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Latest post 06-08-2008 11:27 AM by pcrs. 3 replies.
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  • 06-08-2008 8:04 AM

    Gasoline Tax

    Sorry if already discussed, but I was wondering what the Libertarian response would be to a gasoline tax.  Two articles I have recently read, one by Thomas L. Friedman of the New York Times and another by Charles Krauthammer of the Washington Post espose the virtues of such a tax.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/28/opinion/28friedman.html

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/05/AR2008060503434.html

    The important issues at hand seem to be the reliance on oil from petro dictators.  Thus we are propping up Chavez, Putin, the House of Saud, Sudan's dictators, either directly or indirectly by continuing to rely so much on foreign oil.

     Although, not an out and out believer in global warming as the boogey man thats going to instantaneously transform the world, the argument is made that by continuing to drive gas guzzlers we are damaging the environment and we should move towards fuel efficiency, suggested above through a gasoline tax.

    As a Libertarian though, it seems like there must be a better way to have a more rational way regarding energy use, aside from the need for a gasoline tax.  Obviously one way would be to open up domestic oilfields to drilling as discussed in another thread.  Please let me know your thoughts.

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  • 06-08-2008 8:48 AM In reply to

    Re: Gasoline Tax

    Taxation is theft.
  • 06-08-2008 11:21 AM In reply to

    Re: Gasoline Tax

    jpleezy19:

     Although, not an out and out believer in global warming as the boogey man thats going to instantaneously transform the world, the argument is made that by continuing to drive gas guzzlers we are damaging the environment and we should move towards fuel efficiency, suggested above through a gasoline tax.

    As a Libertarian though, it seems like there must be a better way to have a more rational way regarding energy use, aside from the need for a gasoline tax.  Obviously one way would be to open up domestic oilfields to drilling as discussed in another thread.  Please let me know your thoughts.

    While I can't give an exact way to solve the gas problem, it's certainly not a crisis. We're not about to run out any time soon even though many would suggest we are. Here's a little excerpt by John Stossel on it.

    "records show that when you adjust for inflation the price of gas is now lower than it's been for most of the twentieth century. Prices are lower now than they were 25 years ago. Yes, they price is up from the 1998 all time low of $1.19, but they are a dollar lower than they were in the early 1980s.

    I asked people to compare the price of gas to bottled water or ice cream you can buy inside the gas station. Most people were sure the gas was more expensive. But they're wrong.

    If you took the average price of a bottle of water, a gallon would cost nearly $7. A gallon of Haagen Dazs ice cream would set you back nearly $30 -- 15 times the price of gas.

    And think about how much harder it is to produce gasoline.

    First, oil has to be sucked out of the ground ... sometimes from deep beneath an ocean or underneath ice or from the Middle East where workers risk their lives. And just to get to the oil often means the drill may have to bend and dig sideways through as many five miles of earth. What oil companies find then has to be delivered through long pipelines or shipped in monstrously expensive ships, then converted into three different formulas of gasoline, trucked in trucks that cost more than $100,000 and then your local gas station has to spend a fortune on safety devices to make sure you don't blow yourself up."

     

    As far as the global warming...or is it cooling...nope it's warming. Anyway, there's quite a few lies in regard to the global warming  that "threatens" our earth. Firstly, CO2 doesn't raise the temperature; actually, a rise in tempeture rises CO2 levels. You see the sun warms up the ocean--which by the way is the main "culprit" of CO2 emissions--and then it takes about 300 years for the ocean to feel the effects of it--since the ocean is gigantic. Then after 300 years the C02 levels rise. I probably screwed up the explanation, so just watch this http://www.moviesfoundonline.com/great_global_warming_swindle.php



    It's a movie called the great global warming swindle which outlines the bullshit surrounding the global warming theory. 

     

    And lastly regarding taxation, governments caused much of the problems regarding oil, and it's never the government that fixes such problems. Governments have been good at one thing throughout history, and that's f*cking everyone over.

    Sorry if I couldn't completely answer your question, but I just don't know enough about the topic to say anything for certain. If you want to find some people who really do know about the topic, check out www.mises.org

    "Any system of belief that forces children to lie to attain the praise of their elders is corrupt." Jason McLaughlin

  • 06-08-2008 11:27 AM In reply to

    • pcrs
    • Top 10 Contributor
    • Joined on 04-01-2007
    • Houten, The Netherlands
    • Posts 1,994
    • Philosopher King

    Re: Gasoline Tax

    I'm from europe and we mostly fill are tank with taxes. The higher price hurts poor people more than rich ones, so if the rich ones want to hurt oil exporters, this is a way that does not hurt themselves. The tax money flows into the hands of the government that further wrecks society with warfare and welfare, more cameras, laws and regulations.

    The oil sheik does not get hurt either (plenty of money), but the common folks in those countries bear the grunt. 

    You can kill off your manufacturing industry as well and this will reduce oil imports, you then buy your manufactured stuff from China and it might make you feel a lot better not paying Chavez, but Chavez just sends the oil to the chinese manufacturers and the single net effect is that jobs went from the USa to china. Chavez gets his bank account filled from another source. 

    makes sense? 

    Violence has nothing with which to cover itself except the lie, and the lie has nothing to stand on other than violence. Any man who has once acclaimed violence as his method must inexorably choose the lie as his principle. Solzhenitsyn, Alexander

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