Before hiking the federal tax on gas, officials should consider abolishing the corn ethanol mandate first, according to a new report from the Manhattan Institute.
Democratic Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer suggested the gas tax this year and in 2013.
According to Manhattan Institute senior fellow Robert Bryce, who authored the research, corn ethanol is proportionally 2.4 times less efficient than regular gasoline.
“In other words, drivers have to fill up their tanks more often because they get fewer miles per gallon,” Bryce said in an interview with The Daily Caller. “This amounts to a hidden tax.”
Even the government admits the lower efficiency of ethanol. The report quotes fueleconomy.gov, which reports that E10 (gas mixed with 10 percent ethanol) makes “3 to 4 percent fewer miles per gallon” than if they ran “on 100 percent gasoline.”
“There is no reason to keep this unfair tax that only profits special interests,” Bryce said. “It’s been maintained by the corn lobby and Big Agriculture for too long already.”