Yearly $75 hybrid fee WA State

You beat me to it.

Hybrid tax proposals in other states, and EV taxes in this state, have been discussed in other threads (below), but I don't recall any mention of a hybrid tax in Washington State until the newscast moments ago.

tax per mile
Virginia "NoHybridTax" Petition signatures needed
Virginia Transportation Funding Deal

 

After re-reading a market survey about hybrid owners, I finally understand why some state governments tax hybrid owners:

"Because that's where the money is." - Willie Sutton​

Bob Wilson

 

It is not "odd" it is a clearly stated political agenda of the oil company backed right wing political party in the US. They deny global warming exists, have run up $14T in oil war debt to profit their business interests and keep US yoked to oil, their major product. They push for lower environmental standards for profit.

The completely wacky claims that the 0.5% hybrids do not pay their fair share of road maintenance and that we should tax and discourage the solution to US problem of energy efficiency, hybrids and EV's, is part of the right wing ideology to maintain high oil use and enrich the oil suppliers who need more extreme measures (fracking, BP floating oil bombs etc) to supply the oil. If US were more energy efficient, less demand for oil and voters would want tighter environmental controls since they needed less gasoline.

Taxing energy efficiency is the right wing party's political strategy.

 

You may be interested how things look like across the pond: as you probably know, petrol is very expensive compared to USA, about £1.35 a litre (US gallon is about 3.74 litre if I am not mistaken), so a US gallon of petrol costs about $7.50 in the UK. Out of that a massive $4.54 is tax (see Drivers pay record 81p to Treasury for every litre of fuel | Mail Online), so excluding tax, prices would roughly be the same - about $3 a US gal. On top of that, every car has to pay annual road tax and the price of the tax disc sticker varies according to vehicle's CO2 emissions - the "cleaner" the car, the lower the tax. It ranges from £480 (about $750) a year for a V8 4x4 to £0 for a hybrid or a small engined hatchback (
Select a search : Directgov - Car fuel data, CO2 and vehicle tax tools
). On top of that, cities like London charge residents for parking permits and the dubious privilege of trying to find a parking space on the street where they live - again, the price of the permit depends on the emissions, gas guzzlers pay more than hybrids and fully electric cars park for free (they can use charging points across London for flat £10 annual fee). And finally - London congestion charge - you have to pay £10 every day if you drive into central London (most people have no reason to because there's nowhere to park anyway), however if you have a vehicle emitting less than 100g CO2/km you are exempt. There is no penalty for being more efficient, quite the opposite...

 

Today is Virginia T-day (tax day) we hear about the "Prius Tax" ! and other taxes imposed only on North Virginia (where the dems live). One report says the Gov is expected to lower hybrid fee below $100.

I would like to see the Fed gov't step in and say, "hey VA, if you tax hybrid cars, you do not get your share of Fed gas tax back."

However, you have to look at total tax picture. Virginia has by far the highest car taxes of any state. A Toyota which holds value really pays a lot of tax every year, so Prius is already heavily taxed here, I figure about 15% effective total tax, and 20% with the new fee. Whereas a non-hybrid car that does not hold value like a Prius you could be in the 10-11% range on taxes. North VA has higher car property taxes than rest of state.

In the case of EV, since WA is giving quite a nice sales tax exclusion (right?) its a little harder to argue for no fee there. I feel, if a state is compensating green car owners for the more expensive cost of the car, then OK maybe a fee is needed. But if the green car is already paying high taxes, then it is too much burden to over-tax a green car on gas tax.

 

I think it is very unfair to punish those who want to use less foreign oil based fuel.

It is much more fair to simply raise vehicle fees across the board. This would also raise far more money.

Why don't they?

 

I'm a little leery of this tactic.
Why not just abolish the 50 state governments and stop pretending that the federal government doesn't run EVERYTHING?

I'm not really wild about a hybrid tax for the same reason that I'm not really wild about the gas guzzler tax...or hybrid tax breaks.
The whole purpose for taxes used to be for revenue generation.
Now?
We have this Rube Goldberg collection of tax breaks and penalties that is little more than a public works program for lobbyists, CPAs and tax attorneys.
Somewhere along the way....we manage to actually put (a small portion of...) tax revenue towards things like roads and bridges.

Virginia likes to think of itself as a Commonwealth...which is a traditional English term for a political community founded for the common good.
So....illuminate the "change government" light in your state.
It will be a helluva lot easier than changing the Federal government.

 

^^^the other approach is that Fed gov't could reward states for better MPG by compensating for hybrids etc. in the pay back. Virginia is arguing Hybrids need to pay a fee because Hybrids under-pay Federal gas tax.

 

The federal government in the past gave tax breaks to hybrids, these have expired, and it appears they are no longer necessary. The federal government also favors hybrids in its rising cafe standards, and flat per gallon road tax. It does not favor hybrids that do not achieve good fuel economy though. The only further federal incentive that may work is raising the oil tax.

It seems, your problem is strictly a state issue, and I agree your state is doing the wrong thing. You at least are taxed as much as NY or California. A federal system would likely make the whole country more high tax, not less.

 

+1

Somehow no one is talking about extra tax on motorcycles and bicycles. They also use roads and sip fuel, right?

Now, how about the other types of hybrid cars:

 

This same state, Washington, is talking about taxing bicycles. See the links in this thread. (BTW, the rep who is the subject of that thread is not a member of the party proposing the bicycle tax.)

 

They should in their infinite stupidity also tax:
1. People for walking
2. People for taking the bus
3. People for car pooling

They should just take the money from the bank accounts of the wealthy - just like they do in Cyprus. I find that very very fair.

 

They already do ... at the fare meter, at the car registration office, at the property tax office, and at all locations that must charge sales tax.

That original plan was dropped. Now they are taking only from depositors and bondholders at two troubled banks, Laiki and Bank of Cyprus.

I think this hits super-wealthy tax-dodging Russians a lot more than their American counterparts.

 

IMHO any state that charges a hybrid tax, for the purpose of making up lost Federal gasoline tax dollars, is possibly unconstitutional. We need legal opinion and/or EPA ruling, if the states are allowed to charge a hybrid a fee to correct for Federal gasoline reimbursement. This is like saying the EPA endorses charging vehilces that get better than national average MPG (23) extra taxes, which I doubt.

Presumably the states can do whatever they want to compensate for lost state gasoline taxes. That's a mute point in VA because we have a very low state gasoline tax (yes VA is like a disfunctional family). In fact, the Gov's original proposal was 0% state gasoline tax, with $100/yr hybrid fee to compensate for lost Federal gasoline tax.

 

The only truly fair way to tax us for our road use is on our vehicle weight and the number of miles driven.

Weight because it directly contributes to wear-and-tear on the roads, and use because every pass with our weighted axles is a little bit of wear.

Read the odometer every year when we go to re-register. The curb weight is already a known quantity.

That is the most direct and fair way for us to pay for our roads.

 

Here's how I would look at the proposed $75 fee in WA:

1o-yr Tax on $24k Prius = $2310* ($1560 sales + $750 Fee)
10-yr Tax on $20k Non-Hybrid = $1300*
*Based on 6.5% sales tax (see revised figures in later correction post)

So you are paying $1000* more tax for the hybrid, and ~$4000 more for the hybrid vehicle itself. Not as bad as VA ($2000-$3000 incremental tax vs. non-hybrid) but you are going to have more trouble justifying a Prius financially over say a 35-MPG non-hybrid car.

I am thinking WA Prii owners prior to 2009 (see Fuzzy1 note) had sales tax exempted in WA, so those were the golden days for Prii in WA. Compare $0 tax with the $2310 tax a new Prius owner has to pay (with the fee). probably the new Prius owner should get some relief for a few years since they are paying $260* extra sales tax versus a non-hybrid based on $4000 more expensive car.

I do not favor the new $75 fee because it makes the new Prius or FORD Hybrid hard to justify. It might make sense if there was more tax relief/incentive. Overall the problem is we have no - none - zero no public policy advocacy group to defend hybrids.