GA's "fair share"

On Fri, 04 Nov 2005 15:37:56 -0700, Newps wrote:

You're making it a thousand times harder than it needs to be. User fees
will not be on a per use basis, you will pay a yearly fee most probably
based on the weight of your plane. Canada has user fees. Your typical
single engine spamcan pays less than $50 per year for his user fees.
That's Canadian money of course. So even if the average US owner got a
bill each year for $50 it is trivial to the cost of flying.

I used to pay $25/year to the IRS for the aircraft use tax. That tax
was dropped in the early 1980s because, as was reported at the time,
it cost the IRS more to collect than it brought in. Except for the
inconvenience of filling out an IRS form, I wouldn't mind paying
$50/year.

But that's not the proposal that has had me lying awake at night. I
remember reading a proposal from the Reason Foundation, which has been
a major advocate for user fees, in the Wall Street Journal. As I
recall, that proposal included fees of $50 per touch and go and
$100/hour for IFR operations. That's an unbearable expense, making ATC
cost more far more than gas, depreciation, or insurance.

I think the push for user fees is thinly-veiled attempt at wealth
redistribution. They consider private pilots to be idle rich playboys.
Certain politicians have referred to them as such. The idea of user
fees is to strip them of their ill-gotten riches, acquired only by
stealing from the hard-working poor. These proposals are intended
serve as an interim measure to deal with idle rich playboy pilots, who
do no work and contribute nothing to society, until the worker revolt
finally comes and provides a permanent solution to inequality.

That's why President Clinton proposed FAA user fees with the money
being earmarked for social programs. If the FAA actually needs money
to operate, then why did he even mention social programs? This
proposal completely exposed the purpose of user fees. It's obvious
that the FAA has nothing to do with it.

RK Henry