Georgia governor suspends motor fuel taxes

2nd time in 18 months that Kemp has taken action

· Thursday, September 14, 2023

Georgia Governor extends motor fuels tax suspension (Photo: Jim Allen/FreightWaves)

For the second time in 18 months, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has suspended the state’s taxes on motor fuels.

The suspension of the taxes, at 31.2 cents per gallon of gasoline and 35 cents per gallon of diesel fuel, began Wednesday and is scheduled to last at least through Oct. 12. Georgia’s government gave up an estimated $1.7 billion in revenue during an earlier suspension over 10 months from March 2022 to January 2023, about $170 million a month.

According to AAA, the average diesel pump price in Georgia on Wednesday stood at $4.36 a gallon. That is up from $4.22 a gallon a month ago. As of Wednesday, the national average for diesel pump prices was $4.51 a gallon.

Motor fuel taxes in Georgia are paid to the state by fuel distributors and not by local gas stations. The gap between when distributors pay for taxed fuel and when the fuel reaches the pump means that fuel prices will rise based on the fill-up point.

Mark Solomon

Formerly the Executive Editor at DC Velocity, Mark Solomon joined FreightWaves as Managing Editor of Freight Markets. Solomon began his journalistic career in 1982 at Traffic World magazine, ran his own public relations firm (Media Based Solutions) from 1994 to 2008, and has been at DC Velocity since then. Over the course of his career, Solomon has covered nearly the whole gamut of the transportation and logistics industry, including trucking, railroads, maritime, 3PLs, and regulatory issues. Solomon witnessed and narrated the rise of Amazon and XPO Logistics and the shift of the U.S. Postal Service from a mail-focused service to parcel, as well as the exponential, e-commerce-driven growth of warehouse square footage and omnichannel fulfillment.