Symposium Summary documents
Full Summary
PDF, 587K, 26 pages
Session 1: Implementation Pathways
Session 2: Public and Political Acceptance
Session 4: State of the Practice: Demonstration Projects
Session 6: Roles of the Public and Private Sector
Session 7: Perspectives from Taxation and Revenue Agencies
Session 8: Interactive Discussion
Findings from the Third National Symposium on Mileage-Based User Fees, by Nicholas Wood, Ginger Goodin and Richard T. Baker
Prepared for submission to the Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting, 2012.
PDF, 188K, 11 pages
June 15th Workshop Proceedings:
Summary of Workshop on Integrating PAYD Insurance and Mileage-Based Road User Fees
PDF, 66K, 5 pages
Summary: Session 7
Perspectives from Taxation and Revenue Agencies
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
TREY BAKER, Moderator (Bio)
Texas Transportation Institute
RICH PRISINZANO, Panelist (Bio)
US Department of the Treasury
MARK MURIELLO, Panelist (Bio)
Port Authority of New York and New Jersey
Panelists from tax and revenue agencies gave a brief introduction about their roles and responsibilities and responded to questions on factors to consider in designing a mileage-based fee system.
Rich Prisinzano
The Perspective From a Taxation Agency
- The process for collecting the federal gas tax used to be at the retailer level, but it moved to the refineries directly due to incidents of evasions from individual retailers.
- It is recommended to consider how the current taxation system incentivizes behavior when adopting new taxation rules. At times, the intent and goals of a proposed system may counter the existing structure. For example, alternatively fueled vehicles currently have a federal tax credit, but these vehicles would be taxed under a mileage fee system.
- Taxation policies need to be consistent.
- Finances to support fuel tax rebates are supported by the General Fund, not the Highway Trust Fund. A farmer who pays for fuel to use a tractor off-road is an example of when a tax rebate would be granted.
- An increase to the gas tax is seen as an interim solution. However, the consumer response to change in price is mostly elastic.
[ Top ]
Mark Muriello
The Perspective from the Tolling Industry
- The leadership from the tolling industry leadership has not been keen about the concept of vehicle mileage fees.
- The toll industry should provide insight on the role of the federal government by helping to answer critical questions.
- What should be the standards to certify technology applications?
- What are the mechanisms to settle financial transactions across state and political boundaries?
- Price transparency is a major obstacle toward gaining public acceptance; however, road user fees have the capability to be much more transparent, with regard to explaining transportation finance, to the user.
- The public has a misunderstanding about how taxes and fees finance the transportation system by insisting a viewpoint that all roads and highways are free.
- More research needs to be conducted on equity to identify the winners and losers under a vehicle mileage fee system.
- A mileage fee solution that can allow for market choice is essential to the implementation process. For example, electronic tolling was successful because consumers chose to have transponders. Many users were incentivized to make that choice because value-added services such as reduced waiting time at toll booths and electronic tolling were incorporated.
[ Top ]
