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Gasoline prices are at their lowest level in four years. The price at the pump in many states is almost a full dollar cheaper than it was last spring.

So some politicians think this is a good time to raise gasoline taxes. Several states are tired of waiting for Congress to fix the federal highway trust fund, so they're considering raising gas taxes themselves to address their crumbling roads.

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder is trying to sell that state's legislators — especially those in his own Republican party — on raising the state's motor fuel tax to fund long neglected infrastructure needs.

"Do you know of anyone who says we have good roads in this state? Nobody," said Snyder at a recent speaking engagement after touring a crumbling retaining wall along the Lodge Freeway in Detroit.

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Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder is one several lawmakers pushing for a higher gas tax. Carlos Osorio/AP hide caption

itoggle caption Carlos Osorio/AP

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder is one several lawmakers pushing for a higher gas tax.

Carlos Osorio/AP

Snyder is calling on lawmakers to roughly double Michigan's gas tax over time, to raise more than $1 billion.

"The money I'm talking about is to get us to fair to good roads. They're not even going to be great roads, folks. We can't afford to have great roads in this state given what we need to invest," he continued.

Snyder is one of a growing number of Republicans across the country who see the need to spend big to improve infrastructure, and who are looking to increase gas taxes to pay for it.

"There's kind of been a switch that's been flipped," says Carl Davis, a senior analyst with the nonprofit Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy

Davis says gas tax increases are now on the table in states across the country, from New Jersey to Utah to South Carolina to South Dakota. Democratic governors in Delaware, Vermont and Kentucky, and other states are also looking to possibly raise gas taxes, as has been done in Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Hampshire and Wyoming in the last two years.

"There have been overwhelming infrastructure needs for quite awhile and now that gas prices are lower, it's a little bit more politically feasible to talk about raising the gas tax," he says.

Davis says states are looking to raise their own gas taxes because the federal highway fund is lacking.

"The federal gas tax hasn't gone up in over 21 years and the states don't have the luxury of just sitting around and doing nothing on this issue. They have to find a way to keep their bridges from falling down and keep their roads from developing too many potholes," he argues.

With the federal gas tax stuck at 18.4 cents a gallon since 1993 and construction costs rising, the Highway Trust Fund nearly went broke last summer before Congress came up with a short-term fix that will only last until May.

“ The federal gas tax hasn't gone up in over 21 years and the states don't have the luxury of just sitting around and doing nothing on this issue. They have to find a way to keep their bridges from falling down and keep their roads from developing too many potholes.

- Carl Davis, Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy

While there is some support among a small, but growing number of Republicans in Congress for raising the federal gas tax, including retiring Wisconsin Rep. Tom Petri, and Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker, Congress appears unlikely to act before the end of the year.

And despite poor road conditions, there is little enthusiasm for a gas tax increase among many drivers.

At a Mobile gas station and mini-mart in Chicago's south suburbs, customers are overjoyed by the recent sharp drop in pump prices here.

"Oh, I love it. I love it. I have extra money to spend," says Cheryl Press of Chicago.

Press says she wants to spend her extra cash on Christmas presents, not a higher gas tax.

She and others don't expect gas prices to stay this low for long, and fear the impact of higher gas taxes when prices rise again.

"The prices [are] a whole lot better than what they were right now," says Thomas Harden, as he fills up his pickup truck. "What's the good in raising the tax?"

He'd rather see an income tax increase for the wealthy to fund highway repairs. "Let the rich folks fix the roads and give people like us a break. That's the way I see it."

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Vehicles wait in line at a gas station in Turnersville, N.J., last Thursday. Tom Mihalek/Reuters/Landov hide caption

itoggle caption Tom Mihalek/Reuters/Landov

Vehicles wait in line at a gas station in Turnersville, N.J., last Thursday.

Tom Mihalek/Reuters/Landov

But not everyone is against the idea. Ted Bonau says he'd support an increase in the gas tax to fix the roads.

"Yeah, I would. I mean the roads are pretty bad," the Chicago resident says.

So a gas tax increase might be a tough sell, but not an impossible one.

Congress

For months, Liberia was the country worst-hit by the Ebola outbreak. But the wards in Liberia's Ebola treatment units now stand virtually empty. The number of newly reported cases fell from almost 300 cases a week in mid-September to fewer than 100 by mid-October.

But that doesn't mean it's time to take it easy. In fact, Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has just announced a new campaign, Ebola Must Go, which focuses on the role of the community.

Liberia still records 12 new cases each day, says Kevin De Cock, the doctor leading the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Ebola effort in Liberia. At least half are in the capital Monrovia, a city of more than a million. There are also pockets of the virus in the countryside.

Goats and Soda

Startling Statistic: Only 8 Patients In Largest Ebola Hospital

With Ebola Cases Down, Officials Worry Liberians Aren't Worried Enough Dec. 8, 2014

"We cannot rest until Ebola is eliminated," De Cock says. "Great progress has been made, but elimination of the disease is not yet in sight."

DeCock spoke to me about what still needs to be done. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Liberians seem to have a growing sense of optimism. What about you?

There's a great danger of complacency and accepting this [disease] as the new normal when, in fact, we are now at the same stage [in intensity of the outbreak] we were in late June, early July. Just a year ago, this situation would have been completely unthinkable.

What do you mean by complacency?

Well, one of the effects of this epidemic has been that it's transformed the way the world thinks about Ebola. We've always considered this an important infection, but a kind of isolated and exotic one. It was something one read about in tropical medicine textbooks.

All of a sudden this disease [is] being discussed at the highest levels of international and U.S. governments, on the floor of the United Nations, at the Security Council. Really, it's a crisis in global health.

And yet ... there's a danger that when the epidemic becomes more invisible again, this [continual presence of Ebola] becomes accepted as the new normal. We cannot allow that to happen.

How worrisome are the pockets of transmission in rural areas?

Goats and Soda

As Ebola Pingpongs In Liberia, Cases Disappear Into The Jungle

What we're seeing are clusters erupting in different counties, somewhat unpredictably. About a third to a half [are] apparently initiated by somebody from Monrovia, having traveled — and then local spread.

The country, with all of the international [agencies and organizations], is getting better at responding to these clusters, but they're all their own mini-outbreaks and each of them needs to be addressed and extinguished. And this is continuing to happen. So this is an ongoing epidemic.

How realistic is Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf's target of no new Ebola cases by Christmas?

Goats and Soda

Liberian President's Ambitious Goal: No New Ebola Cases By Christmas

It's an aspirational target, and such aspirations are to be encouraged and supported. We follow the data, [which] show that there is substantial transmission of Ebola still ongoing. And Christmas is pretty near, but we'll see what happens.

The state of emergency has been lifted. There's discussion of reopening schools. All this is very positive, but one has to balance that with a false sense of security that this is all over. And it's not over.

The president's new initiative, Ebola Must Go, shifts the focus from building Ebola treatment units to mobilizing the community. Is this the right time for such a change?

It's a balance now between continuing to address the acuteness of the situation [and] the longer term commitment as the health system reopens. Hospitals begin to focus on the problems that have been neglected in these last few months — you know, maternal health, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, malaria, etc.

I think what the president is aiming at is that [the community] has to want a society that is free of Ebola. That it's not just a job for the Ministry of Health or the government or the external partners. Communities have to be involved.

I personally believe communities have played a substantial role in the impressive decline in the epidemic, particularly in Lofa County [northeast, near the Guinean border]. We need that across the whole region. It's encouraging that the president is committed to this and is really trying to mobilize the people.

What's been different about the Liberian response vs. the response in Sierra Leone, where cases are still rising?

That's an interesting question because there was this perception that something special happened in Liberia. [The answer is] yes and no.

Liberia did what we know needs to be done, which is you isolate the sick, you provide best treatment and safely bury the dead. You protect health care workers, base your response on data and do contact tracing. In some parts of the country, communities played an active role, particularly rural areas. So there's nothing special.

And yet on the other hand, the fact that they did it in a country that is amongst the 10 poorest in the world is encouraging and impressive.

I think in Sierra Leone, they're very reassured to hear that they're doing the right things but they accept that there needs to be increased intensity. And what I think has happened in Freetown [the capital] perhaps is that there's been somewhat of a slowness in isolating the sick [and] waiting for the right facilities to be in place when actually you can't wait. You have to use what you've got to do the best you can.

What's your advice?

Press on. We need to continue with a vigorous response based on addressing Ebola as we know how to do it — with case finding, isolation of the sick, treatment and care of the sick and very, very importantly at this stage, contact tracing. And, as the healthcare system reopens, protection of healthcare workers.

Ebola Must Go

Monrovia

ebola

Liberia

When you think of saffron, dark red strands from Spain or Iran may come to mind. But the delicate spice, one of the most expensive and labor-intensive in the world, grows well in another country long plagued by conflict: Afghanistan.

Rumi Spice, a small, enterprising company in Brighton, Mass., is trying to build an Afghan saffron connection for lovers of the spice in the U.S., and cultivate peace through trade.

Behind Rumi Spice is a group of veterans who served in Afghanistan who are now business school students, a lawyer, an Afghan water specialist and farmers the vets met while serving there.

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Saffron farmers Haji Zarghon (left) and Haji Ebrahim speak with Abdul Shakhoor Ehrarri, a water applications specialist for Rumi Spice, in Herat Province, Afghanistan during the harvest on Nov. 22, 2014. Abdul Shakhoor Ehrarri/Courtesy of Rumi Spice hide caption

itoggle caption Abdul Shakhoor Ehrarri/Courtesy of Rumi Spice

Saffron farmers Haji Zarghon (left) and Haji Ebrahim speak with Abdul Shakhoor Ehrarri, a water applications specialist for Rumi Spice, in Herat Province, Afghanistan during the harvest on Nov. 22, 2014.

Abdul Shakhoor Ehrarri/Courtesy of Rumi Spice

The idea for the fledgling company came about in March 2013, when Army veteran Kimberly Jung was chatting with a fellow vet named Keith Alaniz. Alaniz told her about how when serving in Afghanistan, he met a local saffron farmer who had a warehouse full of the valuable spice, with no buyers lined up overseas.

"I was very surprised to find out it grows the best in the climates of Afghanistan with hot winds and dry climate," Jung tells The Salt. "So, I immediately thought, hey, this could be an awesome business opportunity."

Jung and Alaniz teamed up with four others, and the team realized that if it could create a viable market for saffron in the U.S., they could also transform saffron into a cash crop that might one day replace poppy, the crop used to make opium that helps fund the Taliban.

"Without investment in agriculture, Afghan farmers have little prospects with shrinking land allotments - making them susceptible to the Taliban," the group's website reads. "Rumi Spice strives to change this dynamic."

Saffron ranges wildly in price, but on average goes for about $15 a gram, or $1,500 a pound. Despite that high price, the typical Afghan saffron grower earns just $400 to $600 annually. Rumi Spice says it expects it can help small-scale farmers triple their income through fair-trade tactics of cutting out the middle men.

The Salt

These 5 Crops Are Still Hand-Harvested, And It's Hard Work

The company says it will also reinvest at least 10 percent of profits back into infrastructure, like processing facilities and machines, which Jung represents a continuation of the civil affairs and infrastructural development work she began as a soldier. "This was a very natural extension of what I thought we needed to be doing in Afghanistan," says Jung.

In July 2013, Jung hand-carried their first shipment of saffron directly from the farmers in Herat and Wardak Provinces all the way back to the U.S. During the early stages of Rumi Spice, Jung drove around in her car peddling saffron to local farmers markets and gourmet shops in the Boston area.

"For me that's my target market, my target channel – boutique and gourmet grocers, for people who care where and who picks their food and how these people are treated," says Jung. Rumi Spice now sells to three towns in Massachusetts: Brookline, Lexington and Cambridge.

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Saffron flowers on a farm in Herat, Afghanistan. It takes about 200,000 stigmas from the saffron crocus flower to make one pound of saffron. Majid Saeedi/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Majid Saeedi/Getty Images

Saffron flowers on a farm in Herat, Afghanistan. It takes about 200,000 stigmas from the saffron crocus flower to make one pound of saffron.

Majid Saeedi/Getty Images

Abbdul Shakoor Ehrarri is a water specialist based in Herat, Afghanistan who facilitates growing and agricultural operations for Rumi Spice. He says he sees this is an opportunity to help local farmers in his country and ensure they receive fair value for their hard work.

"Since I heard that [Rumi Spice] was planning to work with the farmers I was really excited because nowadays the farmers are poor," says Ehrarri.

Growing saffron requires a lot of land, and a lot of labor for hand-harvesting. Each saffron flower has three stigmas, and it takes around 200,000 stigmas to get one pound of saffron. The high value and limited supply have also helped create varying levels of quality, as well as a market for counterfeit saffron.

"You have no idea where it comes from, and they give you all kinds of certifications that I don't trust, and that's the story of most of the saffron in the world," said Philippe De Vienne, a professional spice hunter and CEO of Epices De Cru, a Montreal-based spice company. "Meeting Rumi, it was like 'Wow, somebody opened a window and let some fresh air into the house!' "

Rumi Spice's saffron has a feel-good story, but it's also a consistently high-quality product, says De Vienne. "The color is beautiful, the flavor is exceptional," he says. "You can see the craftsmanship in every stem of saffron ... it's 100 percent the right kind of stigma and it's top quality."

However, more than having the right shape, look and color what really counts is the smell and taste, says De Vienne.

Rumi Spice has begun selling their saffron online, following the late-November harvest.

James Clark is a visuals intern at NPR and a former Marine.

saffron

spices

fair trade

Afghanistan

The United Nations Children's Fund calls 2014 a devastating year for children, reporting that as many as 15 million young people are caught in conflicts in the Central African Republic, Iraq, South Sudan, the Palestinian territories, Syria and Ukraine.

Among the grim statistics in a newly released UNICEF report: There are more than 1.7 million child refugees from the conflict in Syria, and 105 children have been killed in the more than 35 attacks on schools in that country. In the Central African Republic, as many as 10,000 children are believed to have been recruited by armed groups in the past year and more than 430 have been killed or maimed.

"Children have been killed while studying in the classroom and while sleeping in their beds," says UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake. "They have been orphaned, kidnapped, tortured, recruited, raped and even sold as slaves.

South Sudan, a new nation that is in the midst of a nearly year-long conflict, has seen almost 750,000 children displaced and several hundred thousand more forced to flee across borders. Amid fears of famine in South Sudan, an estimated 235,000 children under the age of 5 are suffering from acute malnutrition.

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas this summer in Gaza left about 54,000 Palestinian children homeless and 538 dead.

Aid groups have been stretched thin by the sheer number of conflicts and the long-simmering ones that have faded from the headlines. UNICEF says the Ebola outbreak in West Africa presents yet another threat. Thousands of children have been orphaned and, according to UNICEF, some 5 million are out of school in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

UNICEF says it is responding where it can, trying to get children back to school in places such as the Central African Republic and working in Ebola-hit countries to try to prevent the spread of the disease.

Still, the report makes for grim reading. It notes that an estimated 230 million children live in countries where there are armed conflicts, from Iraq to Nigeria.

As Lake puts it, "Never in recent memory have so many children been subjected to such unspeakable brutality."

UNICEF

refugees