I am all for saving money, as long as public services are not jeopardized at the same time.  Once again, Barack Obama (the candidate that I am supporting during the 2008 Presidential Election) is being ganged up on by John McCain and Hillary Clinton.  Somewhere around April 15, 2008, John McCain and Hillary Clinton started to propose that Congress should allow for a “Gas Tax Holiday” (GTH).  The GTH would take place from Memorial Day 2008 (Monday, May 26, 2008) until Labor Day 2008 (Monday, September 1, 2008).  This would provide drivers with 99 days of relief from having to pay the federal gas tax of 18.4¢ per gallon of gas.  Seems like a great idea until you start to dig into the details of their proposal.

The federal gas tax puts money into the “United States Federal Highway Trust Fund” (USFHTF).  This fund was established in 1956 “to ensure dependable financing for maintenance of the United States Interstate Highway System and certain other roads.”  According to a report in August 2007 by MSNBC, the USFHTF will run out in 2009.  Having a GTH would put our nation’s highway system at a major risk.  Something that lawmakers do not want to do after the I-35W bridge collapse in Minnesota.

But no need to fear (yeah right), John McCain and Hillary Clinton have thought of a solution so the USFHTF doesn’t run out of money during the GTH.  The 18.4¢ tax per gallon of gas will be charged to the oil companies.  Once again, a great idea until you dig further.  What will keep oil companies from just increasing the cost of gas another 18.4¢ per gallon of gas?  Nothing.  The oil companies will not want to jeopardize their current profit margin and will simply increase the cost of gas.

Another thing to consider in all of this is how much it will actually save the average driver during the 99 day GTH.  Today I came across that allows users to calculate how much they will actually save.  The calculator is on Jabberwonk.com and the link is below.

http://www.jabberwonk.com/content/gastaxholiday.htm

During this 99 day GTH, I would save only $14.22 and I drive about 165 miles a week in a 1998 Chevrolet Prizm with a 5-speed manual transmission which gets about 33 miles per gallon.

Please post a comment with the amount of money that you will expected to save if the GTH did take place.

FYI: Like always, I have put together a YouTube playlist which contains videos related to my story.  Check it out at http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=B1D5BBC2B2F0AC9F.