Why Congress Won't Attack the Budget

Every budget season, members of Congress say this is the year they’ll make tough choices about government spending. Federal programs must be paid for and not just piled onto the deficit, they insist. Tell that to Wyoming Republican Senator Mike Enzi, who wants to add a whopping half a cent to the 18.4¢ federal tax on a gallon of gas to help keep the Highway Trust Fund from going bust as soon as October. His colleagues scorn the proposal, though, since it would be branded a tax increase.

If Enzi’s measure passed, you probably wouldn’t feel it at the pump. Gas prices can fluctuate a lot more than that in a given week. But you most certainly will feel it driving on crumbling roads if there isn’t enough money to fix them. Enzi has gotten nowhere with this argument. When the Senate Finance Committee took up a highway funding bill last month, he didn’t even put it to a vote. “It would have been 23-1,” Enzi says. “If you’re going to raise a tax—nobody’s really had much practice with that.”