Don't want to keep the rant on, but you would never guess the companies investing big money into "hydrogen fuel technology"? Yep you guessed it! Those evil Big Oil Companies! DAMN THEM TO HELL!
I'll add that if the oil and gas companies start losing money due to market conditions and see their profits shrink or even take a loss, the government still makes the same amount of money per gallon. It's the perfect target for class warfare.
Just seems like an odd statistic to show their PROFIT, and what govt. tax is. If we remove from the equation the money that oil companies uses on expenses, should we also eliminate from the graphic what govt. uses the money on? It seems to try to present it as if the govt. profits are more, when govt. has expenditures tied to what they bring in same way the oil company does.
It seriously baffles me that people want to label these guys as villians. First of all, these companies are "publicly traded"; which means they can't just toss money their way. They are paid based on the market's price for those exects. Just like Players in the NBA are determined by similar caliber players. Let's down size this to a smaller scale. Let's say Larry is a 12 year old kid that has a paper route. He realizes that if he hires 100 kids to run other routes for him; he can take 10% of their earnings (you know setting it up, designing the best possible way to deliver the papers, etc). So now he is managing the 100 kids and stopped delivering paper. Instead he manages the route and customers within that route. All the sudden the local government takes wind of this business venture and decides to take 11% of the total profits. Well he was only making 10% and the cost of papers are the same. So he must go back to his employees and tell them that they must give up an additional 10% to cover the taxes. The employees tell him to fuck off and say "It's your problem, not mine" and poor old Larry goes out of business.
Other than collecting the taxes, what investment does government put into this industry? Some tax credits? What government does with that money after it is collected is irrelevant to this discussion. They have no "skin in the game", to borrow a phrase from a current politician.
Yes you have a point, but take into consideration on the "%" they are taking. If the price of gasoline at the pump is $4.50 per gallon and they are taxing 48.8 ยข; that's a 10.8% sales tax. Now keep in mind that the profit is also taxed at a whopping 42%. I suspect the government is taking in quite a bit of change for oil.
I suppose if all roads were privately fixed, maintained, and not government, then it wouldn't be relevant.
As I said, what government does with that money is irrelevant to this discussion. I'm not saying that the government should not tax gasoline, but I find it hypocritical for politicians to demonize an industry that they depend on for massive tax revenues. Not all gas tax money in Oregon goes directly to road maintenance, anyhow. It's a part of a pot that is the budgeted each year. EDIT - to add the word not.
That's my concern. I want to know how much of this is fixed into the road budget? Also personal and business taxes are supposed to cover this too.
U aren't too far from the truth. The state lottery is supposed to generate funds for the school system, but only 10% of the proceeds actually make it to the schools. In fact california has even dipped into the lottery fund to pay other budgets.
if the lottery were connected to schooling as directly as gas is to transportation, I'd worry about that more.
And I'm not advocating to eliminate the tax but I want to know where this accountability is. Also, it puts a perspective on what these gas companies actually make. It's not much in terms of %.
but take the tax off of their, and their profit would be the same amount. So they're in an industry where the profit margin is small. Lot's of things are like that. They can cut their adveritising budgets, cut other expenses if they want more pure profit, I suppose.
I imagine the accountability is the same place with ALL things we're taxed on. Running through 45 different departments, with none talking to the other.
In Oregon, almost 10% of all tax revenue goes to the PERS fund to pay out people's retirements. That figure is only going to go up as more people on the plan retire at a faster rate than people on the plan are dying.
This is a big concern. How will the state pay for this in 10 years and many more people are on PERS? We've already seen income taxes raised and new and higher fees. What's next?
I really don't have a problem with the gas tax. A use tax is one of the more fair types of taxation that we have. Now I do have a problem with the gas tax being used for other things besides roads and infrastructure, in Portland for instance 25% of our local gas tax is being used for bicycle paths. But the gas tax? Sorry but the people and or businesses that use the roads the most should be the ones that pay for it. And Mags you have to admit it's kind of funny that you're bringing this up when you just drove up here from LA and back in a rig that is getting 12-14 miles per gallon.
Just to play devil's advocate, improving and increasing bicycle transportation would theoretically make the roads nicer for drivers, since there'd be less traffic to deal with. Like paying a tax to not have to deal with some drivers. Though I do think there should be a means for charging bikers, in a sense, whether it be through bicycle registration or what, I don't know.
