As Congress looks for solutions to help fund the nation's crumbling transportation infrastructure, Delaware's senior senator is offering his own approach.
Sen. Tom Carper (D-Delaware) introduced legislation in Congress last week to raise the nation's fuel taxes. Carper calls the TRAFFIC Relief Act a long-overdue plan to generate new funding for transportation infrastructure across the country.
"We have a terrible, a bad and deteriorating transportation system. We can do something about it at a cost of about two bucks a week," said Carper.
The bill would raise the gas and diesel taxes four cents a year for the next four years, for a 16-cent increase overall. Carper says that comes out to about $2 a week for the average driver.
"I bought a cup of coffee yesterday -- I paid two bucks. It was a small cup. For the price of a fairly small cup of coffee, for every driver in this country, we could have one of the best transportation systems in the world," said Carper.
Carper wants to offset the hike by making permanent a set of earned earned income tax credits for more American families.
Carper describes his plan as a backstop in case other federal funding options to supplement transportation don't come through this fall.
His first choice is the plan advanced by President Obama that would tax corporations’ foreign earnings at around 14 percent rather than the current 35 percent top rate, which could raise around 2 trillion dollars. That has bipartisan support in the House and from the Senate Finance committee, but Carper worries it could face Republican roadblocks.
