Yes, given that the gas tax is regressive and hits strained working class budgets harder than it does anyone else.
Only if you ignore the (overwhelmingly lower-income) slice of people who don't pay gas tax at all. And even if so, the problems that stem from underpricing/implicitly subsidizing the use of fossil fuels (and failing to invest in infrastructure) are sufficiently obvious and extreme that, well, they trump basically all other concerns. The proper response to equity concerns is to a) invest in the sorts of improvements that would well and truly make gasoline usage inessential for as many people as possible, and b) in the meantime, make it up in other areas of the code.
Selectively raising equity concerns as a cudgel against the prospect of dealing with legitimate and severe externality problems (and I'm not saying that you
yourself are selective here, but you are providing cover for folks who
are engaging in that sort of, well, selectivity) is simply unacceptable.
Poll
