Remembered as a triumph of bipartisanship, the reality of the 1982 gas tax increase was a bit messier.
www.enotrans.org
Overview. The Highway Revenue Act of 1982 has now passed into transportation industry folklore as a tri-
umph of bipartisanship – a Republican President who had recently passed the largest tax cuts in living mem-
ory joined with a Democratic House of Representatives and a Republican Senate to more than double (from
4 cents per gallon to 9 cents per gallon) federal motor fuels taxes and to use that money to provide large
increases in federal spending on highways and bridges and, for the first time, to provide a permanent federal
role in funding urban mass transit. Crumbling infrastructure would be repaired; jobs would be created; and
economic recovery would be advanced. As the legend goes, people of goodwill in both political parties saw a
great national need and came together to find a politically challenging, bipartisan, common-sense solution.
The reality is a bit messier.
Republicans love gasoline taxes and other consumption taxes because they **** over working people more than other income demographics. So do Democrats, but Republicans especially love them and VAT taxes. Reagan also sicced the IRS on waitresses. lol