Center for Local and State Solutions
Other Resources--Neal Peirce Column

Category: Article (Journal or Newspaper)
Jurisdiction: City/County Government, International
Management Issues: Catalytic Government, Community Based Strategies, Community/Economic Development
Policy Area: Cities/Counties

For Release Sunday, August 19, 2007


© 2007 Washington Post Writers Group

BRIDGES, ROADS: BIG PROBLEM
DEMANDS BIG NEW TAX

By Neal Peirce

It’s time for a Big New Tax in America.

The Minnesota bridge disaster is just the latest signal -- but perhaps a decisive one. The indisputable reality is that our national infrastructure, led by decaying roads and bridges, is in perilous shape.  Bridges alone tell the story: We have 75,621 of them deemed structurally deficient-- potential tragedies waiting to happen.

Remember -- back in the ‘60s and ‘70s, when most of today’s interstate bridges and roads were built, standards were lower: no one figured today’s incredible run-up in cars’ weight, traffic volume and flood of monster trucks stressing our bridges and chewing up our roadways.

More years of dawdling half-measures in critical repairs will trigger many more deaths, make nightmares of daily commutes, and imperil our entire national future in the highly competitive new global economy. 

So why a “Big New Tax”?  Simple: the repair job is going to cost dazzling sums.  And we’ve had enough of running up deficits for our children and grandchildren to pay.

My proposal is a new federal excise tax, levied on the purchase of any new vehicle. The tax would be calculated to reflect the precise weight per wheel -- the wear and tear -- that the new car or truck will place on our bridges and roads.

Such a tax should average at least several hundred dollars per vehicle.  Arguably, that would be chump change in the prices haggled over each new car or truck.  But it would be a sure generator of needed multi-billions for the roadways. 

Vehicle owners, in fact, could easily recoup the cost in freer-flowing traffic and less roadway damage to their tires and shock absorbers. Already, drivers in urban areas pay an unseen congestion tax of around $1,000 yearly in unnecessarily burned fuel.

Many peoples’ reaction will be: A new tax?  No way! Congress just allocates money to its members’ pet projects, like the infamous “Bridge to Nowhere” in Alaska.  It was Congress’ dreary record on transportation funding that enabled President Bush to dismiss a recently proposed 5-cent a gallon gas tax increase.  Let the lawmakers “examine how they set priorities” first, he said.

Bush then baldly --let’s say foolishly -- asserted that an increase of a few pennies a gallon tax boost might “affect economic growth.”  As my Minnesota-based colleague Curtis Johnson notes, “the price at the pump fluctuates more than a dime between breakfast or lunch on any given day.”  Plus, the inflation-adjusted purchasing power of the federal gas tax (18.4 cents a gallon) is less than half of what it was in the 1960s.

But Bush has a solid point about Congress’ transportation irresponsibility, including the rapid growth of special “earmarks” in recent years.  And the fact is Congress could  act a lot more responsibly in allocating transportation dollars.

Britain is showing the way with its recent “Eddington Transport Study” on how transportation decisions can be linked to the most critical concerns -- the country’s economic competitiveness as well as sustainable development in an era of rising concern about carbon emissions.

The Eddington report’s big breakthrough was a decision to apply a vigorous cost-benefit ratio analysis to gauge the actual outcomes of any transportation investments that government might make.

Perhaps less applicable to immediate U.S. safety concerns about delayed road and bridge infrastructure, the British report urged the government to be “agnostic” on transportation modes -- not automatically predisposed to favor highways, or high speed rail, or any other means of transportation, but rather to gauge the comparable returns on any public investment.

Still, Britain’s principle of treating transportation funds as investments, carefully weighing benefits against costs on any and all projects, is precisely the antidote to political pork-barrel transportation funding this country needs to restore public faith and use our public dollars wisely.

The best U.S. choice would be an immediate bridge and road safety repair fund funded by an excise tax on vehicles (leaving the long-battered gas tax in its political doghouse).  Then, with a variety of other targeted user-based fees, the country could develop an even larger, long-term infrastructure development fund, encompassing levees and water systems as well as new transportation ventures ranging from roadways to airports to public transit.

Indeed, a federal offer to the states could go something like this: We’re making no guarantees, and we’re not granting any totally free money.  But prove to us that your specific projects match clear efficiency and outcome and environment criteria, and we’ll match you dollar for dollar.  That would lead to priority setting, sound investments, and be a response worthy of this century’s pressing needs.

Right now, we’d better get serious about the dollar crunch.  Especially with the run-ups in construction costs, we need lots of new revenue for the critical job ahead.  To the visceral anti-taxers, I say: Wake up, smell the coffee.  If you don’t want to pay for roads and bridges, stop driving.

Comments may be addressed to npeirce@citistates.com