with construction needs as cars became more fuel-efficient. “We’ve been playing a game of financial gymnastics by taking more money from the general fund – wad up the chewing gum and the duct tape and plug the holes,” said Joseph Kane, senior research associate at the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program.Īnd still, the Congressional Budget Office has projected a nearly $70 billion shortfall in the Highway Trust Fund in the next five years. ![]() ![]() The lack of sustainable funding has thwarted highway bills for decades.Ĭongress approved the last five-year funding bill in December 2015 with a variety of onetime funding mechanisms rather than a long-term solution like raising the gas tax. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg speaks to Amtrak employees during a visit to Union Station Februin Washington, DC. "To be clear, he never said that VMT was under consideration by the White House as part of this infrastructure plan – and it is not." "The Secretary was having a broad conversation about a variety of ways to fund transportation," spokesman Benjamin Halle said in a statement. He told CNBC on Friday that a vehicle-miles-traveled tax "shows a lot of promise" as a sustainable funding stream.īut it's not promising enough for Biden's plan. Last week, Buttigieg acknowledged the "difficulty in Washington" in raising the gas tax and said other options are needed "if we want to preserve that user-pays principle." Fuel taxes have provided 85% to 90% of the money in the Highway Trust Fund in most years, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. But since 2008, Congress has transferred $157 billion from the general treasury to the Highway Trust Fund to cover the shortfall for authorized programs, according to the Congressional Budget Office.Īfter Pete Buttigieg said at his January confirmation hearing for transportation secretary that he was open to all funding options, his spokesman quickly clarified that those options did not include a gas tax increase.
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