With 112,000 infrastructure projects and 700,000 jobs at stake, the Obama administration and Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx are both urging Congress find a way to provide funding to the United States Highway Trust Fund before the well goes dry as early as August.
Autoblog reports both parties offered Congress a four-year funding bill that would help raise the needed funds through tolling by individual states, and through closing a loophole on deferred corporate taxes on overseas earnings, which alone would bring $150 billion to the table.
In the Senate, an alternative bill is in the works that would retain funding levels at $105 billion annually with interest for six years, though sourcing the funds would come at a later date. Meanwhile, Republican legislators aren't keen on raising taxes to fund the trust, especially during the 2014 election season.
As for why the fund is running dry, an 18.4-cent-per-gallon fuel tax issued in the 1990s hasn't been raised in over 20 years to keep up with increased fuel efficiency among new vehicles, with more increases coming down the CAFE pipeline.
from The Truth About Cars http://ift.tt/Jh8LjA
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