Featured "Hippy tax" tag fees?

https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/electric-vehicles-ev-taxes-state/

 

I've seen this come up a couple of times.

My $.02 is these if implemented should not be retroactive.

Let people know ahead of time that these taxes will apply to their new EV purchases each year when they register them and they can then figure that into their Return on Investment for their purchase.

To begin to tax old EV and PHEV purchases when they try to register has a bad smell to it.

Then what about Hybrids - how long till some politician figures out they don't use as much gas as a regular vehicle so their registration must be prorated?

I will say I think the issue is apolitical and the "red states " are just trying to catch up with their left leaning cousins
Article is from 2019
Oregon EV Owners Will Soon See Higher Registration Fees (govtech.com)

 

Or simply get rid of gas taxes and charge everyone by miles x vehicle weight

 

Some states already hit hybrids, or just efficient cars, with increased fees. All because politicians figure they are a group too small to fight back. Yet even the excessive fees aren't enough to make up for the funding loss of the general efficiency improvement of the entire fleet, coupled with fuel taxes set decades ago without an inflation mechanism.

 

I pay an extra $80 a year for tags because I drive a hybrid. $160 if I drove a BEV

 

This is why I don't get into politics. I can see both sides of the coin, pros and cons to each suggestion. Nothing is perfect, and you can't make everyone happy.

 

according to this chart, us gas consumption has gone up every year for the 24 years from 1995 through 2019.
it dropped back in 2020, and doesn't show the last 3 years, but i wouldn't be surprised if it was way up again.

20211208-sivak.html

 

if there has been a drop in inflation adjusted gas tax revenue in massachusetts, you sure can't tell by the amount of road repair.

 

Virginia all cars over 25 MPG now pay an extra HUF fee (Highway Use Fee) prorated for MPG.
I pay $50-60 extra registration per year for RAV4HV@40MPG.

This came about when the Dems got control and wanted to bump our state fuel taxes from among the lowest, up to closer to the higher state gaso taxes. It was behind closed doors in a smoke filled room, but basically Repubs are hyper-worried that fuel efficient vehicles are unfair re: state fuel taxes. We basically have an estimated miles-driven tax, with the extra fee.

So now we are a little like California where the pump taxes are not the total picture. You have to add the other fees not at the pump, to see the true state tax comparison.

 

Not to forget H.R. 3684 kicking a bunch of deferred maintenance into gear.

 

Illinois doesn’t have higher fees for hybrids but they do charge an additional $100 fee for electric vehicles licenses. FWIW, it is also considered “Democrat” with a significant amount of counties leaning Republican, but the majority of the metropolitan areas are Democrat. So much for “all but one are Republican”.

 

I was just about to post what Doug has. Largely Democratic-run here. The Prime is $151/year, and the BEV is $251. I guess Illinois is one of those exceptions? They raised the fees a few years back. BEV's used to be almost free to renew.

 

Been thing about another hybrid or a first BEV. Forgot that my state charges extra and is looking to increase the fee.

They could just charge everyone a negligible amount rather than discourage more efficient vehicles.

 

That's total consumption. The per capita amounts dropped, and mostly leveled off, since 2000. Higher total with less per person means more people on the roads. The wear of that increased traffic can outpace the amount of tax collected with more fuel use.

In the case of federal and other flat fuel taxes, the real issue is inflation. The federal rate hasn't changed since 1993. To account for the increased costs of road maintenance since then, it should be something like 10 cents higher per gallon. That number was before the pandemic.

 

which is why it should be a miles based fee (tax), not a gas tax with a bunch of random fees that are hard to track

 

No politician wants to take the blame of raising gas taxes.

 

not even here in taxachusetts. gas tax is the third rail

 

Again, I don't agree nor disagree. But I would point out the difficulty of keeping track of the miles of millions of vehicles. Would that include older vehicles? How would you keep track of that? Wouldn't that lead to a higher rate of illegal odometer modifications? Maybe more people would put on too big of tires to also defeat the system? How would that info be sent? Lots of places don't even do emissions testing, would this be some wireless black box with a GPS that is installed in the vehicle? What if someone figures out how to take it out?

 

yes, without emissions testing, miles would have to be self reported. but people cheat the system all the time. most people are reasonably honest and it could include random audits if someone were too paranoid about it i suppose.
our insurance company requires our mileage every year. won't be an issue unless you make a claim.

or there could be transponders, like tolls. the gas tax was okay, not great, when everyone was using gas.