Let’s Raise Gas Taxes & Lower Income Taxes

by Lester R. Brown

Now that the $100 tax rebate proposed by the Senate Republican leadership as a response to rising gasoline prices has been discarded, it is time to get serious. Any effective response to climbing gas prices must recognize a geological reality, namely that the earth

Instead of encouraging gasoline use with tax rebates or gas tax holidays, we need a way to reduce gasoline use, one that is practical and politically acceptable. We need a higher gas tax, but the only way to get a gas tax rise large enough to wean us from imported oil is to offset the rise with a reduction in the tax on income.

The gas tax boost should be substantial