Funding highways and funding the central goverment

According to US Senator Mike Lee (R-UT):

The Highway Trust Fund in a nutshell: states send money to Washington DC, Washington takes its share (see graph which shows how much states get back from the Highway Trust Fund), then Washington sends money back to states with strings attached.

The Senate will vote on my Transportation Empowerment Act as an amendment to the bill to reauthorize the Highway Trust Fund. My proposal will reduce the federal gas tax and give the states more power to fund, build and maintain roads.

The goal of this legislation is to increase America’s investment in infrastructure, by putting decisions in the hands of communities with the most to gain from better roads, highways, and transit, and by cutting out Washington’s middlemen. Under the current system, the federal Davis-Bacon Act adds an estimated 10% to the costs of federal construction projects, at a price of more than $10 billion per year. Federal environmental reviews are estimated to add an additional 8-10% to the cost and up to 8 years to the approval time for projects. My amendment will allow transportation dollars to be spent on steel and concrete, not bureaucrats and special interests, so Americans can get more roads and bridges for their buck.

My opinion on highway funding extends to funding the entire central government:

1 - Repeal the 16th Amendment (income tax).

2 - Repeal the 17th Amendment (direct election of US senators).

3 - Any and all corporate and individual taxation on income or consumption must be imposed only at the state and/or local level.

4 - Instead of federal taxes on businesses and on the People themselves, funding for the central government would be through an assessment on the individual States based on state population.

5 - Since, with the repeal of the 17th Amendment, US senators would serve at the pleasure of the respective state legislatures, they will be more sensitive to federal assessment demands on the States. A more frugal central government will be the natural result.

6 - As for funding highways, there would be a small federal tax on highway fuels, as there is now. 100% of those funds would go to the States to pay a significant portion of the cost of "post roads" (Interstate and US Highways) based on the number of miles of such roads in the respective states. The only "strings attached" would be standards for the construction and maintenance of "post roads". Funding for all other roads and highways would be strictly a State or local responsibility.