I've always wondered why gas stations include the cost of tax in the rates that they advertise. Most things are advertised as X + tax...even for things were the cost of the item makes the tax quite a bit of money (ie: cars).
It would seem to make sense for gas stations to advertise the real price, and then say plus tax. It would make the price look less on their ads...and would make people realise just how much they are paying in taxes.
Is this against some law, in an attempt by the government to keep people from complaining? I tried google...but couldn't find anything useful.
Posted by Boris (Member # 6935) on :
It's actually a better idea for them to advertise the cost with tax included, mostly because pricing without tax would confuse the heck out of customers, who aren't often aware of how much they pay in taxes. Most of the gas stations I go to have the tax rate shown on the pump somewhere, and it's usually a pretty large portion of the cost (like 50-60 cents per gallon).
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
It wouldn't fit on most signs now a days.
Posted by docmagik (Member # 1131) on :
My guess is it's required by law.
Betcha a dollar.
Posted by littlemissattitude (Member # 4514) on :
In my experience, gas stations used to post the amount of tax and the distribution of them (state, federal, sales tax) per gallon on each gasoline pump. They don't do that any more, at least not around here. Maybe someone doesn't want us to know exactly how much of what we are paying at the pump goes to taxes.
Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :
I don't understand the .9 tacked on to the price. A gallon of gas is, say, $2.87 + 9/10. This makes it very hard to pay with exact change. I've been trying to file down 1/10th off some pennies, but this is a lot of effort.
Seems like, though, when I pay, it always manages to come out evenly to the penny. Hmmm. Someone is rounding up, I think. I want to know who is keeping all those tenths of pennies.
No wonder the CEO of Exxon/Mobil gets such a huge bonus every year. He's skimming mils.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
In Canada, when I was up there, each station had a breakdown of how much each gasoline tax was on each pump. It was a heck of a lot of tax, if I remember.
If they really wanted to make gas look less expensive, they could change to metric. I mean, it'd be less than a dollar a liter, so they could go back to advertising $0.91 on their signs. Americans would have no idea what that means, and wouldn't be able to convert it.
Maybe that'd go a long way towards finally changing this country over to metric.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
Of course we'd know how to convert it. A liter is the medium sized Evian bottle.
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