7 ms·
States Hit Electric Vehicle Owners with High Fees
- mikece 7y agoOne idea: eliminate gasoline taxes and charge every vehicle an annual road use fee based on the weight of the vehicle as part of their registration renewal.
- adrianN 7y agoBurning gas in cities has many externalities that are not priced in sufficiently even with the current taxes. Taxes should be raised, not lowered.
- ajmurmann 7y agoBurning gas anywhere should be practically unaffordable, given we are likely making large parts of the planet unhabitable.
- cglace 7y agoMaking gas unaffordable makes large parts of the planet uninhabitable in the short term.
- tonyedgecombe 7y agoWe could ramp up public transport very quickly given the will to.
- adrianN 7y agoNot in the places that would become uninhabitable without gas.
- tonyedgecombe 7y agoYou did say large parts of the planet, what large parts of the planet couldn't adopt public transport?
- adrianN 7y agoI didn't say that, but all parts of the planet that are too sparsely populated and have poor infrastructure. There is little point in having a bus if there are only a handful of people per square kilometer. There are large parts of the planet that don't have a reliable power grid either. IMHO we should just abandon those areas and give them back to nature.
- cannonedhamster 7y agoPower is actually pretty easy to solve compared to transportation. You can reliably generate either wind, water, or solar anywhere on the planet and store it locally. You're right though that centralizing populations tends to be the most efficient use of resources.
- dagw 7y agoSure, but that should be priced separately by each city in the form of congestion charges.
- kadoban 7y agoThat would just be a large subsidy for anyone that drives a lot.
- shard972 7y agoBecause only the rich drive alot.
- wastedhours 7y agoPetrol taxes are probably the fairest way to tax ICE based on usage short of having black-boxes in every car (which would in turn create a nice black market in itself for fiddling them) - heavier and less efficient vehicles naturally use more and so get charged more, the more you drive, the more you burn, the more you pay. I can't see a fairer way than that for ICE at the moment.
- 5555624 7y agoThe OP wants to eliminate petrol taxes on ICE vehicles to treat all vehicles the same way. Right now, an EV doesn't pay any petrol taxes, which are often used to maintain road infrastructure.
- dsfyu404ed 7y agoSince nobody is making EV heavy trucks yet and EVs are a small minority of road traffic they account for approximately none of the infrastructure wear and tear. It's a pure cash grab. If they need more money they should be up front about it rather than being smiley and trying to portray it as EV owners not paying their fair share. I say this as someone who buys a heck of a lot of gas.
- Spooky23 7y agoFee based taxation at the vehicle level is there to slow electric adoption and benefit a few stakeholders, period. The obvious way to raise money from all motor vehicles today is LPR. The Federal government already has an extensive network of LPR and high resolution cameras on the interstate highway system for criminal and customs surveillance, and most states have extensive networks that can easily be scaled. You could even use LPR for demand based taxation, instead of mileage based systems, put fees on peak usage or vehicle class. The current system is significantly flawed anyway, because state policy varies, especially with trucks. A truck operating in New York may be gassing up In Pennsylvania, and be out of the jurisdiction of the state for safety and other regulation. Also commercial vehicles use flags of convenience for registration... rental vehicles are often registered in Arizona and Indiana.
- 7y ago
- bryanlarsen 7y agoThat's massively regressive. In the United States, poor people don't own significantly fewer cars than rich people. Jay Leno is a rare exception.
- ianai 7y agoThey’re mostly R leaning states and/or currently R governed or controlled.
- kasey_junk 7y agoIl passed their fee through a legislative with D control of both houses & it was signed by a D governor.
- ianai 7y agoThey’re not on the map.
- sremani 7y agoBecause that does not fit into the ALEC narrative. Washington state was one of the earlier states to consider additional fee on EVs. I do not know if they did it or not. The idea of certain vehicles not paying taxes that fund roads is or at least used to be bi-partisan.
- cannonedhamster 7y agoOnly states with taxes higher to EV vehicles than gas taxes are included in the map. Not all states that have EV taxes are included.
- Miner49er 7y agoMany of the states also produce lots of oil.
- dcchambers 7y agoI know that this sounds unfair/bad - but it brings up something I never thought about with EVs. With many states a huge portion of the taxes that support the road infrastucture comes from the gas taxes. With EVs not filling up at the pump - how can states ensure they pay their share to keep the roads maintained? Gas taxes are nice because they ensure that even people travelling into your state help pay for the roads they are using. If you just charge higher tax at registration you can't capture any of that revenue.
- ilyanep 7y agoGas taxes are already not-that-high of a fraction of what funds the roads anyway: https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2015/05/debunking-the-myth-that-only-drivers-pay-for-roads/393134/ https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2015/05/debunking-the...
- dsfyu404ed 7y agoThat doesn't mean politicians won't pretend like every piece of infrastructure is funded purely though state gas taxes in an effort to create additional revenue streams and justify increasing registration fees and whatnot. Personally I'm fine with not imposing extra taxes on EVs. They're a negligible portion of road traffic right now and since they aren't heavy trucks they account for basically none of the infrastructure wear and tear.
- yummypaint 7y agoMost road damage due to vehicles is actually caused by heavy commercial trucks etc. Taxing vehicles by total impact on roads makes more sense to me, as the price will effectively be passed onto consumers who buy products transported by truck. It might help incentivise development of more local rail lines which we need to be doing in the US anyway.
- gorkish 7y agoThose taxes don't just pay for repairing damaged roads. It also pays to build and maintain streets and pedestrian ways where it wouldn't ordinarily be economic to do so -- like paving the street to your house or paving your alleyway and keeping it in good repair. That being said, the 'make up' taxes being proposed for EVs in general far outstrip the taxes that would be collected on the fuel had the cars consumed it, even if they had consumed it at the rates of far less fuel efficient cars. I think we can probably agree on that point.
- gambiting 7y agoI think ultimately, we'll have to tax the electricity used for electric vehicles, as at least over here(UK) roads are almost entirely maintained from fuel taxes and those will keep shrinking with every year. I imagine that the car will have its own meter and you will have to report it every now and then, just like we already do with gas and electricity at home already. Or maybe all chargers will be required to know that this electricity is charged at a different tariff than the rest. We already do it with regular diesel and diesel for non-motoring use after all.
- esotericn 7y agoJust use the odometer. You know the mileage, you know the weight of the car, done. In modern cars I can't imagine it would be very easy to cheat.
- gambiting 7y agoYou want to tax the amount of electricity used though. 1 mile travelled accelerator to the floor vs 1 mile travelled gently at 5mph will use very different amounts of energy. And I mean it would be trivial for the car to keep track of the number of kWh used.
- esotericn 7y agoThe amount of energy isn't relevant though? The road wear is. Unless you're talking about like, indirectly taxing the emissions (since the UK is pretty bad, 300gCO2e/kWh). I would have thought it makes sense to just apply that, at the grid level, on all electricity consumption.
- gambiting 7y agoI mean, I'm just thinking that's how it works with petrol/diesel already - we're taxing it on per litre basis, so if you drive a very efficient vehicle(or just drive gently) then you will pay less of that tax than someone who drives a very inefficient car, even if the distances covered are exactly the same. Obviously just because that's how we do it now doesn't mean we have to keep doing that forever.
- janesvilleseo 7y agoI currently live in a state that charges extra for EV. I ran the numbers as I have an EV. It turns out. I pay less tax under the EV tax then I would driving using Gas. I use the roads. I have no problem helping to pay for them.
- paganel 7y agoGenerally speaking the average person who buys an EV is better off than the average person who buys a gasoline/diesel car, new or used, the reason being that EVs are on average more expensive compared to the same class of vehicles which are powered by gasoline/diesel (to say nothing of the fact that I don't know of used EVs that can be purchased under 4,000-5,000 euros, of which the roads around me are full of). As such it makes sense to tax more the people that have more money, you aren't going to get as much money from a single-mum driving her 1.2l Opel Corsa compared to what you can get from a programmer/lawyer/real estate investor who drives a 80,000 euro Tesla.
- justlaughingatt 7y agobut dont you dare tax that corporation! they are living on the cents!
- magashna 7y ago>Max Baumhefner, staff attorney of the climate and energy program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, says the reality is much different, because most of the 1.3 million EVs on the road today were bought as used cars. That’s because they’re typically bought on leases, then sold used after two to three years to low- and middle-income people, many looking to save money on gas, he says.
- paganel 7y agoNot sure how things are in the States, but over here in Europe when I search for an electric vehicle in the 4,000-6,000 euro range [1] I get mostly just toy cars (i.e. the Renault Twizy). And low-income people generally go for 2,000-3,000 euro cars, even lower. Maybe things are better for this class of people in the States and they can afford to purchase used EVs with starting prices of $10,000 or $15,000, can't tell. [1] https://suchen.mobile.de/fahrzeuge/search.html?damageUnrepaired=NO_DAMAGE_UNREPAIRED&fuels=ELECTRICITY&isSearchRequest=true&maxPrice=6000&minPrice=4000&pageNumber=2&scopeId=C&sfmr=false https://suchen.mobile.de/fahrzeuge/search.html?damageUnrepai...
- 7y ago
- blisterpeanuts 7y agoWouldn't it make more sense to use some other general tax revenue to fund the roads? Whether or not they drive a car, everyone benefits almost equally from the road system, which is used for transporting food and other vital products, for medical transport, for law enforcement, for practically everything to support our modern lifestyles. Even someone claiming to be living totally off-grid is benefiting from roads just by purchasing materials to build their homes, solar panels, selling their produce at the farmer's market etc. Like gasoline tax, a per-vehicle tax is regressive; the affluent can afford it, but the poor get taxed almost as much for a necessity that they can't get to work without. A case could be made that a Tesla S might pay a higher excise tax than a Leaf (or any cheaper sedan) but the higher taxes levied on electrics are going to disincentivize the working poor and lower middle class from going to EV's.
- hourislate 7y agoI don't own an EV but I have no problem giving them a pass. I'm sure the fuel tax these states collect at the pumps for gas powered off road vehicles and equipment more than covers the extra fees they want to charge EV's. My lawn mower, weed wacker, kids minibike and gas generator don't use roads but still pay a fuel tax at the pump.
- justlaughingatt 7y agoThis thread seems to love Big Oil in ways that make me skeptical of the msg
- Glench 7y agoThese fees are remarkably short-sighted. We're in a climate emergency and we need massive adoption of electric vehicles powered by clean electricity as soon as possible. Anything that gets in the way of that goal, especially in the next 10 years, is contributing to our demise. Basically if you're getting a new car, it needs to be electric, and we'll let the energy companies catch up. Saul Griffith of Otherlab at Maker Faire: https://youtu.be/CjFwHhB8JeU?t=21686 https://youtu.be/CjFwHhB8JeU?t=21686