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30% is not a "holy shit" level of fuel tax. The federal fuel tax in 1993 was 18.4c per gallon (and remains at that level), while crude oil that year cost as li

30% is not a "holy shit" level of fuel tax. The federal fuel tax in 1993 was 18.4c per gallon (and remains at that level), while crude oil that year cost as little as $13/barrel. That's a 57% tax. Of course the real value of the federal fuel tax has monotonically declined through inflation, since it remains at a nominal 18.4c/gallon. In civilized countries the fuel tax is generally well over 100%. In Switzerland for example the tax is .75/liter, or about 120CHF (~$120) per barrel.

DrScump 11y ago
<The federal fuel tax in 1993 was 18.4c per gallon (and remains at that level), while crude oil that year cost as little as $13/barrel. That's a 57% tax.> Your math eludes me. National average gasoline price for 1993 was $1.10, yielding less than 17% tax.
- thrownaway2424 11y ago
  This article is using the price of crude oil as the denominator. In 1993 Brent Crude Oil varied between $13 and $20 per barrel.
  - DrScump 11y ago
    But the fuel tax figure you quoted was for gasoline, not crude. You were comparing apples to Orangesicles.
gnarbarian 11y ago
All except one of those "civilized" countries don't produce oil. They also all have much higher population densities where public transit makes sense and most people can't even afford to buy a car. That is not analogous to the situation here. There isn't a single European country with a population density so low it is close to Alaska [1]. Even Norway who is most similar to AK and is an oil producer has much smaller towns that individually are less spread out and are more easily served by public transit as a whole, norway has 30x the population density of AK[1]. In these civilized utopias most people can't even consider buying a car there due to artificially inflated costs from over regulation and taxes. I like a 4x4 truck that can get me to work in shitty weather. I like being able to afford to drive a boat around the ocean on the weekends and catch halibut. None of this pertains to my argument though and only serves to offer a bit of perspective. Regardless of consumer costs ($10 more is still a far cry from $110) What really matters here is the supply glut which causes a shortage of demand per unit of oil. This kills margins and rules out any new investment and developments in Alaska. These are the things that drive jobs. High margins fund the state government and new development. Low prices mean layoffs across the board before we even think about a huge tax stabbing into demand. In other words, that tax will retard oil's recovery by artificially suppressing national demand for oil. US consumers can withstand it no problem. But at the moment that tax is equivalent to kicking Alaska's economy in the gut when we're already on the ground trying to tap out. I love Alaska and I don't want to have to move. If you can't empathize with that I understand. Who cares about 700,000 rednecks and eskimos up north who like to fish and hunt. They're probably all like sarah palin anyway haha. (she screwed our oil industry with crazy taxes and pretty much single handedly ensured AK industry didn't take part in or benefit from the US oil boom and is not a popular person around here) Like it or not. The US is a major oil producer now thanks to shale oil and technological improvements. High oil prices enabled us to go for harder to reach fields and the low price eliminates their feasibility. Like I said before, We produce as much oil as saudi arabia. Low prices will have a dramatic negative effect in many localized places like alaska. I understand if you don't empathize with us or care what happens to our economy but this kind of tax is not going to do alaska texas oklahoma idaho or north dakota any favors. [1] norway has 14 people per sq/km versus 0.46 people per sq/km in alaska. Even Mongolia has 4x AK's population density! Russia is 19x our density. https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=alaska%20population%20density https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e... http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.POP.DNST?order=wbapi_data_value_2014+wbapi_data_value+wbapi_data_value-last&sort=asc http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.POP.DNST?order=wbapi_...
- scotty79 11y ago
  > Even Norway who is most similar to AK and is an oil producer has much smaller towns that individually are less spread out and are more easily served by public transit as a whole, Wouldn't having lower number of larger towns be easier to service with mass transit (trains, planes) than larger number of smaller towns? I don't think distances make public transport vs cars hard. It's non-clustering as in US suburbs opposed to European cities and towns. > I understand if you don't empathize with us or care what happens to our economy but this kind of tax is not going to do alaska texas oklahoma idaho or north dakota any favors. Does it get windy in Alaska? How about seeding wind power industry there with the money taken from people that make holes in your ground and suck the oil? Or do you want it to remain your top industry forever? Norway doesn't want that for itself.
  - gnarbarian 11y ago
    Alaska was built in the 70s so our towns and cities have very low density "non clustered" making public transit difficult. Consider your example contrasting suburban US and Europe. Alaska is to lower 48 burbs what US burbs are to Europe. We have big lots and we have spread out. So public transit is expensive and it poorly serves us. To compound this difficulty, the majority of villages aren't even connected to the road system. The locals get around with snowmobiles and 4wheelers. Those tend to be more clustered but public transit in a town that has no jobs and 100 people living in 2 sq miles is pointless. I lived in the 4th biggest city in Alaska and it was 8 miles to the nearest gas station and 20 miles to my highschool. You can't export wind power. The current hope is to build a liquid natural gas line and export that. Unfortunately Gas prices trend with oil prices so getting that built in this market is going to be difficult and potentially unprofitable in the long run. Figuring out how to have an self contained perpetually sustainable economy is an interesting problem I don't think any nation has figured out. If you have a trade deficit your country/state will become poorer over time a surplus will enrich it. So it's best to try and export and stay ahead of the game or you will bleed out. Alaska needs to export goods because we import most of our food and necessities. Not everyone is willing to live on moose and salmon. (although I sure could)
    - 11y ago
gnarbarian 11y ago
I wonder what would have happened to SV if the Federal government put a 30% tax on every dollar earned by tech companies a week after .com bubble burst.
- scotty79 11y ago
  It would have been perfectly fine solutions if they wanted to phase out internet use.
  - gnarbarian 11y ago
    Well the rent would certainly be cheaper.

DrScump 11y ago

<The federal fuel tax in 1993 was 18.4c per gallon (and remains at that level), while crude oil that year cost as little as $13/barrel. That's a 57% tax.> Your math eludes me. National average gasoline price for 1993 was $1.10, yielding less than 17% tax.

thrownaway2424 11y ago
This article is using the price of crude oil as the denominator. In 1993 Brent Crude Oil varied between $13 and $20 per barrel.
- DrScump 11y ago
  But the fuel tax figure you quoted was for gasoline, not crude. You were comparing apples to Orangesicles.

gnarbarian 11y ago

All except one of those "civilized" countries don't produce oil. They also all have much higher population densities where public transit makes sense and most people can't even afford to buy a car. That is not analogous to the situation here. There isn't a single European country with a population density so low it is close to Alaska [1]. Even Norway who is most similar to AK and is an oil producer has much smaller towns that individually are less spread out and are more easily served by public transit as a whole, norway has 30x the population density of AK[1]. In these civilized utopias most people can't even consider buying a car there due to artificially inflated costs from over regulation and taxes. I like a 4x4 truck that can get me to work in shitty weather. I like being able to afford to drive a boat around the ocean on the weekends and catch halibut. None of this pertains to my argument though and only serves to offer a bit of perspective. Regardless of consumer costs ($10 more is still a far cry from $110) What really matters here is the supply glut which causes a shortage of demand per unit of oil. This kills margins and rules out any new investment and developments in Alaska. These are the things that drive jobs. High margins fund the state government and new development. Low prices mean layoffs across the board before we even think about a huge tax stabbing into demand. In other words, that tax will retard oil's recovery by artificially suppressing national demand for oil. US consumers can withstand it no problem. But at the moment that tax is equivalent to kicking Alaska's economy in the gut when we're already on the ground trying to tap out. I love Alaska and I don't want to have to move. If you can't empathize with that I understand. Who cares about 700,000 rednecks and eskimos up north who like to fish and hunt. They're probably all like sarah palin anyway haha. (she screwed our oil industry with crazy taxes and pretty much single handedly ensured AK industry didn't take part in or benefit from the US oil boom and is not a popular person around here) Like it or not. The US is a major oil producer now thanks to shale oil and technological improvements. High oil prices enabled us to go for harder to reach fields and the low price eliminates their feasibility. Like I said before, We produce as much oil as saudi arabia. Low prices will have a dramatic negative effect in many localized places like alaska. I understand if you don't empathize with us or care what happens to our economy but this kind of tax is not going to do alaska texas oklahoma idaho or north dakota any favors. [1] norway has 14 people per sq/km versus 0.46 people per sq/km in alaska. Even Mongolia has 4x AK's population density! Russia is 19x our density. https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=alaska%20population%20density https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e... http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.POP.DNST?order=wbapi_data_value_2014+wbapi_data_value+wbapi_data_value-last&sort=asc http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.POP.DNST?order=wbapi_...

scotty79 11y ago
> Even Norway who is most similar to AK and is an oil producer has much smaller towns that individually are less spread out and are more easily served by public transit as a whole, Wouldn't having lower number of larger towns be easier to service with mass transit (trains, planes) than larger number of smaller towns? I don't think distances make public transport vs cars hard. It's non-clustering as in US suburbs opposed to European cities and towns. > I understand if you don't empathize with us or care what happens to our economy but this kind of tax is not going to do alaska texas oklahoma idaho or north dakota any favors. Does it get windy in Alaska? How about seeding wind power industry there with the money taken from people that make holes in your ground and suck the oil? Or do you want it to remain your top industry forever? Norway doesn't want that for itself.
- gnarbarian 11y ago
  Alaska was built in the 70s so our towns and cities have very low density "non clustered" making public transit difficult. Consider your example contrasting suburban US and Europe. Alaska is to lower 48 burbs what US burbs are to Europe. We have big lots and we have spread out. So public transit is expensive and it poorly serves us. To compound this difficulty, the majority of villages aren't even connected to the road system. The locals get around with snowmobiles and 4wheelers. Those tend to be more clustered but public transit in a town that has no jobs and 100 people living in 2 sq miles is pointless. I lived in the 4th biggest city in Alaska and it was 8 miles to the nearest gas station and 20 miles to my highschool. You can't export wind power. The current hope is to build a liquid natural gas line and export that. Unfortunately Gas prices trend with oil prices so getting that built in this market is going to be difficult and potentially unprofitable in the long run. Figuring out how to have an self contained perpetually sustainable economy is an interesting problem I don't think any nation has figured out. If you have a trade deficit your country/state will become poorer over time a surplus will enrich it. So it's best to try and export and stay ahead of the game or you will bleed out. Alaska needs to export goods because we import most of our food and necessities. Not everyone is willing to live on moose and salmon. (although I sure could)
  - 11y ago

gnarbarian 11y ago

I wonder what would have happened to SV if the Federal government put a 30% tax on every dollar earned by tech companies a week after .com bubble burst.

scotty79 11y ago
It would have been perfectly fine solutions if they wanted to phase out internet use.
- gnarbarian 11y ago
  Well the rent would certainly be cheaper.