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 Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker has proposed temporarily blocking the automatic
annual gas tax increase for fiscal year 2023, but the election-year promise
offers little real savings compared to the cost he imposed when he doubled the
tax in 2019.
Pritzker said Feb. 5 preventing the increase “does right by working families
across the state” as part of his new Illinois budget proposal. But working
families are already paying $105 more a year per driver thanks to Pritzker
doubling the state gas tax to 38 cents per gallon in 2019 and building in
automatic increases that have boosted the tax to 39.2 cents.
Illinois drivers paid the nation’s 10th-highest state gas tax before Pritzker
took office in 2019. Illinois gas now averages second-highest thanks to the
doubled gas tax, which Pritzker imposed to fund a $45 billion infrastructure
plan filled with pork projects.
Combined with federal taxes and state fees, Illinoisans now pay 78 cents in
taxes per gallon.
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Pritzker’s policy has encouraged Illinois residents
living near the state line to fill up in neighboring states where
they stand to save an average of about 28 cents per gallon in total
taxes. Illinoisans who buy gas in Missouri – home to the
second-lowest gas tax in the nation – save nearly 40 cents per
gallon.
Future automatic increases to the state gas tax will only exacerbate
Illinois’ competitive disadvantage compared to neighbors. Automatic
increases also let state lawmakers escape responsibility for
unpopular tax hike votes, plus do the most harm to low-income
Illinoisans who can least afford them.
Lawmakers need to pull back on automatic gas taxes and repeal the
2019 gas tax hike. That would truly help working families – much
more than a temporary delay of a tax hike. |
