Republican Senators: Cap-And-Trade Bill Results In $3.6 Trillion Gas Tax

October 26, 2009
By Kathleen Hart

As the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee prepares to hold legislative hearings on the Kerry-Boxer climate change bill, Sens. Kit Bond, R-Mo., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, released a report Oct. 21 that concluded the House-passed Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill would amount to a $3.6 trillion gas tax for American families and businesses.

"Cap-and-trade is a giant new gas tax on America's families, farmers and workers. We should not increase pain at the pump in these tough times," Bond said in a news release on the report, "Climate Change Legislation: A $3.6 Trillion Gas Tax."

"We can improve the environment and economy through American ingenuity and technological advancement, not with taxes and mandates that increase costs and burden American families and businesses," Hutchison said.

The Hutchison-Bond report said cap-and-trade legislation such as the Waxman-Markey bill passed by the House of Representatives in June will increase the price of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. It also described the ways in which gas taxes will affect farmers, commuters, truckers and businesses across the nation. The report was supported by farming, small-business and trucking groups, including the American Highway Users Alliance, the American Trucking Association, the American Farm Bureau and the National Black Chamber of Commerce.

"Combining the increased price per gallon of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel expected from climate legislation such as the Waxman-Markey bill multiplied by the amount of fuel this country is expected to use over the life of that bill has revealed the truly massive new gas tax that climate legislation will impose on the American people," the report said. The legislation will impose a $3.6 trillion total gas tax that includes a $2 trillion gasoline tax on U.S. drivers, workers and businesses; a $1.3 trillion diesel fuel tax; and a $330 billion jet fuel tax on U.S. air passengers. "These figures include provisions in the legislation intended to reduce the impact of this massive new gas tax," the report said.

The report suggested that the "gas tax" from the Kerry-Boxer bill, which Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass., and Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., introduced at the end of September, will be even larger than $3.6 trillion. While noting that the Kerry-Boxer cap-and-trade bill omitted details in key areas, "they do suggest even greater emissions reductions of 20% in 2020 instead of the House's 17%. This will drive up the cost of the program, energy prices and energy taxes," the report said. "Additionally, there is no indication that they will expand help to mitigate fuel cost increases."

The Kerry-Boxer bill calls for a 20% reduction in U.S. emissions of carbon dioxide from 2005 levels in 2020 and an 83% reduction in emissions by 2050. The Waxman-Markey bill, HR 2454, which the House of Representatives passed June 26, is less stringent than the Boxer-Kerry bill, requiring electric utilities and other large facilities to reduce CO2 emissions by 17% in 2020 compared with 2005 levels.

Boxer has scheduled three days of hearings during the last week of October on the climate change bill and expects to mark up the legislation within two weeks after the hearings. She has sent the latest version of the chairman's mark to the Environmental Protection Agency for analysis.