Cornyn enrages truckers by pitching 25 cent per mile tax on big rigs to finance highway work

[IsailedawayfromFR]

For decades, taxes on gasoline and diesel financed the nation’s highways. But as vehicles get more efficient, they use less fuel. Someone has to pay to repair pavement, replace aging bridges and widen lanes.

Sen. John Cornyn floated an idea this week: a 25-cent tax on every mile driven by heavy trucks — semis, moving trucks, cement mixers and the like. That would bring in $33 billion a year, nearly as much as the fuel taxes.

“We’ve got to come up with some money from somewhere,” he said.

Truckers feel that Cornyn is throwing them under the bus.

A truck-only vehicle-miles-traveled tax is common in Europe, and the idea of some sort of VMT has gained traction in the United States to offset chronic shortfalls in the Highway Trust Fund. But discussion has centered on levies as low as 1 cent per mile, a small fraction of what Cornyn suggested at Tuesday’s infrastructure hearing in the Senate Finance Committee.

“That number is absolutely huge. ... I would be forced to sell or close the doors, no question,” said Jonathan Kennemer, president and CEO of a McKinney-based company his dad started with one truck, hauling oil pipe in the 1960s.

CKJ Transport now has 350 rigs serving the oil patch and delivering stone, sand, gravel and other building materials around the state. Each puts on 110,000 to 125,000 miles a year.

At 25 cents a mile, that’s $30,000 per truck – $10 million a year.

“That just scares the hell out of me. I don’t have a $10 million margin,” said Kennemer, who chairs the Texas Trucking Association, a trade group of 1,000 small and large companies. “I’m concerned to hear a proposal like that come from my home state Republican senator, I can tell you that.”

On April 13, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a number of transportation and labor groups wrote the House and Senate transportation committees urging creation of a VMT to offset dwindling fuel tax revenues and restore solvency to the Highway Trust Fund.

The groups left details to the imagination of Congress, including a potential rate and whether to apply it broadly or only to trucks.

As Cornyn noted at the hearing, President Joe Biden has acknowledged that raising the fuel tax is a political nonstarter. He cited 2019 projections from the Joint Committee on Taxation, a House-Senate panel, showing a $33 billion revenue stream if class 7 and 8 trucks pay 25 cents per mile.
https://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/2021/05/20/cornyn-enrages-truckers-by-pitching-25-cent-per-mile-tax-on-big-rigs-to-finance-highway-work/

What is wrong with this RINO Senator?

Taxing truckers just passes along higher costs to all consumers.

Think about this:  Biden kills pipelines, then Congress makes truck shipments more costly.

Who benefits the most?

Railroads.  Like Buffett's BNSF.

Always follow the money.

[rustynail]

"Taxing truckers just passes along higher costs to all consumers."....sounds fair.   That way 'we are

all in this together'.

[Hoodat]

Hey Cornyn, have you ever considered simply spending less money?

[Night Hides Not]

Hey Cornyn, have you ever considered simply spending less money?

 

[Hoodat]

Taxing truckers just passes along higher costs to all consumers.

If you bought it, a truck brought it.  Everyone's standard of living will take a hit.

[libertybele]

If you bought it, a truck brought it.  Everyone's standard of living will take a hit.

Absolutely.  Cornyn does more harm than good.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

On April 13, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a number of transportation and labor groups wrote the House and Senate transportation committees urging creation of a VMT to offset dwindling fuel tax revenues and restore solvency to the Highway Trust Fund.

Maybe we need to force the EV guys to cough up some revenue since they are using the roads and not paying fuel tax?
Too radical an idea for you, Cornyn?

[Smokin Joe]

Hey Cornyn, have you ever considered simply spending less money?

That's where I'm at. Skim a few billion here, a few billion there off the taxpayer funds sent overseas, and, voila! there's the extra to spend on the roads.

Trucking firms are already paying fuel taxes of 24.3 cents a gallon at the Federal level, and the average semi gets 6.5 miles per gallon.

[Hoodat]

The federal government subsidizes public transportation and forces mileage standards down our throats forcing us to pay more for cars having better fuel efficiency, and then they whine because we now use less gas.  They couldn't figure this one out from the start?

[Smokin Joe]

The federal government subsidizes public transportation and forces mileage standards down our throats forcing us to pay more for cars having better fuel efficiency, and then they whine because we now use less gas.  They couldn't figure this one out from the start?

Not to mention tax breaks for hybrids and electrics...who pay less or no gas tax, respectively.

[christian]

People were amply warned, democrats massive spending is followed by democrats insisting their fiscal insanity is followed by democrats demanding and insisting its their right (invented excuse) to massive tax increases.  Hitler, Stalin, Maduros would/are proud, another socialist scam coming to fruition.  Eating rats to become gourmet eating, the deniers earned their gourmet meals, if they can get them.

[BassWrangler]

https://twitter.com/tx_ta/status/1395810797708881936?s=21

[GtHawk]

The federal government subsidizes public transportation and forces mileage standards down our throats forcing us to pay more for cars having better fuel efficiency, and then they whine because we now use less gas.  They couldn't figure this one out from the start?

Well they haven't figured it out with tobacco taxes so why should this be any different. Maybe they should get Meathead to come out and do his "For the Children' bullshit lies to con the gullible and liberal robots.

[Sled Dog]

"We've got to come up with the money from somewhere", huh?

Well, the Constitution forbids Congress from spending taxpayer dollars on education.   

The Constitution forbids Congress from spending taxpayer dollars on health care.

The Constitution does not allow Congress to regulate drugs. 

The Constitution explicitly forbids the Congress from regulating firearms.

I can see LOTS of places where the Congress isn't allowed to spend money where it's spending money.

It's not hard to see how the Congress can find the necessary funds to maintain and build "infrastructure".

Oh, and, the nation's electric grid is not a "post road".  Nor is the Internet.   Nor are the various pipelines and refineries.  Those items are supposed to be constructed and maintained by the private industries profiting from their use.

[Sled Dog]

https://twitter.com/tx_ta/status/1395810797708881936?s=21

Well, since it's a universal tax, the tax would be transferred to those shipping the goods, who would transfer the tax to the people buying the goods.

This is just another "Hide the Tax" salami game.

And what happens is the customer base dwindles by some extent as the lower end decides it doesn't want to pay the cost for the product.   

And at a quarter a mile, many things shipped by road would find air transport more attractive, too.  And trains.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

That's where I'm at. Skim a few billion here, a few billion there off the taxpayer funds sent overseas, and, voila! there's the extra to spend on the roads.

Trucking firms are already paying fuel taxes of 24.3 cents a gallon at the Federal level, and the average semi gets 6.5 miles per gallon.

Another radical idea:  Maybe stop paying illegals to come here and use that money instead of taxing truckers.

[Sled Dog]

Another radical idea:  Maybe stop paying illegals to come here and use that money instead of taxing truckers.

But truckers voted for Trump, illegal aliens vote for the Rodents as many times as the law doesn't allow.

[roamer_1]

Hey Cornyn, have you ever considered simply spending less money?

Why would anyone do that?

[roamer_1]

Well, since it's a universal tax, the tax would be transferred to those shipping the goods, who would transfer the tax to the people buying the goods.

This is just another "Hide the Tax" salami game.

Except that is not how it works. Taxes do not consider what the market will bear. And often the market will bear no more - Leaving the tax on the truckers... Just like a 15 dollar minimum wage did to restaurateurs and waitresses...

[Bigun]

Except that is not how it works. Taxes do not consider what the market will bear. And often the market will bear no more - Leaving the tax on the truckers... Just like a 15 dollar minimum wage did to restaurateurs and waitresses...

The market will bear it or do without! Truckers, nor any other business for that matter, can operate for long without recovering ALL their operational costs including the costs of complying with such stupid BS as this.

[roamer_1]

The market will bear it or do without! Truckers, nor any other business for that matter, can operate for long without recovering ALL their operational costs including the costs of complying with such stupid BS as this.

That's right, and I fear that will be 'do without'. Truckers are already on a bare margin since they limited driving hours. The money was always in the turn and burn.

[Hoodat]

Truckers are already on a bare margin since they limited driving hours.

Once log books went electronic, that ruined it for everyone.

[roamer_1]

Once log books went electronic, that ruined it for everyone.

Facts.

[christian]

It doesn't matter how much democrats tax and spend, because Biden is better, saving us from the evil Trump.  So enjoy, and watch them laugh and smile as they gut you up to your tonsils, utopia, utopia, utopia!  Maduros style governance/rule is here!

[Smokin Joe]

Except that is not how it works. Taxes do not consider what the market will bear. And often the market will bear no more - Leaving the tax on the truckers... Just like a 15 dollar minimum wage did to restaurateurs and waitresses...

If You're going to pay that much for the toilet paper that came on the truck, maybe using FRNs directly will be cheaper. (Better hoof it to the bank and bat the run on the ones....)

Remember "stagflation"?  The tax load slowed the economy's growth, and prices kept going up