10 ms·
Your understanding is a bit deficient then because the gas tax revenues do not even begin to cover road building and maintenance. In California for example the
by honkhonkpants 10y ago
Your understanding is a bit deficient then because the gas tax revenues do not even begin to cover road building and maintenance. In California for example the transportation budget is $17 billion per year, $14 billion of which is for roads, but the fuel tax revenue is only $6 billion and the vehicle license and registration fees are $3.2 billion. The remainder is provided from general revenues, that is to say it constitutes a subsidy.
At the federal level, Congress has been transferring money from general funds into the Highway Trust Fund every year since 2001, because the fuel tax has gone down in real terms every year since 1993.
Tolls are nice but only account for 5% of road funds in the US. To use the pejorative applied against transit projects, the "fare recovery ratio" for roads ranks below literally every transit agency in the nation.
In short, roads are highly subsidized from general revenues.
- graycat 10y agoMy impression is that local roads are paid for heavily local real estate taxes, state roads are paid for via state gasoline taxes, state license fees, and tolls, Federal roads and bridges are paid for via the Federal gas taxes and tolls. My impression is that the Federal Highway Trust Fund is funded by Federal gas taxes and gets used also for purposes other than Federal highways and bridges. But I don't have good data. I want good data but don't have it. E.g., there are a lot of roads and bridges that are not Federal, e.g., not the Interstate highway system. So, when I hear that the gas taxes don't pay for all the roads and bridges, I think, of course not -- e.g., my local roads and bridges are paid for heavily, maybe mostly, by local real estate taxes, and in my area that is fair -- everyone here needs the local roads and bridges.