wealth transfer from the 1% to the wannabee 1% meanwhile poor people get screwed again

Post #403,762 by boxley 7/30/15 8:36:10 AM 7/30/15 8:39:28 AM Reply	wealth transfer from the 1% to the wannabee 1% meanwhile poor people get screwed again nukes How well do taxes work? When Gore was foaming at the mouth that we should tax the crap out of gasoline so people would have to pay $2 a gallon for gas and he was berated soundly for the idea. What is the current cost of gs and how much less gasoline are we using currently? Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free American and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 59 years. meep Edited by boxley July 30, 2015, 08:39:28 AM EDT Expand All History
Post #403,764 by malraux 7/30/15 9:28:12 AM Reply	-0.64 The price elasticity of demand for gasoline in the long term. If the price goes up 10%, this turns into a reduction of gasoline usage by 6% over the long run. http://economics.about.com/od/priceelasticityofdemand/a/gasoline_elast.htm When gas hit $4, people started driving fewer miles and buying more efficient cars. Unfortunately, gas taxes do hit the poor and middle class harder. Regards, -scott Welcome to Rivendell, Mr. Anderson.
Post #403,767 by Another Scott 7/30/15 9:41:28 AM Reply	Regressiveness is an issue. It can be handled, though, by cutting taxes in other areas. E.g. Make the gas tax a percentage of the price instead of $0.18/gal or whatever it is in your locality. Reduce the sales tax by an amount to make it revenue neutral in that locality. Make up the difference, if any, by increasing property taxes on homes valued at over $1M (or whatever number makes sense in a particular area). It's not an insurmountable problem, and as you show, making gas (and coal and oil and natural gas) more expensive to burn will cause people to use less of it and make renewables/solar/wind relatively cheaper. Cheers, Scott.

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