> > > I'm forced to foot part of this cost
> > > regardless of how many petroleum products I actually consume.
> >
> > If you buy petroleum products, you pay the extra excise tax collected at
the
> > pump or point of sale.
>
> Perhaps this tax should be increased until it reflects the actual
> costs of the services the US armed forces provide to oil
> companies.
IMHO it would be better to scale back US armed force involvement in being
worlds policeman and cut taxes. Let oil companies pay for protection
directly to private protection aagencies. Don't run it thru big government
first. They will want to build the mile wide atomic helicopter to do the
job; they have little incentive to do the job cheaply.
>Why should people who walk to work subsidize other people's fuel?
Good point. The more that gov't services are privatized, the less we all
will be forced to subsidize other people's activities.
>Furthermore, such a tax will increase the economic incentive for
> developing alternative energy sources...
If we try to let the price of resources reflect their true price, then
signals get sent thru the market and people act accordingly.
Pat Fallon
pfallon@ptd.net
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat May 11 2002 - 17:44:13 MDT