The number of cars keeps increasing, so road systems should be expanded. Some people think the government should pay for it, while others think the car owners should pay for it. What’s your opinion?
With growing incomes, it is not surprising that everyone wants to live a lavish lifestyle. Every other individual owns a car these days. That is why road systems have to be expanded. All this requires money. That is why the debate has arisen as to who should pay for this expansion. Some opine that the government should pay while others contend that the car owners should pay. I tend to agree with the latter.
To begin with, higher cost for car owners would encourage public transport use. This would definitely be better for the environment as there would be less pollution and less usage of natural resources like petrol and diesel. People would also be encouraged to do car pooling so that the added expenses are shared. Moreover, shorter journeys may be made on foot or bicycle which would lead to a healthier nation.
In addition, it would be unfair if government pays all the money out of the taxes. In this way even those people who are not using the roads for their private vehicles would also be taxed. Moreover, government has so much else on its shoulders such as basic healthcare and education which would be advantageous for all.
Admittedly, better roads means lesser congestion, lesser traffic jams and therefore lesser pollution and faster mobility which would be better for the big businesses. Therefore, this cost should be met by the big companies and not the average taxpayer.
To put it in a nutshell, I pen down saying that expanding the road system is the need of the hour and most of the cost should be met with by the car owners and big companies and some paid by the government
From Darsana IELTS
Unless roads are developed to accommodate the increasing number of cars, it would aggravate the rising traffic problems in our cities. However, it is unfair for the government to expect car owners to bear the cost of expanding roads due to a number of reasons.
In the first place, car owners are already burdened by various types of taxes levied on them by the government at the time of purchase of the car and on a periodic basic. Increasing number of cars would naturally boost the tax revenue of the government. This money should be used for widening existing roads, building new highways and constructing bridges and flyovers. For example, in many cities of India, ideally a large number of flyovers are built by government funding. It is quite unreasonable to charge car owners to pay toll for these new developments.
Furthermore, it is the responsibility of a responsible government to provide the basic infrastructure like efficient roads to the people. If tax revenue is not sufficient for this purpose, Governments usually perform these responsibilities by availing loans. For instance, international financial institutions like World Bank and International Monitory Fund lend huge amounts of money to governments at lower interest rates for such purposes. This would mean that there is hardly any need for governments to require car owners to pay for such expenses.
On the other hand, there are people who believe that since it is the car owners who need better roads, they should pay for its construction. This argument would, in fact, seriously downplay the basic responsibility of the government to provide people with infrastructural facilities.
In conclusion, from the above arguments it is clear that government should bear the cost of improving the road system, in order to handle the growing traffic problems associated with large number of cars.