Ohio’s 90-day gas tax holiday was sold to us as relief at the pump. More than three weeks into this tax sabbatical, prices have climbed anyway, and statewide averages are back above the national average.
As The Pennant reported yesterday, the latest jump came after ExxonMobil took a key unit offline at its Joliet, Ill., refinery and maintenance at a Cenovus refinery in Ohio squeezed regional supply. That sent the state average from $4.05 to $4.34 a gallon in a single day.
No tax holiday can fix a refinery outage.
Meanwhile, back at the Statehouse, Gov. Mike DeWine insists suspending the 38.5-cent gas tax and 47-cent diesel tax is helping. But even he concedes it’s “difficult to know for sure” whether the full savings reach consumers.
And the holiday came with a hefty price tag. Lawmakers moved $725 million from the state’s general revenue surplus to cover the lost revenue. That’s taxpayer money recycled into a temporary discount whose timing, weeks before an election, is hard to miss.
Both candidates for governor, Republican Vivek Ramaswamy and Democrat Amy Acton, embraced the idea. It feels less like sound policy and more like a pre-election giveaway Ohioans will pay for down the line.
Besides a couple of broken refineries, the forces driving prices up are the war with Iran and volatile oil markets. Sadly, both are beyond Ohio’s control. And the tax holiday ends after the election. Unless the war ends and oil markets settle by then, prices could leap overnight when the tax returns.
Hindsight is an editorial staff’s right, so let’s use some here. If Ohio has $725 million to spare, wouldn’t it be better to give it back through lower property taxes or across-the-board tax cuts for families? In other words, something people can count on, not a campaign-season gift.
Or here’s a novel idea: Keep it for roads and bridges, which is what the gas tax is for in the first place.
Ohioans don’t need a sugar high at the pump. They need a state government that knows the difference between a gimmick and a policy.
This editorial reflects the views of The Pennant Editorial Board. Questions or comments are welcome at [email protected].