Thursday, May 11, 2006

Eliminate the gas tax for three months?

thats a proposal being talked up on Beacon Hill. Predictably, Lt. Governor Healey has glommed onto it as a means of polishing her pseudo-populist bona fides. There are however some democrats who are interested in the idea as well though.
Oddly enough, Romney is cool to the idea...or he was as of this morning, Grover Norquist may well get to him by noontime.

Dunno if this is a good idea though, as the price of gas edges closer to three bucks a gallon for regular, the net savings of a twenty one cent three month rollback seems pretty puny.
And it could cost the state plenty in terms of funds earmarked for public transportation. If that three dollar a gallon spike becomes a price-plateau then there will be additional performance pressures on public transport. Keep in mind, the MBTA and the local transportation franchises have to buy gasoline for their buses at the going rate like everyone else.
All this seems to illustrate the impotence of state government when it comes to influencing the price of a critical commodity.

Me?
I'd spend the twenty billion on train track upgrades in the northeast and push for better more reliable trains and schedules. Hell we'll already flushed away a comparable amount of money for warlord payola in Iraq and Afganistan.

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