> non-user funds from property taxes and other
> General Fund Appropriations made up $44.5 billion
> of the $116.5 billion in total revenues reported
> by the agency, with the remainder being covered by
> user fees.

Sir, this is exactly what I said. Roads are mostly funded by user fees. I know they are partially general-taxpayer subsidized, which is why I didn’t say “fully funded”. The fact is, the majority of the funds come from the people who use the infrastructure. The only other form of transit I can think of where this is the case is airline travel, and even that is subsidized partially.

The point is that other forms of transit are more heavily funded by non-users, so Greg’s injection of “we pay for roads with taxes, so that’s the same thing” doesn’t really apply.

Quote: Roads are funded mostly by fuel taxes and licensing fees.

False. From the Finance section of the US Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration’s most recent (2006) report, non-user funds from property taxes and other General Fund Appropriations made up $44.5 billion of the $116.5 billion in total revenues reported by the agency, with the remainder being covered by user fees.

(Source: http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policy/ohpi/qffinance.cfm)

There are also many other costs to taxpayers not covered here such as the need for additional enforcement and emergency personnel, as well as infrastructure costs not covered by the Feds. City parking ramps, for example, now cost roughly $50,000 PER STALL to build and maintain. Clearly, these costs are not offset by user fees. These costs all represent taxpayer subsidies of the auto-based transportation system.

Any way you slice it, the car-based transportation system is taxpayer-subsidized.

thanks!

I like to pay taxes. With them I buy civilization.

O.K., taxes buys civilization. Accordingly, the more I am taxed the more I am civilized. If I turn all my property over to the state, I’ll be totally civilized.

Yet every Holems quote has its antithesis:

The power to tax is not the power to destroy while this Court sits. [Oliver Wendell Holmes]

Roads are funded mostly by fuel taxes and licensing fees. People who do not use roads do not buy fuel and do not pay for a drivers license.

“I like to pay taxes. With them I buy civilization.” ~Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

I appreciate your sophmoric sarcasm. Perhaps I should follow your sage advice and move South like many other Wisconsin retirees, college graduates and manufacturing jobs.

As a retired person living on a pension and investments, I pay almost 25% of my income in federal, state, and city taxes—taxes that will only go up. That’s not pixie dust, that’s a hard reality.

You’re the person living in a fool’s pardise where a progressive government will solve all our problems if we were only willing to turn over more and more of our income and property. I’m not willing but they’ll take it anyway.