The neat thing...because of the tax structure...we are paying more on gas taxes now, than we ever did before.
Only if we're consuming more now. All states and the fed tax fuel per gallon. It's a fixed rate excise tax. That excise tax varies by state and fuel type (the fed rate is 18.4 cents/gallon for gas and 24.4 cents/gallon for diesel). Some states do add sales tax on top of this (California, Connecticut, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New York and Virginia), but most do not. The higher the price of fuel, the lower actual percentage cost of the fuel tax, again, excepting those states that charge a sales tax on top of everything else.