8 Reasons Trump's Proposed Gas Tax Will Not Make America Great.

1. A Gas Tax Will Affect Every Business and Consumer, Even Many of Those Who Cannot Afford to Pay It. Any company which uses gasoline or diesel to make or transport goods or services, which has suppliers who do or which has employees who can’t simply walk to work or who buy anything from such firms will be under at least some kind of pressure to pay more for its raw materials or labor. As that would seem to include pretty much every single firm in the country, the fact that we associate rises in fuel prices with drops in economic activity should be no big surprise. Heck, after the petrol inflation of the 70s and early 80s, which at times hit the double-digits, it should be old news. Somehow though, Donald Trump, who believes that income tax is too much of a burden on our nation’s enterprises even though it at least tries to adjust itself to be affordable, does not seem to understand that such an increase in expenses would be a problem or that by raising costs it would in fact inhibit job growth. 2. A Gas Tax Will Also Be Cumulative and So It Will Cost More Than Its Stated Percentage. A sales tax does not, after all, simply impose itself at the point where the consumer buys something. It also puts a cost on sales between producers, refiners, wholesalers and brokers, and, as each business is going to pass that added expense to their buyers, it actually raises prices by a larger percentage than the one the government claims to collect. Hell, since it taxes the total price of something, it even ends up taxing the previous tax payments that have raised that price. For this reason, even a low 3% tax gathered only from a driller, a refiner, a wholesaler and a retailer would raise pump prices over nine and a quarter percent, and one of 6% one would raise it slightly over a 19% one. Obviously though, if more companies come into the picture, the expense would be greater, so these figures may well be conservative. 3. All of Which Means That Common People Will Be Able to Buy Less. Obviously, if companies are going to charge more for goods and services and consumers will have to cope with the resulting rises in prices for both those commodities and fuel itself, they’re going to have to make at least some number of sacrifices. 4. And For These Reasons We Will Be Sacrificing at Least Some Job Growth. Obviously, any company which has to pay more for something loses its ability to pay for something else, and any company whose customers have to buy less of their products will be in the same shape. Because of this, then, any company facing both of these problems becomes quite unlikely to try anything so expensive and risky as expansion. 5. As the Tax Will Not Affect Sales Made outside the United States, It Will Give an Advantage to Foreign Petroleum Concerns. Any company buying oil offshore or refining, storing or wholesaling it there will avoid at least a 3% cost each time it does this, and as it can then pass this saving on to consumers, it will have an obvious price advantage over anyone using American firms at any time. Obviously then, such a foreign driller, refiner, wholesaler or retailer will be able to make more sales than its competitors and will thus be able to deprive our firms of income. 6. As the Loss of Such Incomes Is Associated with Layoffs, It May Decrease Employment. Just check with the nearest auto worker. 7. It Will Worsen Any Price Increase by OPEC. As the gas tax increases fuel costs by a percentage of petroleum’s untaxed price, it will worsen any rise in that untaxed price, so if OPEC wants to raise its per barrel price, we’ll end up facing an even worse situation than one involving such a rise without the tax. 8. Thus, It Will Strengthen the Bargaining Power of the Non-Israeli Nations of the Middle East. Given that OPEC might just stage such a rise in prices to teach us some kind of lesson about supporting Israel or trying to suppress terrorism, it would in fact give them a bigger way of hurting us when they tried.