Fight gas price hikes with windfall profits tax

Americans, working class, are being burdened with high gas prices. Guess who's making money from the high gas prices - reaping a giant windfall from this crisis? That's right, Big Oil.

They're jacking up prices, raking in record profits and instead of absorbing the high cost of oil or investing the profits in renewable energy research, they are showering their stockholders and executives with cash. So what can be done? Hit Big Oil with a windfall profits tax and use the money to help Americans who are facing sticker shock. The European Union is advising its members to enact a windfall profits tax to prevent war profiteering and legislation was just introduced in Congress to do the same here in the U.S.

The Biden administration is doing the right thing by ramping up economic sanctions on Russia. But punishing Putin doesn't have to mean punishing Americans, especially lower-income earners, along with him. The windfall tax on oil companies is just one way to mitigate harm happening to everyday Americans.

We can also extend the Child Tax Credit to help low-income Americans who are feeling the crunch. We can invest in renewable energy rather than the fossil fuels that give Putin so much power over Europe and the world. That means rejecting calls from the oil companies and Republicans to build liquid-natural-gas export terminals, new pipelines and other dirty infrastructure - and subsidizing solar panels, electric cars and other green energy instead. President Biden even warned oil companies against price-gouging in a recent speech at the White House.

Debbie Styka

Addison