Thanks Alan!

To Brian, Jeffrey and all.
In answer to your (Brian's) recent QT message, I am not sure what commitment I can make to VGT long term, but for a start I will
contact Union of Concerned Scientists and see if there is any
possible partnership there.

With hopes for a new year that will see a halt to the dismantling of our environmental protections-and our very democracy! (dream on...) Alan
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  "Be the change you want to see in the world. Whatever you do may seem insignificant, but it is most important that you do it." -Mahatma Gandhi %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Hi Alan,

Thanks for your last post (/m26) to the Voluntary Gas Tax QuickTopic page.

I like your idea of asking the Union of Concerned Scientists to host the VGT. That would be great, if they're up for it. And I think the other option you mentioned is good too: using a Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund. I had given up on that when I heard that the minimum incremental deposit was $1,000. I'm glad you checked further and found out that they do in fact accept smaller checks.

> We need to greatly increase the number of VGT
> participants if it is to have significant impact
> and to be worth spending time and effort on
> sustaining.

Yup, I agree.

> What exposure in media has actually been achieved?
> Is this low number a sign of lack of publicity or
> of basic stinginess of many drivers?

So far, there's really been very little media exposure. There have been a couple of newspaper articles, but we've never made a big effort to get press coverage about the project. We've also never made an effort to advertise the project, or to get any coverage in newsletters or mailing lists. Up to now we've grown almost entirely just by word-of-mouth alone. I'm sure we'd get more participants if we began to make people aware of the project.

But I'm not sure how many more people would sign up. Most people feel that gas is already too expensive, and paying an additional tax is the last thing they want to do. I think the whole idea of the gas tax is inherently unpopular. The project could still grow to have thousands of members, but I think it would take some real work to get it there.

The first step was just to get the project up and running. We've done that. It seems like the next step would be to start working on getting more exposure, either through press coverage, or advertising, or through some partnership with an organization like the Union of Concerned Scientists.

What we need now is someone who's interested in stepping up to lead the project into that next phase. Unfortunately, I'm not the right person for that job. I'm glad to have had a role in getting the project started, but I don't want to undertake this next phase, for a few different reasons. Partly it's that I don't have experience doing PR or advertising, and partly it's that I'm pretty introverted and people-shy, but the main thing is that I started a new job last year and that's eating up most of my time and energy these days.

I'm hoping that you or one of the other current members might be interested in taking over for me now, and taking on the two tasks that the project is faced with: the task of getting broader exposure for the project, and the task of finding a new home at a tax-exempt organization, like the Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund or the Union of Concerned Scientists. I'd be happy to stay involved and help out in little ways. I can keep providing the web hosting for the gastax.org web site, and I can provide a little bit of funding to help cover overhead costs for the next year or two. And I think Jeffrey is game to keep doing the day-to-day operations, maintaining the member database and doing the bookkeeping and sending out the regular mail messages.

Would you be interested in stepping up your involvement and trying to shepherd the project through these next couple years? I'll also post this message to the QuickTopic list, where other people can see it, in case there are other people who are interested in getting more involved.

Happy New Year,
  Brian
  skinner@gumption.org

I think Alan is on to something big here. the Union of Concerned Scientists could be a huge boon to the effectiveness and membership of the VGT. if they accept, I support this proposal wholehartedly.

Hi Jeffrey and fellow VGT participants,

I have been thinking about the question you, Jeffrey, posed.

1) We need to greatly increase the number of VGT participants if it is to have significant impact and to be worth spending time and
effort on sustaining. What exposure in media has actually been
achieved? Is this low number a sign of lack of publicity or of basic stinginess of many drivers?

2) I checked with the Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund, where I
established my own modest tax exempt charitable fund some years ago. A VGT tax exempt fund could easily be established there with no
annual fee, but it would require $10,000 to open the account and deposits are supposed to be a minimum of $1,000. Neither of these items are insurmountable. We might be able to negotiate a lower
threshold and find donors to get it started. And Fidelity said they do not in fact reject smaller checks from being deposited in a gift fund. So it is not ideal, but possible.

3) Maybe the Union of Concerned Scientists would be willing to host VGT as one of their own programs. This would also give VGT broader exposure as they could publicize VGT through their magazine. Either all proceeds could go to them or they might agree to distribute
percentages to different organizations (including themselves). I would be willing to try to work this out with them if you'all opt for this. I think this could be a good option as it addresses the issue of expanding the number of VGT participants as well.

Those are my thoughts for now,

Alan
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"From the right to know and the duty to inquire come the obligation to act" From Living Downstream by the environmentalist Sandra Steingraber %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

>I propose that our organization considers and votes to allocate
>a portion of our money toward the relief of pain and suffering
>from petroleum-based acts of aggression such as the recent and
>ongoing events in Iraq (which after all does not contain the
>planet's second-largest broccoli reserves). Organizations such
>as Mideast Children's Fund, or Oxfam, or Medecins sans
>Frontieres are providing relief to the innocent and would make
>excellent partners. I feel that it is imperative to stress the
>connections between oil and death, and to link our driving to
>the actions of the US military.
>
>john.p@earthlink.net

My heart agrees with John. I am livid about how the US first
debilitated the Iraqi people through sanctions and then hurt them further with an aggressive attack. I am working in other arenas on such issues. But my head says we need to keep a focus that people can all understand and agree with and I think we need to keep our grant making closely tied to reducing fuel consumption. (Would that we could organize FOOL consumption, starting with Washington!)

Note the "signature" I am using, below, to spread the word.
Alan

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There IS something we can do to REDUCE fuel consumption, emission of greenhouse gases, payments to undemocratic regimes, to reduce trade deficits and encourage a sustainable energy practices. It could even reduce resentment against the US and thus the threat of terrorism. "Reply" to me and ask me about the "Voluntary Gas Tax" or go to
http://www.gastax.org/ . I have been doing it for two years and
recommend it.
Alan
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Hi John,
Given that your proposal has already been discussed in this forum, can you address the arguments given in those previous posts and indicate why you disagree with them?

I propose that our organization considers and votes to allocate a portion of our money toward the relief of pain and suffering from petroleum-based acts of aggression such as the recent and ongoing events in Iraq (which after all does not contain the planet's second-largest broccoli reserves). Organizations such as Mideast Children's Fund, or Oxfam, or Medecins sans Frontieres are providing relief to the innocent and would make excellent partners. I feel that it is imperative to stress the connections between oil and death, and to link our driving to the actions of the US military.

john.p@earthlink.net

>Any suggestions for crafting a better voting policy?
>
>Brian (skinner@gumption.org)

Hi all,
With a preference for keeping things simple, as long as we are a small group that I suspect is compatible and flexible I am
comfortable with a simple average of votes rounded to the nearest 10 cents/gallon- or even an administrative decision. Perhaps a more complex voting system should kick in after there are a minimum of, say, 100 participants.

Best wishes,
Alan

PS: Heard Robert Kennedy Jr. last night describing how if we had sustained the improved US "fleet" mpg under Carter and if the CAFE standards had not been subverted (starting with Reagan admin) we would have been able to be virtually free of Middle East oil imports (and our cosy relations with repressive Saudi's and others), in which case we might not have had the attacks of 9/11/01 and 3/19/03.

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To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only
unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Theodore Roosevelt, 26th US President (1858-1919)
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Subject: tax rate

This is in response to Jon and Alan's posts about tax rates (/m12, /m18, /m19).

I think the tax rate should not be set so high that it's a real obstacle for people who want to participate. And yet it should be set high enough that it does begin to reflect the true costs of driving. We want to provide some real disincentive for driving, and we want to have enough revenue to provide meaningful funding to help offset the impact of our driving.

That said, I'd be perfectly comfortable with anything in the range of 25 to 50 cents per gallon. Initially we wanted to set the tax rate so that it closely matched the externalized costs of the CO2 emissions. But that proved to be difficult. It's hard to know exactly what the real costs are. Economics, climate science, and public policy are inexact sciences. The initial rate of 50 cents per gallon was just a ballpark guess. It's a reasonable rate, but I think 25 cents per gallon is a reasonable rate too, especially if we're talking about also offering an option where people will be paying an air travel tax as well.

I had already cast my vote this year, for 50 cents per gallon, but I sent mail to Jeffrey today asking him to change my vote to something lower. Plus it sounds like Alan will vote for something lower, and my mom was talking about voting for something lower this year.

I'm a little concerned about our voting process. This is what our web site says about the official policy... "Figures from all members are collected, and the new tax rate is set at the average of the median 80% of suggested rates. This is an attempt to get the sense of the group while discarding suggestions outside a reasonable range."

I think that policy might make sense if we had a large number of members, and some of the votes were clearly frivolous, like $8,000/gallon. But given that we have only a small number of members, I think it's especially important that everybody's vote should count. I think we need to figure out some other way to weed out extreme votes, but still count everybody's votes when people are voting for what they really think is the right thing to do.

Any suggestions for crafting a better voting policy?

Brian (skinner@gumption.org)

Hey Jon, thanks for the post about "gas tax as economic policy" vs. "gas tax as self-punishment" (/m18). I've also run into the need for making that distinction. It's good to see it all in writing.

Brian (skinner@gumption.org)

In regards to Jon's comments, I agree in principle with his comments about 50 cents per gallon being a powerful disincentive to
driving/flying, but it sometimes may pose difficult choices such as in my case.

I should first note that I used to drive more. Now whenever possible I walk, ride my bicycle or take public transportation. When I drive on the highway I allow more time and go about 45-50 mph to conserve fuel (which is sometimes problematic when others are going 70 mph!) My resistance to driving sometimes puts a strain on personal
relationships. As you can imagine, not wanting to go "away" for a vacation doesn't always go over very well!

I use my car when I have to carry a lot of stuff. This stuff is usually computers that I collect and refurbish for a poor school district in South Africa. To quit this unpaid "job" would be a tricky trade off-I would have to sacrifice the benefits for literally
thousands of school children. (I hope that the more educated the children are, the more environmentally aware they will be.)

I believe so far I have provided a significant fraction (1/4?) of all VGT money collected. The VGT concept has only a limited value if a handful of us participate. I know this is very unscientific, but I am pretty committed to put my money where my mouth is, yet even I feel some hesitation for writing out checks for more than $100 a whack.
Anyway, if it remains 50 cents a gallon, I still enthusiastically support the concept. But we must expand the number of participants. I am working on going through all my old email and compiling a big list of addresses to email to about it. I also mention it whenever I am at any kind of environmental meeting.

Alan

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Population pressures "create a volatile mixture of youthful
aspirations that when coupled with economic and political
frustrations help form a large pool of potential terrorists." George H.W.Bush
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In reference to Alan's post, I am in favor of keeping the tax rate at 50 cents per gallon. I agree with him when he said that an expensive tax is "partly the point," but not perhaps for the reason he meant.

I think that some people have the idea that the VGT is some form of punishment for doing something we know we shouldn't do (or should at least do less) but we do anyway. But in my mind it has a more important goal than just self-flagellation. I think the point is to use economics to influence our choices in a direction which more closely matches the realities of our fuel usage.

In a previous post I said that having to pay for the combined 700 gallons of fuel that my wife and I used when flying to Thailand might discourage such action in the future. I meant that seriously, despite the smiley. My point there wasn't that we should have to pay because We Were Bad; it was that if we knew it was going to cost us an additional $350, it might have affected our decision-making about how to take a vacation.

Similarly, when Alan said that he "can't avoid driving 10-15,000 miles a year," I suspect that that was only partly the case. I can think of very few reasons why someone truly couldn't avoid that. I'm guessing that it's Alan's choices (regarding job, SO, family, whatever) which make that driving necessary. But the point is that those really are choices. If the gas tax is expensive for him, that's good; not because he deserves punishment, but because it causes his personal economics to reflect the true cost of his decisions.

Now I hope I haven't come off sounding holier-than-thou, because my point is precisely that I don't think the VGT should be a holier-than-thou tax. I'm sure Alan has some good reasons for driving as much as he does, and I'm certainly in no position to say he shouldn't. I just think that the VGT introduces a financial aspect into our choices which helps move us in the direction we want to go. Lower the tax rate and that effect is lessened.

With all that said, I should address Alan's second point, which was that a lower tax rate might encourage more people to join. He may well be right. I would be interested in finding out if that is true, because I would very much like to see the membership expand. I'm not sure there's a good way to find out without experimenting with different rates. On the other hand, we probably all know some people whom we've told about the VGT but who haven't joined. It would be interesting to ask them whether they would have joined if the rate were lower (e.g. 25, 10, even 5 cents per gallon).

If someone convinced me that lowering the rate to 25 cents per gallon really would draw in more people, then I wouldn't feel strongly about it one way or the other, despite what I said above.

Edited by author 04-16-2003 03:40 AM
Subject: open process organizations

I discovered a web site that has some appealing ideas about the governance of online communities. I thought other people here might be interested in these links:

OpenProcess -- http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?OpenProcess
PeerPrivilege -- http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?PeerPrivilege
AuditTrail -- http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?AuditTrail
FairProcess -- http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?FairProcess

Subject: web site additions

A couple people have suggested additions to the gas tax web site.

   Ben suggested "a table of uses and their correlated VGT charges" ... "in general people don't have a clear picture of how much fossil fuel they each use in many different ways. A table of uses and relevant figures would [be good]"

   Alan suggested: "How about an issues page of the VGT web site devoted to all the issues that people can think of that relate to fuel consumption?"

I think it'd be great if we could get the gas tax site set up so that anybody could add new pages. I just learned about Wikis last year. You may know about Wikis already, but in case you don't, a Wiki is just a kind of web based collaboration platform. Using a Wiki, a group of people can set up a web site where any of the web pages are editable by anybody who is reading the page. Traditional web pages are set up so that one person publishes and many people read. The publisher effectively "owns" the content. In contrast, with a Wiki web site the content is all collectively owned. Anybody can make corrections or additions whenever they want. Alternatively, it's also possible to set up a Wiki site where not just anyone can make changes, but where all of the people who have accounts and passwords still can. For more info, check out the TWiki home page at http://www.twiki.org/

I think it'd be great to get the whole gas tax web site set up as a Wiki site. I like the idea of web site being run in a collegial way instead of a publish-subscribe kind of way. But I think there are some practical problems with that. For one thing, just installing the Wiki software can be pretty involved, and then administering it might be some work, and it might lead later to portability and migration problems. Plus, right now the gas tax site is hosted through a service that only offers a limited range of features, so it might not even be possible to install the Wiki software there.

But I'd love to see us move to a wiki-based web site, if that became practical. Let me know if you know of an easy way to do that, or if you know someone who might be interested in hosting that site, or voluntering their time to get it set up.

Edited by author 04-16-2003 03:17 AM
Subject: tax rate

Here's a quick summary of what people have said in response to Jeffrey's question:
   "The gas tax rate for 2002 driving is set at 50 cents/gallon. What do you think an appropriate tax rate for 2003 would be?"

50 cents/gallon -- nobody
25 cents/gallon -- Alan

Abstain (happy with any reasonable rate) -- Brian