Agreed
Thursday, May 14, 2026 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Eschaton…
Federal Gas Tax Cut
It’s always on the table when gas prices rise, which I suspect leads to people thinking that it’s a significant amount when it’s only 18.5 cents/gallon.
It’s an action which will make people more mad, because it’s inevitably swamped by the actual price increase. You promised help! You said you’d cut the tax but gas is still 5 bucks a gallon!
Discuss.
- Occasionally Moderated - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 8:55 am:
Can someone refresh me or provide a link to when Illinois did this and can we expect similar national effect.
- thingamajaig - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 8:56 am:
That’s how it is with all the insignificant taxes. It’s just to generate a talking point. Take, for example, the elimination of the state’s whopping 1 percent grocery tax. Relief for working families…. not! Even worse, since cities and villages retain power to levy a new grocery tax
- hisgirlfriday - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:03 am:
2000.
Here’s a JCAR report
https://cgfa.ilga.gov/Upload/GasTaxSuspension.PDF
I feel like at some point during that gas tax holiday I paid just under $1 a gallon (likely for the last time in my lifetime)
- Demoralized - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:15 am:
People think prices will go down penny for penny in the amount of the tax. It’s like people thinking that if Illinois suspended it’s gas tax prices would go down 50 cents a gallon. That won’t happen. Not even close. There will be some other reason that “causes” gas prices to remain higher. Some other thing will happen around the world or gas stations will simply pocket the extra money.
- City Zen - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:22 am:
Another example of where the beneficiary (govt) of a tax gets to measure the benefits in the aggregate while dismissing the cost at the individual level as trivial. The problem is the individual is bombarded by dozens of these taxes where, if each were looked at in the aggregate and were reduced in as equally a trivially manner, would amount to a substantial savings to the individual. But that never happens.
- PolOp - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:26 am:
This sounds an awful like what will happen with the property tax relief gimmick in the House’s megaproject legislation.
“You said this was the biggest property tax relief in Illinois history, but my taxes still went up!”
- WhiteHat76 - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:30 am:
To City’s point - it’s all death by 1,000 cuts. When dollars count, saving $10 a week on gas could be monumental for some folks. And that’s just the federal tax.
Personally, a suspension of the State gas tax in conjunction with the federal suspension would yield my family about $125 of savings in a month of driving.
- StarLineChicago - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:33 am:
It’s also lose-lose because not only do consumers generally not notice it, but it blows massive holes in already-thin transportation budgets.
- Huh? - Thursday, May 14, 26 @ 9:33 am:
Gas tax holidays are so stupid only an idiot could think of it.
A federal gas tax holiday will further exacerbate the insolvency problems of the Highway Trust Fund. The Highway Trust Fund pays for a significant portion of highway construction project through the Surface Transportation Program block grants thst are distributed to each State.