The U.S. Federal Highway Trust Fund will go broke in 2015 - how to fix?

[Doc Savage Fan]

Easy; loot the coffers of the investment firms that took out all that money from the US Treasury in '08.

Cyprus had a much better solution.

 

[Jaepheth]

Stop spending so much to destroy other countries and start spending that money at home.

(shift a lot of spending away from the "Defence" budget)

 

[Texashiker]

Tax the upper 1% at 50% of their income.

Most of our money problems would go away.

In fact, go ahead and make it 60%

 

[PokerGuy]

Tax the upper 1% at 50% of their income.

Most of our money problems would go away.

In fact, go ahead and make it 60%

Not sure what you're smoking, but even if you were to tax them at 100% of their income, it wouldn't even come close to covering the deficit, forget about making "money problems go away".

 

[PokerGuy]

IMO gas taxes should be indexed to inflation, and electric / alternate fuel vehicles should be taxed either per mile or as a flat fee as part of registration. There's no reason they should be getting a free pass on paying for the infrastructure they're using.

 

[Texashiker]

Not sure what you're smoking, but even if you were to tax them at 100% of their income, it wouldn't even come close to covering the deficit, forget about making "money problems go away".

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101282625

Through Dec. 11, Buffett's net worth—at least on paper—shot up by $12.7 billion to $59.1 billion in 2013.

12.7 billion / 2 = 6.35 billion.

The national Federal Highway Trust Fund spends about $50 billion per year.

Just by taxing Buffet at 50% that is 1/10th of what the highway trust needs.

I am pretty sure we can find another 10 or 15 billionaires to tax. Lets start with zuckenberg and gates.

Then lets tax google, walmart, exxon and apple at 50% also.

Obama had a tax rate of only 20%. Lets hit him for another 30%.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101282625

Top billionaire gainers in 2013

Warren Buffett—$12.7 billion gain
Bill Gates—$11.5 billion gain
Sheldon Adelson—$11.4 billion
Jeff Bezos—$11.3 billion gain
Mark Zuckerberg—$10.5 billion gain
Masayoshi Son—$10.3 billion gain
Sergey Brin—$9.3 billion gain
Larry Page—$9.3 billion gain
Lui Chee Woo—$8.3 billion gain
Carl Icahn—$7.2 billion gain

Take 1/2 that gain for 2013 and you are on your way to paying for highway system.

 

[mpo]

Did you know the original Federal Highway Act was a temporary act and then everything was to be turned over to the states? But you know how Federal government is, once it has it's paws into something, it never lets go.

This does not sound right at all. The first federal aid law came out in 1916 to support post routes. The bill was written as an ongoing partnership for rural development.

This came out of the Good Roads Movement. The rise of (relative) high speed travel by bicycle and car lead to the motoring public to demand paved all-weather roads. Up until the teens, some states still required statutory labor for maintaining roads. Plus, the first federal bill had a 10-year sunset.

By the time the first Interstate Act came along in the 50s, the project was seen as a long-term investment. Plus, there was the creation of funding categories only for the Interstate system. I wouldn't expect the feds to create long-term plans with dedicated funding streams if they were going to turn the enterprise over to the states only.

 

[cabri]

That gain is not income - only paper.
I am sure that Buffett did not get paid 12.7B nor did he sell 12.7B of stock.
That 12.7 is the increase in the value of his investments. Not his cash flow.

 

[PokerGuy]

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101282625



12.7 billion / 2 = 6.35 billion.

The national Federal Highway Trust Fund spends about $50 billion per year.

Just by taxing Buffet at 50% that is 1/10th of what the highway trust needs.

I am pretty sure we can find another 10 or 15 billionaires to tax. Lets start with zuckenberg and gates.

Then lets tax google, walmart, exxon and apple at 50% also.

Obama had a tax rate of only 20%. Lets hit him for another 30%.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101282625



Take 1/2 that gain for 2013 and you are on your way to paying for highway system.

You do realize that a gain in net worth is not the same as income, right?

Adding some random crazy tax on people or corporations like that will simply encourage companies and people to make sure their money is not in the US, and then we'll have an even bigger problem: we'll have mcowned making stupid threads every other week whining that people and companies have their money overseas in tax havens

 

[glenn1]

Easy; loot the coffers of the investment firms that took out all that money from the US Treasury in '08.

Or better yet, criminalize auto ownership for anyone making less than $50k/year. The peasants can just ride bicycles everywhere like China during the Cultural Revolution.

 

[mchammer187]

Easy; loot the coffers of the investment firms that took out all that money from the US Treasury in '08.

You know TARP actually made money for the government right? As did the Fanny and Freddie bailouts.

 

[RampantAndroid]

I don't ride 'round them fancy "highways" so why should I have to pay for them?

'cause your food rides around on them before ending up in a supermarket for you to buy.

 

[soccerballtux]

To really do this right it should based on miles driven and type of vehicle regardless of fuel type. But that would require having a mature conversation about the subject which won't happen.

there's an easy way to do this. Have it be based on the amount of fuel consumed. Heavy vehicles consume more, if you drive a lot you pay more tax, problem solved.
So we just need to increase the tax.

Of all the things worth debating if government should be doing, I think the interstate system is legitimate enough and simple enough to manage (build more, its broke? build it again) with little administration and room for waste that we should just raise the tax.

 

[soccerballtux]

Put 50% of the taxes already collected per gallon of fuel towards it (where it's supposed to be going anyway) instead of 85% of fuel tax going to earmarked programs (pork)
Only 15% of fuel tax actually goes to that fund.
Or they can just shut it all down,collect 0 taxes, bump the state's cut up 15%, let the states handle all roads
and call it a day
win-win on the latter.
Never happen.

man is this true? I get so depressed the more I learn.

 

[soccerballtux]

You know TARP actually made money for the government right? As did the Fanny and Freddie bailouts.

making money is a bad metric. It was at the cost of propping up overpriced housing. We needed a deeper correction so all the young folks graduating with student debt can afford a house.

 

[shady28]

You do realize that a gain in net worth is not the same as income, right?

Adding some random crazy tax on people or corporations like that will simply encourage companies and people to make sure their money is not in the US, and then we'll have an even bigger problem: we'll have mcowned making stupid threads every other week whining that people and companies have their money overseas in tax havens

Exactly.

There are some fairly easy ways that this can be done though - it would be trivial, in fact.

The Bush tax cuts, specifically the capital gains / dividends tax cuts, reduced the rate on those gains from 25% to 15%. This is very beneficial to middle class people investing for retirement etc as well, and it helps prop up the markets, so eliminating it wholesale is not a good idea.

But I do not see why one could not cap that 15% rate, very easily. Just make it so the first $1 million is taxed at 15%, 1 - 100 million at 25%, and everything above 100 million at 50%.

But that won't happen, because both Democrats and Repubs are bought and paid for (noting that Obama and the Democratic Congress rolled back the SS tax and payroll tax cuts, but did not touch capital gains or dividends...).

Many corporations do pay very high taxes BTW. See the link below.

Ironically, most of the high tax paying corporations are "evil companies" noted on these forums. Exxon for example, has an effective tax rate of 42%. Chevron 43%, Conoco 45%. Other high tax paying corporations include Apple, Phillip Morris, and Intel.

http://www.forbes.com/pictures/mef45fkfh/1-exxonmobil/


Deadbeat no-tax paying corporations include Verizon, General Motors, and Bank of America. Funny we never see anyone complain about those companies :

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/10-us-companies-paying-no-taxes-2013-03-26

 

[K1052]

1) Index federal fuel tax to inflation.

2) Requre states filing for DOT grants to have their state fuel taxes indexed as well.

3) Implement a review process that greatly restricts federal dollars for new roads. Decisions shold be made on an economic basis alone with repair of existing assets always getting priority.

4) Implement an additional weight and mileage tax for commercial/fleet vehicles.

5) Introduce dynamic congestion/parking pricing in major metro downtowns. Ply generated revenues into mass transit rebuilding, expansion, operation.

6) Create a national infrastructure bank and provide seed money to states to set up their own.