The solution can't be to make gas cheaper. If nothing else, that would encourage more gas being burned, which is unsustainable for the environment.

The solution cannot be to provide below-cost goods to everyone. Instead, we need to use the money that would have been wasted by such an ill-advised scheme, and target it better to help those who truly need the help.

Things like helping the poor get a quality education at a price that's affordable to them, possibly tied to a percentage of their income.

Things like making sure that all income is taxed at the same rates, rather than giving a huge discount for capital gains which is how the rich make much of their income, without having to work at all (in the present) to get that money.

Things like not giving a basis step-up for heirs on the money they inherit (though this is a really complicated thing to accomplish without e.g. forcing those heirs to sell off a family business they inherit in order to pay that tax).

Things like using the higher tax collections from the above to give a higher standard deduction, and applying that deduction to payroll taxes too. About half of American taxpayers pay no income tax, but they pay far too much in payroll taxes for their ability to afford.

We need the government to rebalance its priorities to take care of all Americans, not just those who have the money (and the power that comes with it) to lobby for tax breaks and incentives they don't truly need, and that accelerate the wealth inequality that's already soaring. Just ask Warren Buffet, who said years ago that it's inconceivable that he pays a lower tax rate than his administrative assistant.

In short, life is full of simple (apparent) solutions that would simply make things worse overall. The trick is to identify them as such, and move beyond them to real solutions, which are unfortunately a lot less simple to implement.