Time For Airlines To Pay Fuel Tax
01/24/09 14:19
Unlike every other transportation mode, airliners don’t pay fuel tax.
Trains pay fuel tax, cars & buses pay, ferries and ships pay, trucks pay. (So do farm tractors and construction equipment.) Airliners don’t and this is neither right nor fair.
It is time to fix this now.
Free Rider...
Unlike vehicles, trains, boats and other fuel users, airlines pay no or fuel taxes virtually worldwide. In the U.S., airlines pay 8% of what other transportation methods use. They also do not pay state sales taxes while ferries and other transportation do.
This means other transportation methods subsidize airlines.
What To Do?
At the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Chicago Conference in 1944 established that governments would not charge airlines tax on fuel in order to stimulate air transport. Most IATA member countries wanted robust airline growth and adopted this stimulus plan - however with airlines blanketing the world today, the need for stimulus is gone.
IATA lobbies hard to prevent aviation fuel taxes, however a few countries such as Norway, the Netherlands and the UK have begun to tax domestic airline emissions and fuel.
As part of the United Nations, we think International Civil Aviation Aviation Organization has a responsibility to endorse airline fuel be taxed at the same rate as road transportation for domestic and international routes. But in the meantime, countries like the U.S. should begin at home by taxing airlines equally to other transportation modes.
Q: What is the difference between reducing energy consumption in cars or lightbulbs and airliners?
A: When people buy efficient cars and lightbulbs they don't typically drive more or leave the lights on longer so energy consumption goes down. Whereas new more efficient airliners (as used by Southwest Airlines and RyanAir)
... drive down the cost of flying and people fly more.
The "demand elasticity" for air travel means more efficient planes may not save energy whereas more efficient lighting and cars do. Partly that is because air travel is government subsidized by other forms of transportation so prices are artficially low.
IATA lobbies hard to prevent aviation fuel taxes, however a few countries such as Norway, the Netherlands and the UK have begun to tax domestic airline emissions and fuel.
As part of the United Nations, we think International Civil Aviation Aviation Organization has a responsibility to endorse airline fuel be taxed at the same rate as road transportation for domestic and international routes. But in the meantime, countries like the U.S. should begin at home by taxing airlines equally to other transportation modes.
Q: What is the difference between reducing energy consumption in cars or lightbulbs and airliners?
A: When people buy efficient cars and lightbulbs they don't typically drive more or leave the lights on longer so energy consumption goes down. Whereas new more efficient airliners (as used by Southwest Airlines and RyanAir)
... drive down the cost of flying and people fly more.
The "demand elasticity" for air travel means more efficient planes may not save energy whereas more efficient lighting and cars do. Partly that is because air travel is government subsidized by other forms of transportation so prices are artficially low.
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