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It's interesting that diesel is taxed more than gas in the US. It's the other way around in France.

by gniv 22d ago

retired 22d ago
It’s largely historical. France heavily encouraged diesel cars for decades, so there’s now a huge installed base. Once you’ve done that, you can’t suddenly jack up diesel taxes without making a lot of people very angry (and probably setting a few cars on fire).
- ButlerianJihad 22d ago
  We noticed. In the 1980s, it was not uncommon to smell/hear a diesel sedan putting around town. It was invariably something like a Peugeot or a Volkswagen.
  - retired 22d ago
    In true French colonial fashion: export the problem to West Africa and make it someone else's problem. That's where most of those old Peugeots and Volkswagens ended up.
    - infecto 22d ago
      Is it really a problem though?
- gniv 22d ago
  Yes they tried to increase it a few years ago and failed. Farmers came with tractors to Paris..
  - deleted 22d ago
    [deleted]
altcognito 22d ago
The diesel/gas relationship is inverted between the countries, so it actually makes a lot of sense (though not perfectly as both countries use diesel for freight)
jmclnx 22d ago
I think this will be an unpopular opinion here, but I believe gas/diesel prices in the US should be much higher. That is needed force a move to renewals with the US gov. trying to foster more use of fossil fuels. The way we are going, we are heading to a world that will be much harder and more expensive to live in.
- myrmidon 22d ago
  Agreed. Interesting fact: If you price CO2 at <$100/ton and assume that (ballpark) 2000 Gt of emissions (starting now) already lead to very severe consequences (this is quite generous), then you are pricing "somewhat intact climate for the next few centuries" at around one years GDP (which is insane to me).
- tialaramex 22d ago
  Fuel taxes are a good idea in principle but they're very easy to fiddle with as a popularity hack, and so like the US "Debt Ceiling" they become a useless political football. UK governments routinely announce that they are "freezing" their version of this tax because as I said, that's popular even though it's a bad idea.
- bryanlarsen 22d ago
  We should mostly be using trains for long distance transport and electric trucks for last mile transport. Both are very feasible today. We can get much of the benefit with little of the cost by phasing in a proper carbon tax slowly. Transitions like that can't happen overnight.
quickthrowman 22d ago
Heavy trucks do more damage to roads so the fuel tax is higher. Agricultural or ‘off road’ diesel is untaxed as the fuel tax is meant to pay for road maintenance, tractors and combine harvesters spend almost all of their time in a field and very little time on a road.
xoa 22d ago
>It's interesting that diesel is taxed more than gas in the US. It's the other way around in France. Although in the US there is commonly an "on-road"/"off-road" split, at least in more rural/agricultural regions or states like mine. The diesel is dyed so it can be distinguished if inspected, and the off-road diesel is either not taxed at all or taxed at a much lower rate. The intention is to not tax agricultural usage, and also that it doesn't make sense anyway to tax tractors and other equipment (almost all using diesel still) used in fields and woods for road maintenance. In contrast, the biggest on-road use of diesel in the US is commercial trucking of various flavors, and those really do do much more damage to roads (and if anything aren't taxed proportionally at all). One of the very rare times the politics and costs have even mildly aligned. It'd be nice if we could have more electrification in off road agricultural equipment as well but even putting aside all issues of energy density (which are solvable via quick swap packs/trailors if nothing else, and that's much easier to engineer in a tractor form factor and much easier to have a setup for at a typical farm) the weight will be a challenge, soil compaction is a very serious concern for most ag. Maybe electrification along with extra R&D/gov support can drive down the cost and improve the reliability of continuous track (or split continuous) for ag applications. John Deer has developed a few models with it, but the majority up and down the spectrum use tires. Combining the two though could allow for electrification with the same (or actually lower) ground pressure.
- myrmidon 22d ago
  Diesel for agricultural use is subsidised almost everywhere in the west to some degree. France removed taxes on non-road diesel this year and paid per-liter-subsidies on top. Keeping independent local agriculture is quite existential for any state, so this is understandable despite being morally questionable in my opinion.
  - hagbard_c 22d ago
    Taxing less =/= subsidising
    - myrmidon 22d ago

It's interesting that diesel is taxed more than gas in the US. It's the other way around in France.

by gniv 22d ago

It's interesting that diesel is taxed more than gas in the US. It's the other way around in France.

It’s largely historical. France heavily encouraged diesel cars for decades, so there’s now a huge installed base. Once you’ve done that, you can’t suddenly jack up diesel taxes without making a lot of people very angry (and probably setting a few cars on fire).

ButlerianJihad 22d ago
We noticed. In the 1980s, it was not uncommon to smell/hear a diesel sedan putting around town. It was invariably something like a Peugeot or a Volkswagen.
- retired 22d ago
  In true French colonial fashion: export the problem to West Africa and make it someone else's problem. That's where most of those old Peugeots and Volkswagens ended up.
  - infecto 22d ago
    Is it really a problem though?
gniv 22d ago
Yes they tried to increase it a few years ago and failed. Farmers came with tractors to Paris..
- deleted 22d ago
  [deleted]

altcognito 22d ago

The diesel/gas relationship is inverted between the countries, so it actually makes a lot of sense (though not perfectly as both countries use diesel for freight)

jmclnx 22d ago

I think this will be an unpopular opinion here, but I believe gas/diesel prices in the US should be much higher. That is needed force a move to renewals with the US gov. trying to foster more use of fossil fuels. The way we are going, we are heading to a world that will be much harder and more expensive to live in.

myrmidon 22d ago
Agreed. Interesting fact: If you price CO2 at <$100/ton and assume that (ballpark) 2000 Gt of emissions (starting now) already lead to very severe consequences (this is quite generous), then you are pricing "somewhat intact climate for the next few centuries" at around one years GDP (which is insane to me).
tialaramex 22d ago
Fuel taxes are a good idea in principle but they're very easy to fiddle with as a popularity hack, and so like the US "Debt Ceiling" they become a useless political football. UK governments routinely announce that they are "freezing" their version of this tax because as I said, that's popular even though it's a bad idea.
bryanlarsen 22d ago
We should mostly be using trains for long distance transport and electric trucks for last mile transport. Both are very feasible today. We can get much of the benefit with little of the cost by phasing in a proper carbon tax slowly. Transitions like that can't happen overnight.

quickthrowman 22d ago

Heavy trucks do more damage to roads so the fuel tax is higher. Agricultural or ‘off road’ diesel is untaxed as the fuel tax is meant to pay for road maintenance, tractors and combine harvesters spend almost all of their time in a field and very little time on a road.

xoa 22d ago

>It's interesting that diesel is taxed more than gas in the US. It's the other way around in France. Although in the US there is commonly an "on-road"/"off-road" split, at least in more rural/agricultural regions or states like mine. The diesel is dyed so it can be distinguished if inspected, and the off-road diesel is either not taxed at all or taxed at a much lower rate. The intention is to not tax agricultural usage, and also that it doesn't make sense anyway to tax tractors and other equipment (almost all using diesel still) used in fields and woods for road maintenance. In contrast, the biggest on-road use of diesel in the US is commercial trucking of various flavors, and those really do do much more damage to roads (and if anything aren't taxed proportionally at all). One of the very rare times the politics and costs have even mildly aligned. It'd be nice if we could have more electrification in off road agricultural equipment as well but even putting aside all issues of energy density (which are solvable via quick swap packs/trailors if nothing else, and that's much easier to engineer in a tractor form factor and much easier to have a setup for at a typical farm) the weight will be a challenge, soil compaction is a very serious concern for most ag. Maybe electrification along with extra R&D/gov support can drive down the cost and improve the reliability of continuous track (or split continuous) for ag applications. John Deer has developed a few models with it, but the majority up and down the spectrum use tires. Combining the two though could allow for electrification with the same (or actually lower) ground pressure.

myrmidon 22d ago
Diesel for agricultural use is subsidised almost everywhere in the west to some degree. France removed taxes on non-road diesel this year and paid per-liter-subsidies on top. Keeping independent local agriculture is quite existential for any state, so this is understandable despite being morally questionable in my opinion.
- hagbard_c 22d ago
  Taxing less =/= subsidising
  - myrmidon 22d ago