Letters to the Editor
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bad math
if this program was 60% effective, doesn't that mean that 40% of the tax cut went into gas company pockets? that's acceptable?
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Try on a new lense.
Why isn't there a discussion on how HRC is proposing to spend the wind fall profits tax twice? Or how the Clinton administration actually raised the gas tax a nickel in the 90's. Or even: Is it good policy to be encouraging summer driving when we are approaching, if not already in, an energy and environmental crisis? (Here's where we go to the clip of HRC standing on the back of a gas guzzling truck talking about her( Really John McCain's) gas tax hoiday in North Carolina)
If you want to take on the oil companies, a good place to start would be by not sending American soldiers to die in the middle east for bloody oil, and we already know where HRC stood when it came time to vote for the war.
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This post is disingenuous
Even if every word of this article is true it is dishonest and disingenuous. The Federal tax Hillary Clinton proposes to give us a holiday from is one that is imposed on the oil companies at the refinery. In other words Hillary is proposing giving the oil companies a tax break and is making an assumption that they will pass most or all of it on to consumers. That is a huge assumption, and not one that most economists believe is warranted.
The Indiana gas tax was a sales tax imposed on consumers at the pump. Thus any oil company wanting to profit from it would have had to raise the wholesale price specifically in Illinois, a move that would have been totally transparent as a blatant attempt to price gouge.
Mr. Frost is trying to compare apples and oranges. The fact that oil companies did not take advantage of a sales tax holiday in Illinois by regionally raising the wholesale price of gas in no way suggests that they would pass a tax reduction imposed at the refinery on to consumers.
It is this kind of shady logic that makes people like me distrust Hillary Clinton.
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George Frost is wrong about the gas tax
Temporary gas price reductions that re-adjust after a day or two will NOT help consumers. The Clinton/McCain proposal to suspend Federal gas taxes will funnel additional windfall money to the oil companies when the price rebounds. Depriving the highway fund of this money will make Americans even less safe!
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More Than That
If you want to take on the oil companies, a good place to start would be by not sending American soldiers to die in the middle east for bloody oil
stepstep raises an interesting point, but it goes beyond that. Not only did Hillary McCain vote to send our troops into the Iraq quagmire, she and her spineless ilk are also to blame for squandering over a trillion dollars (and counting!) of taxpayer dollars on this misadventure to boot. That's something like $3,000 a citizen.
So Hillary McCain steals $3,000 from your bank account, then offers to give $30 of it back? How magnanimous.
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The gas tax should be $10.18, not 18 cents!
Why can't Americans be intelligent like the rest of the world? Why do they always have to be an 800 lb. idiot? The price of crude is pretty much the same to every buyer. Why do Europeans pay more than $8 a gallon at the pump and America less than half?
Tax.
Why do Europeans have a choice in transportation to and from work and Americans do not? Europeans have spent the tax on alternative forms of transportation. Have you 800 lb idiots visited Paris? If you have, you will find how easy it is to get around without a gas guzzler.
Eliminating the 18.5 cent tax on gasoline is not going to save your asses now. You have for years lived on cheap gasoline and continue to want it still cheaper. An 800 lb idiot is a huge idiot who refuses to accept any pain for long run benefits. Do not cry when the day of reckoning arrives. The world is laughing at you now. Your war in Iraq, your dollar, your economic power are all going to hell on you. Elect more idiots. You get what you deserve because you refuse to think and act responsibly.
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Why don't people research before writing articles???
1. The federal gas tax is imposed at the refinery level, not at the pump. So it affects the price paid by the wholesaler.
2. There is a "crack spread" which is the difference between refinery input prices and the price they can sell their products for. Right now, the crack spread is extremely low, which is why refinery stock prices on Wall Street usually fall on the days that oil prices shoot upward.
3. Being businessmen, the managers of refineries would welcome the news "YOU (the refiners) don't have to pay a Federal gas tax this summer, thanks to Clinton/McCain".
4. Being businessmen, the managers of refineries would very, very likely sell their products to the wholesalers for the SAME price as before, thus keeping the money that would otherwise go to the tax man.
5. That would "widen the crack spread" and cause their beaten-down stock prices to go up.
6. Finally, because the refiners' earning have been so abysmal of late, no "windfall profit tax" would have much effect on them.
Conclusion: suspend the tax, make my shares of refiners stocks more valuable, probably no change in the RETAIL price of gas!!
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raise the gas tax instead
The problem with CO2 emissions and global warming is that none of us pay the cost of emitting CO2. Right now, its free to pollute with CO2.
Let's slap a tax on all fossil fuel emissions, from our homes, cars, whatever. The fossil fuel tax would be paid at the pump and in our home electric and/or gas bills. If we want to avoid making the poor pay this admittedly regressive tax, we could offer low income exemptions from the electric and gas bill taxes and low income tax breaks for gasoline.
Doing this would drive a move towards conservation, lowering demand. This would both lower prices and reduce our CO2 emissions. (The lower prices would disproportionally help the poor.) We'd regain our leadership role in world politics on the environment. We'd become less dependent on despots in the Middle East and Latin America. The development of clean energy technologies could drive a new round of economic growth for the USA, much in the way the internet did in the 90s.
Obama has chosen the high road on this issue and he deserves the nomination for it. In contrast, Hillary has shown us what sort of president she would be. When push comes to shove, she'll back down and pick the politically expedient choice instead of doing what's right for the country.
If you think 5 cents a gallon is going to help anyone, you are delusional.