I Wonder

Do you suppose anyone on the Washington Post editorial board reads the Washington Post?

One day after that editorial team called for an increase in the gas tax (again), a regressive tax that slams the poorest among us hardest, we get this:

Poor? Pay Up.
By DeNeen L. Brown, Washington Post Staff Writer

Consider this a primer on the economics of poverty.

"The poor pay more for a gallon of milk; they pay more on a capital basis for inferior housing," says Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.). "The poor and 100 million who are struggling for the middle class actually end up paying more for transportation, for housing, for health care, for mortgages. They get steered to subprime lending. . . . The poor pay more for things middle-class America takes for granted."

Poverty 101: We'll start with the basics. [link]

The long and short of it is this: The poor find themselves paying more for everything. With money many of them don't have.

Knowing that, how can the Washington Post editorialists call - repeatedly - for increases in the gas tax? And the cigarette tax? And health care taxes? And climate change taxes (for God's sake)? Have they no compassion? Are they that far removed from the reality we call America? Are their heads buried so deep in Washington politics that they are unable to get a whiff of that odor that emanates from the impoverished environs of Appalachia? Do they not care?

The answer comes in the editorial that demands higher gas taxes:

"Hardly anyone welcomes higher gas prices. But Bob Chase, head of the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance, estimates that a 10-cent increase in the gas tax would cost Virginians an average of $60 a year."

Chump change. $60.

Unless that's what you have to spend on groceries over the next two weeks.