In Our View: Roads Need Attention

The headline seemed familiar, as though plucked from a different time: “Gas prices break $2 barrier in Clark County.”

But while consumers have grown accustomed over the years to reading about gas prices breaking one barrier or another, the alternate-universe reality this weekend was that prices have fallen below $2 a gallon at some outlets in Clark County. That’s a far cry from the roughly $4 a gallon motorists were paying in early July — a situation that has generated numerous policy implications.

What, for example, should the federal government do about the national gas tax? The federal tax of 18.4 cents per gallon, used primarily to fund the Highway Trust Fund, has not been raised in two decades. In the meantime, inflation has rendered the Highway Trust Fund nearly insolvent even as infrastructure projects go largely ignored. Late last year, Congress propped up the highway fund with a poorly conceived plan to allow the use of “pension smoothing” to help provide revenue. With the nation’s bridges and roads drifting toward disrepair, some long-term, fiscally responsible solutions are required.

And what, for example, should the state government do to fund infrastructure? Washington’s gas tax of 37 cents a gallon is among the highest in the nation, and yet the Legislature has failed in recent years to approve a transportation package that would provide for economically vital projects.

For both the new Congress and the new Legislature, the notion of increasing the gas tax is enticing. The American Society of Civil Engineers has given the condition of roads throughout the United States a grade of D, and the importance of a sound infrastructure to a burgeoning economy is indisputable. With gas prices plummeting in recent months, and with consumers celebrating prices that flirt with the $2-a-gallon mark, it likely will be many years before the public is this receptive to a hike in the gas tax.

The problem, however, is that such a hike would be reactionary to factors that are inevitably temporary. As The Washington Post reports, “Today’s price level — and the enormous cyclical swing in price since June — is not a ‘new normal’ for oil; it’s the old normal.” Current gas prices appear exceedingly low, yet they are within the historical range when adjusted for inflation. The dichotomy is a result of historically high prices in recent years: “The four years with the highest average crude prices since the 1860s were 2008, 2011, 2012, and 2013,” the Post reports. “So when people talk about cheap oil, they’re talking about crude oil that is still more expensive than the average price from 1986 to 2004.”

There also is a bit of fool’s gold involved in examining the reasons for the recent drop in prices. While some of the change is the result of increased domestic crude extraction, the primary factor is an increase in production by Saudi Arabia. “The kingdom is the driving force behind the drop in prices because it has grown weary of cutting its own oil output in order to prop up prices enjoyed by other countries,” according to The Washington Post.

In other words, gas prices will increase when Saudi Arabia decides that they should be increased. Which makes it important to separate current prices from any discussion about American gas taxes and American infrastructure.

Regardless of how much motorists are paying at the pump, the United States is in dire need of infrastructure investment. That investment should be made no matter what the headlines are saying about gas prices.