benefit everyone... the port athority doesn't benefit everyone, not everyone is suffering from asthma, i doubt everyone else is under driving into work everyday. reducing demand on FF, doesn't help everyone, you've said several times it'll be made up in china and india(mostly)... very quickly with only 1 city here raising gas tax...this would only be a drop in a oil barrel for consumption decrease.

you're using emotional "reasons" to say you're correct in advocating the tax increase. although i would agree that taxing people that use the "service" is the most fair thing that the gov can do, it is not the best solution available.

benefit everyone... the port athority doesn't benefit everyone, not everyone is suffering from asthma, i doubt everyone else is under driving into work everyday. reducing demand on FF, doesn't help everyone, you've said several times it'll be made up in china and india(mostly)... very quickly with only 1 city here raising gas tax...this would only be a drop in a oil barrel for consumption decrease.

you're using emotional "reasons" to say you're correct in advocating the tax increase. although i would agree that taxing people that use the "service" is the most fair thing that the gov can do, it is not the best solution available.

Why would you even look at those things individually? I clearly made them as a list to include all people who would benefit. The sum total of that list will include pretty much everyone in the metro area. You might find one non-allergy sufferer who never drives... but guess what... THEY THEN DON'T PAY THE TAX!

I've also clearly been using Pittsburgh as an example of what should happen to metro areas nationwide.

Loki,

What you posted isn't even relevant. Nothing in my proposals involves me or anyone else giving up their V8s. All it does is make the option of public transit available to more people who can then choose to use it or not.

There is a minimum level of service frequency that is required for any transit system to maintain viable ridership. That minimum is actually rather high. That means the overhead is rather high because sometimes you are running buses that are half full. It also means that as a profit making venture, public transit is doomed. It must have subsidies to operate.

In Pittsburgh and many other cities, the transit has been so much that even people who don't want to drive and want to take the bus cannot do so because service is no longer offered.

Offering people the option to get out of their cars and use public transit is NOT AT ALL like the situation in the video you described.

not relevant? it's showing that there are other options than "public" transit. because public transit "can't" make a profit, it crowds out real businesses providing the "Service" therefore being a drain on tax payers and creating fake jobs(no business can operate w/o a profit). your proposal insists that supply and demand "don't matter" to gov when it taxes it's citizens and tourists if it can provide a service not yet in the market place. this thinking shows why there is no private action to be taken in the market place as far as a business is concerned. the power to coerce can only destroy in an already civilized society.

here in my city a taxi company was basically taken over by the city so that we can have a public transit system. granted there are still taxis that run around town, but now they have gov competition which has to be effecting their bottom line, i don't know what the income/expenses are for our transit system is either, but based on what you said, i don't have too.

Why would you even look at those things individually? I clearly made them as a list to include all people who would benefit. The sum total of that list will include pretty much everyone in the metro area. You might find one non-allergy sufferer who never drives... but guess what... THEY THEN DON'T PAY THE TAX!

I've also clearly been using Pittsburgh as an example of what should happen to metro areas nationwide.

pittsburg isn't a microcosm of metro areas nationwide.

if they don't "pay the tax" then they must be self reliant. which i don't see happening in a city. seeing as this whole topic was about a federal tax, local solutions for local problems. we've talked about the gas tax many times before in other threads. i don't see this going anywhere else.

has the NYC subway put the taxi companies out of business?

Congratulations loki, you have successfully demonstrated why we only allow certain members into the Politics forum.