1.5 cents per mile instead of gasoline tax

Taxing fuels has produced good results in Europe concerning consumption and driving habits.
Taxing miles driven will change driving habits, but little in individual vehicle consumption selection trends And giving less importance to the greener cars.

 

Georgia is planning to charge BEV's $200/yr for gaso tax (which seems too high). Couple other states VA, WA charge extra $100 or so for BEV.

Not sure what Georgia is thinking, but probably they are taking 15000 miles/year and assuming average car 25 MPG with 36 cents/gal (planned total state + local gaso taxes) so that's $200. That's similar $ per mile to Oregon.

 

they should tax by vehicle weight.

 

Actually a per-mile tax is exceedingly fair, and super simple to implement.
Odometer readings are already reported as a matter of practice for the various states that license vehicles, and it's already against the law to tamper with the readings.
No privacy issues exist where they're not already being raised by licensing and registration processes.
Add to this, there is already an infrastructure in place to verify odometer accuracies - and while it's certainly not immune from tinkering and tampering, it's at least as efficient as anything that any government will ever come up with.
Poor people do not have to pay a higher percentage of their transportation budget for fuel while they wait for trickle-down technology to make greener cars more affordable, or default to mass transit.
Of course all of this means that it's doomed to fail, since government bureaucrats utterly despise simple, PAYGO systems that they cannot manipulate, and one percenters cannot game the system by getting carve-outs for eco-chic vehicles.

Common sense: fail.

 

it's fair if the money is for road and bridge repair. since it's not, we're better off with increased gas tax.

 

^excellent point.

 

Don't second gen Prius odometers stop at 300,000?

 

Georgia isn't doing badly here. First they give each bev $5000 of state money, then charge $200/year for roads, hoping those hating EVs will be satisfied. Say the car is on the road 10 years, you could offer $4000 off the car, and $100/year, but that would not encourage as many cars, and the $100 would anger those driving guzzlers that bevs aren't paying their fair share.

This oregon plan is the camels nose under the tent. Its trying to get people used to the plan and pretend it costs less, but this is how it will actually work.

Car owner pays road tax by fuel A it averages B per car.

Or car Owner pays for gps device X, plus people to analyze gps device Y, plus road taxes which average B.
So the car owner now has increased his average cost by X + Y for the same roads, and given up a little of his freedom in the interests of what the politicians call fairness. Now this fairness is to tax guzzlers less, so in the interest of fairness not only will the average car be taxed more per mile, but we have probably burned more gasoline as it has encouraged fewer vmt but in less efficient vehicles.

What do the politicians get out of this? Well their buddy sells the government improved device, so their buddy's company makes a big proffit. This tax is more complicated to monitor and collect, so they get a bigger budget for computers and to hire more people to grow government.

What do the people get out of it? More economic risk from higher oil use. Bigger and less efficient government.

Oregon. Please look at the pluses and minuses and don't pretend the data won't be used against us. When red light camera's went in my town it was to make it more safe, not to ticket. 4 years later they started issuing tickets against their promises. What is really going to stop government from abusing the gps data?

If that were the oregon plan, then there would not be civil liberties or tax cost problems, but it is not.
They only want to tax in state mileage. You still will pay federal gas tax. They therefore need a new device (gps) and a new set of people reading them, as these are special gps's for the tax.

Odometer readings where annual inspections are required are not onerous. This also solves one of the pollution problems with classic cars. The claim is old cars get exempt because they don't run very much, this can be enforced on odometer readings.

First we have a very easy and hard for government to tamper with gas tax. It is collected by the gas stations that can do it as easy as sales tax, so no undo burden. There is very little cheating. The problem is the tax did not get gauged to road construction inflation and lower total gas used.

Now a PAYGO system would require at a minimum all those places without anual inspections add them, which is a cost. Then you need a mechenism for states to share, not that big of a deal, but ..... It still would have to raise the tax, just like the gas tax, as people drive less and road construction costs go up. In other words it doesn't really solve a problem. At less than 1% of the cars pluging in, and many of those using gas, most drivers of efficient cars would end up paying more. Worse you get those taxes all at once 1 time a year.

So for Oregon the average car gets 25 mpg and pays $0.48/gallon state and federal. That is $0.0192/mile. A 50 mpg car pays half that today, oh how unfair. Say they go 15000 miles per year, you pay $288, and don't feel it at all when filling up.

Now that 18 mpg car that likes the rule, pays at the pump $0.48 less on every one of those 833 gallons you would need if you drove 15,000 miles in a year. On ten gallons you could only go 180 miles, so it kind of hurt that extra $4.80 of taxes each tank, but now its less and only once a year. That may encourage that 18 mpg driver to drive more.

 

I believe that this is very unfair to the Hybrid and EV drivers. The wear on roads are caused by weather changes and the weight of the vehicle on the road. To tax for any other reason other than to maintain said roads is dishonest. I feel that if the state charges based on weight of vehicle, they would have a more balanced income per damage caused to the roads. Gas taxes are terrible, but driving taxes punish those that are trying to do better for themselves financially, care about the environment, and those that are tired of feeding the fat cats in the oil industry.

 

Many hybrid and EV drivers think this.
Poorer people who cannot afford newer more efficient vehicles think a little differently.
In the end...a road use tax should be a road use tax.
BEVs and PHEVs already get tax breaks, which I have no problem with since we already know that trickle-down technology works.

I wouldn't lay awake and worry about it.
The government will not implement a system that they cannot award favors and carve-outs in.

Another excellent point.
And yet another group of self-entitled rich vehicle owners who will demand that an exception be made for them.

 

I don't and have not gotten any tax breaks for my Prius. I don't believe our gov't is really out to help us in these matters, but merely to find other ways to have us pay for things that are being mismanaged.

 

The gas tax really isn't for road repair. It just hasn't been adjusted with the times, so it collects less than the repairs cost.

Per mile is the simplest and fairest, specially with the possibility of truly alternate fuels like electric, CNG, or hydrogen.

The is no need for some monitoring device as ETC(SS) pointed out. Odometers all ready are regularly read. A state might have to hire some more employees for that purpose, but it likely works out better than buying all those devices. Unless the company making them is a big donor.

 

Having an indepth knowledge of, and working with technology, I really would be concerned about the "effectiveness" of the calculation ability of any electronic devices. A mile is a mile, but if the device is designed to shave off 1/20th of a mile per vehicle from it's calculation - something no one might notice...or worse, 1/10th - what's stopping us from each of us being taxed more than $30 per month from an incorrect calculation device? This may not seem like a lot to people - and maybe it isn't - but when I spend $35 per fill up 1x per week (I drive around some in my Prius for work, varied days) which comes to about $140/month in gas that I pay for, $30 of my $140 a month I buy gas, comes out to a 21.43% tax per month.

Also, I haven't read that the gas taxes would be removed, so I'm assuming I'm still paying those at the pump as well. So, therefore, we're being hit twice.

 

That's what I was thinking as well. If the supposed purpose of the tax is for road creation and maintenance then the tax should be based on distance traveled and vehicle weight. All that information is available or in the case of custom cars could be obtained with a scale at the DMV when cars are registered.

 

In case you missed the big news, Georgia is stopping the $5000 BEV incentive and going with +$200 road tax.

In case that loss of GA incentive is depresssing, the good news is Oregon liked the Georgia incentive and proposes to add $3000 incentive for BEV incentive (which is huge considering there is no sales tax in OR). $1500 for PHEV (not sure if PiP qualifies),

 

Tesla's Model S is over two tons of fun. In NJ it is in the same weight class as SUVs and costs more to register than my Prius.

In the NJ & NY a certain organization figured out how to sell gasoline, collect the taxes, then not forward the collected tax to the government. This was one reason why gas station ownership changed every year.

 

I knew some wanted it gone, but not that it was killed. I thought the legislature still had it. What is the date that it will end.

 

I'm sure the actual info is out there, but I don't think the weight difference between personal vehicles is enough to have a measurable impact on road wear between them. The real difference doesn't show up until you get to heavy trucks.

I suspect that has more with it being a Tesla than actual weight. My Ranger cost more to register in Pa, and I understand that was so in NJ. Because it was a truck; that was lighter than many cars. A friend has a Tahoe that ocassionally pulls a two horse trailer. The registration fee is the same as a car, because the state calls it a station wagon.