Let’s eliminate the Sales tax and replace it with another tax. A Fossil Fuel/Carbon Sales tax. Well will tax consumers in there Carbon fuel purchasing if that consumer or business does not have to compete in an import/export market. That is a restaurant and store that doesn’t have to compete with china, but steel making and car manufacture would.

In my state I pay a Sales tax when I buy a car, new and used, but I don’t pay a Carbon tax on the fuel. I pay a tax for roads, but nothing for the fuel. It’s the fuel that is polluting and depleatable. The car, if the money that I spend in the Sales tax was put into a more fuel efficient vehicle and made up for with a Carbon Fuel tax, we would be generally better off, same amount of money going to taxes, less Carbon fuel used.

Let’s cut Property taxes in half. We need Property taxes in high density areas like cities, but lets eliminate property taxes for farmland, but tax the Carbon fuel used to plant and harvest the crops. The land is going to be here 50, 100, 500 or a million years. The fossil fuel we use will be long gone. Lets reduce the Property taxes on buildings, but increase the taxes on the Carbon fuel used to heat, light and cool the building. The building will be here 50, maybe a 100, and even 500 years from now, but the fossil/carbon fuel use the heat, power and cool the buildingw will be long gone. By taxing the Carbon fuel instead of the buildings we would be better off because we would have incentive to use less of the polluting and depleatable fossil fuels.

We are Tax Stupid. We don’t respect the things that are here long term, like buildings and land by taxing them at the level we do. We don’t respect the things that are polluting and depleatable, like fossil/carbon fuels, by not taxing them to keep them around.