The Atlantic: How Red States Learned to Love the Gas Tax

If nothing has changed in Washington, why are Republicans so tax-happy on the state level—at least when it comes to fuel? “The difference is states have to balance their budgets,” said Carl Davis, a senior analyst at ITEP. Unlike Congress, state lawmakers can’t simply borrow money and accumulate debt when the coffers run dry, and the sorry state of the nation’s transportation infrastructure has been well-documented. “States have a tough list of options they can choose from,” Davis explained:They can raise the gas tax, they can raise a different tax, or they can cut spending on education and other parts of the budget and spend that money on roads and bridges instead. Because you can only let your infrastructure get so bad before you have to find a way to deal with it.

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