[Retric]

For some reason Amtrak is by far the least subsidized form of transport in the US. If cars had so little subsidy gas tax would be 3 dollars a gallon to cover road construction, maintenance, and parking lots etc. Airplanes are less subsidized, but you would still see an extra 20-40% added to the ticket price.

It might not be rational, but we pay a lot more in taxes to make it seem like traveling is far less expensive than it actually is.

[twoodfin]

You're completely wrong about Federal highway spending: 90+% is funded by gas taxes and other user fee-like sources. In contrast, Amtrak is hugely subsidized on a passenger-miles basis.

[Retric]

I suggest you rethink the numbers.

Several states impose a fuel tax that's below their sales tax limit. They still need to pay for road maintenance.

"U.S. annual gasoline consumption is 140 billion gallons and growing." The federal tax is 18.4 cents per gallon that's 25.76 billion a year but you need to subtract out the oil company subsidy's, NHTSA's billion a year for safety, federal reconstruction aid after a disaster etc, and not just the new federal construction costs.

While 'free parking' is available in large sections of the country it still takes land and someone needs to maintain it. However, it's vary unusual for federal, state, or local governments to pay for such parking as part of a gas tax, it's generally taken from the budget of the agency providing that parking space.

[patrickgzill]

You are very, very wrong, because not only are you not accounting for state fuel taxes, but toll roads, AND, the extra fees paid by truckers and other commercial vehicles. However I am not goint to write a dissertation for your sole benefit - suffice it to say, that each 18 wheeler you see, is a source of over $25K per year in taxes. Yes, over $2000 per month.

[Retric]

18 wheeler's do significantly more damage than cars or bridges to road surfaces. I could go into it, but I don't think you want to hear that the average 18 wheeler does more than 2k a month in damage to road surfaces. (It's vary weight and speed dependent, but when you look at the average it's well over 2k a month. http://archive.gao.gov/f0302/109884.pdf basically road damage from one 18-wheeler is equivalent to 9600 cars.)

Anyway, I responded to someone making a very specific claim about federal spending so I responded to that, state spending is a far more complex issue so here are some numbers:

http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/rate/mf.pdf

Do you really think Alaska magically get's by on 8 cents a gallon or are the diverting funds for somewhere else to pay for roads? They don't have a sales tax so the math is easy on that one.

But, now let's look at Wyoming it has a nice 4% general tax on everything and charges 14 cents a gallon for gas. Let's say gas is around 3.25 a gallon before taxes and at 4% would wait for it be 13 cents. Do you think that single extra cent is going to pay to maintain all their roads? Because if the tax was 12 cents a gallon clearly they would be subsidizing that relative to you buying say cheeseburgers and they don't exactly have a lot of toll roads. Then again, if they spent close to the same percentage on road maintenance as people did on gas then the numbers would work out just fine. But wait for it, they don't.

[bjoernw]

How do you know so much about federal and municipal taxes? HN is made up of people with such diverse backgrounds, I'm curious.