2013-06-03

Cato: To VMT or Not to VMT

“Gasoline taxes are not generating enough revenue to pay for roads and bridges,” says USA Today, so some states are experimenting with vehicle-miles traveled (VMT) fees. Actually, as I show in my recent Cato paper on this subject, gas taxes are currently generating enough revenue to maintain roads and bridges, but that revenue is expected to decline as cars become more fuel-efficient.
Better arguments for replacing gas taxes with VMT fees, my paper shows, are that such fees can virtually eliminate traffic congestion and save local governments $30 billion a year in general funds that are now used to subsidize local roads and streets. However, as I relearned after Cato published my paper, proposals for vehicle-mile fees produce two strong, visceral reactions from the public.
First is a fear that VMT fees will allow the government to invade your privacy by tracking your location. Second is a worry that government will waste the revenues it collects from vehicle-mile fees by spending them on pork barrel or other foolish things. Both of these complaints are really about problems with government, not the user-fee proposal.
Every time you make a phone call, send an email, or even walk out of your house into the possible view of a closed-circuit camera, you are giving the government an opportunity to track your whereabouts. This doesn’t mean we should ban telephones, email, or people leaving their homes; it does mean that we should design our technologies and institutions in ways that will preserve people’s privacy. As I explained in my paper, the VMT fee systems tested in Oregon and Minnesota are designed to make it impossible for the government to know where people drove or when they drove there; the systems only transmit the amount of money people owe for using the street and road network.

No comments:

Post a Comment