"It would lose us $2 million a day — that’s $6 million for three days. But I think it would be a big boost for the state’s economy and most of all, it would just give our citizens a break (from high gas prices)."
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[B’ Spokes: Do you really want to know what would be good for the economy? Give away $6 million in bikes, cargo trailers, racks and panniers. Empower the people to spend money and a verity of goods and services without sinking so much into just one thing that mostly profits out of state business.
Or maybe we should look at every parked car as someone begging for a hand out because they can no longer afford to be a profitable member of society by going lots of places like they once did. So cyclists could unite to form a chartable society and take some of that money we save and give it to "the poor" cars in the form of little gas cans and printed on the side of the gas can something like: "We know owning a car is expensive so here is enough gas to get you to the store and back so you can spend your money on more important things then just gas. Or you could go out and buy a bike like we did and save even more."
Of course giving away little cans of gas is silly but so is gas tax holiday. If you want to give people a holiday, how about $6 million worth of six Flags or Movie discounts? Why does the auto industry and only the auto industry benefit from such "deals", what’s wrong with spreading some anti-inflation around? It’s not like the price of gas is the only thing that got more expensive.
Assuming we get people to buy as much gas as they are saving in tax, that’s $5 million that Maryland is giving to the middle east and other places that produced the gas and less then one million will stay in the local economy (See "Cars, good for the economy".) It’s like co-opting "buy from local farmers markets because it’s good for the economy" with "buy anything but locally produced stuff." ]
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Md. comptroller calls for gas tax freeze: https://www.wtop.com/?sid=2397801&nid=697
Cars, good for the economy: https://www.baltimorespokes.org/article.php?story=20110221143044883oldId.20110529210213835
Biking in Baltimore