石油税基金的选择 运输和基础设施The Option of an Oil Tax to Fund Transportation and Infrastructure

本文的目的是提出与使用石油税为美国交通基础设施提供资金有关的关键问题，确定国会在设计此类税时需要做出的决定，并概述采用石油税的一些潜在影响。 2009年，联邦在地面运输基础设施上的支出超过了联邦公路信托基金（HTF）的收入186亿美元。 H HTF由联邦对汽油和柴油的税款提供资金。 由于这些税未列入通货膨胀指数，并且由于美国机动车的效率提高，导致汽油和柴油的购买量减少，因此这些税产生的实际收入有所下降。 国会正在考虑解决运输收入与支出之间差距的方法。

The goal of this paper is to raise the key issues associated with using an oil tax to fund U.S. transportation infrastructure, identify the decisions Congress would need to make in designing such a tax, and outline some of the likely implications of adopting an oil tax. In 2009, federal spending on surface-transportation infrastructure outpaced revenues into the federal Highway Trust Fund (HTF) by $18.6 billion. Te HTF is funded through federal taxes on gasoline and diesel fuel. Because these taxes are not indexed to inflation and because U.S. motor vehicles are becoming more efcient, resulting in fewer purchases of gasoline and diesel, real revenue generated from these taxes has declined. Congress is considering ways to address this gap between transportation revenues and expenditures.