EV property tax

[Rt1AWD]

Meaning make everything a toll road? Some states (especially back east) do have more toll roads, but expanding tolling by 1000x would present a lot of problems, and add a ton of cost.

Not much more then taxing miles. In any case just adding to registration fee is the easiest the cheapest and the most straightforward way to collect for the roads. I have no problems with that at all.

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[HuntingPudel]

you don't have to really go to big dump trucks in terms of comparison. Here in GA, the big pickup trucks are extremely popular here, and they're as heavy or heavier than any EV.
<SNIP>

Heh, even ICE coupes can be heavier. My ‘69 Copue de Villle (factory screw-up with a convertible frame) weighed 5300 pounds empty. Add gas and people and it’s… Massive. ??

 

[waldo1949]

I just received property tax bills for my two cars. Both of them are nearly equal in value but only one of them is a Ford MME. That one carries an additional “electric vehicle tax” of $214.86 I’ve read that this compensates the State for lost gasoline taxes. But in effect it is an attempt by the State of North Carolina to punish anyone trying to lower environmental pollution, by buying an EV. Shouldn’t we be incentivizing voluntary attempts by private citizens to curtail atmospheric poisoning. What’s next? Pay people who pollute and punish those who try to better the AQI? Maybe their slogan will be “give a hoot! Pollute” or perhaps, ”Want clean air? Move to Mars!”

Roads cost money and you use them with your mach e! Without the charge, you would be freeloading. I pay an extra fee for my MI plates.
Some states are considering taxing all vehicles based on miles driven to eliminate the gas tax and e car fees, which seems like a good way to do it.

 

[dbsb3233]

I have read gasoline would jump to 15/gallon without those subsidies.

That's not accurate. Or even close, really. Every industry has it's favorable or unfavorable treatment, but O/G gets very few *actual* subsidies measured as a % of volume. Most of what the opponents call subsidy is really tax treatment that's standard for all manufacturing, just tailored to fit the mechanics of that type of business. They also try to attribute military spending to it, but we use the military to protect shipping routes for any crucial supplies. (Look at how we're gearing up to protect crucial semiconductor chip supplies from Taiwan.) Sometimes they try to put a number on implied environment impact, but that's highly nebulous and inconsistent with how everything else is treated. It's not right to count any of that as "subsidy".

Another point... the price of West Texas Intermediate (the benchmark price for US oil) is virtually the same as the price for Brent Crude (the benchmark price for North Sea oil). If the US were greatly subsidizing oil production here, WTI price should be a lot lower than Brent price. Or the other benchmark prices around the world.

The places heavily subsidizing are actually some of the countries that have nationalized their oil industries, like Venezuela. Gasoline is 12 cents/gallon there, because the government subsidizes it completely.

One of the reasons gasoline is so expensive in Europe is the high taxes they add to it. But other anti-oil policies have also contributed, that squeeze supply. In the US, our gas taxes are more modest, and our supply chains are much more dependable. We also have better refining capacity.

It's not that we're heavily subsidizing gasoline here, it's that we're not overburdening it like some places do.

 

[dbsb3233]

Not much more then taxing miles. In any case just adding to registration fee is the easiest the cheapest and the most straightforward way to collect for the roads. I have no problems with that at all.

Yeah I don't care for the idea of tracking and taxing miles either. I'm OK with a reasonable EV registration fee. Although that's only a partial solution, and I don't want to see it grow as large as it would take to be the full solution. I would favor a shift to more general fund use for roads, even if supplemented some with registration fees and (fading) gas taxes.

 

[zvez]

Then you probably need a gasoline car

actually, no I don't.

 

[Otto klub]

As others have said, per mile would never work. Logistics would drive all costs up.
Loaded or unloaded to easy to cheat.
What I have not seen mentioned is road use fees, which is what we all pay annual at registration.
On page two someone posted a photo of a dump truck and a Mustang.
Whomever put that dump truck on the road pays ten to twenty times or more annual road use fees than that Mustang. Because of weight. Plus taxes on every gallon of fuel put in it.
That looks like brand new asphalt the dump truck is sitting on.
For those of you that want to do away fossil fuels and stop drilling for crude I ask you, what do you want to drive on? Dirt? Gravel?
Without crude oil we cannot have asphalt.
Asphalt is a petroleum product.

 

[rad1234]

some of the states are offering a two tiered system of EV fees, a higher flat rate (which would benefit people who do a lot of miles) and a mileage based rate (which benefit people that don't drive so much). I'm in the don't drive so much group, so the $210 GA ev fee which translates to the tax on 800 gallons of gas is far more than I ever use in a year.

Georgia was one of the first states to charge EV's additional fee for road tax. They had a very generous $5000 refund on your state taxes that could be carried over for five years to use up. When the current party came to power in the state, they nixed that and imposed a $200 fee that would automatically escalate with inflation. When asked how they came up with that figure, one politician on the committee said that the average car paid $70 per year. We all know that EV's drive many more miles, so we doubled it to $140, then rounded it up to $200.

 

[zvez]

Georgia was one of the first states to charge EV's additional fee for road tax. They had a very generous $5000 refund on your state taxes that could be carried over for five years to use up. When the current party came to power in the state, they nixed that and imposed a $200 fee that would automatically escalate with inflation. When asked how they came up with that figure, one politician on the committee said that the average car paid $70 per year. We all know that EV's drive many more miles, so we doubled it to $140, then rounded it up to $200.

OUr state house has the mistaken impression that only wealthy people drive evs, that's when they got rid of the tax credit. It's been a mess ever since.

 

[SonicBlue]

I've also tried to find something substantiated and it seems like it's a tough ask. It would likely be political suicide to even propose such a thing for any party.. But Elon said he'd like to see subsidies removed everywhere which would include oil and gas. I don't agree with him on much these days but definitely do on that...even if it's nowhere near that 15/gallon mark...we have alternative energy sources now...let's just remove subsidies from them all...that should be what capitalism is all about after all.

Super expensive gas, which is what that would cause, seems like a pretty terrible idea, both for the economy and foreign policy. It isn’t just a matter of politics… although that would explain why not even many Democrats support such a thing.

I’m about as anti-subsidy as they come, but cheap gas is a good thing.

 

[Deleted member 20140]

Perhaps I wasn’t clear. Properly maintained roads benefits everyone in the country even if they don’t use the roads themselves and therefore don’t pay fuel taxes, even indirectly. National defense, ambulances and other first responders require a roads structure not to mention commerce in general. How to fund that necessary expense is another matter. It sounds “fair” to say that road users should pay the tax but really at the same time it benefits others who by personal choice or health issues do not drive and pay the tax. Just as in my state a lottery was considered “gambling” and therefore sinful. But if you tied the profits from the lottery to funding public education then what was sinful became laudatory. BL - the whole community benefits from cars that don’t pollute and are less reliant on imported oil and that should be encouraged and not taxed. HAND.

 

[AKgrampy]

We do not pay anything yet here in Alaska but I would prefer a simple set fee over mileage. A couple things I ponder as I have read the discussions is if we monitor milage how would mileage obtained traveling in other states be credited to those states? When you purchase fuel they receive the tax (assuming you purchase some) or plenty of toll roads back East. Second many mention weight, and I am not a highway engineer, but I believe the actual lbs/sq-in will come down to tire size. So overall weight matters for bridges but I would believe the lbs/sq-in should matter for road wear and tear. So should a person get credit for a better tire footprint? Final thought what about mileage on unmaintained roads or self maintained? I lived on a dirt road and our Service Area taxes us to maintain it. Many dirt roads up here and in the desert country too. Just some thoughts. Once again I am fine with a flat fee when the time comes.

 

[dbsb3233]

We do not pay anything yet here in Alaska but I would prefer a simple set fee over mileage. A couple things I ponder as I have read the discussions is if we monitor milage how would mileage obtained traveling in other states be credited to those states? When you purchase fuel they receive the tax (assuming you purchase some) or plenty of toll roads back East. Second many mention weight, and I am not a highway engineer, but I believe the actual lbs/sq-in will come down to tire size. So overall weight matters for bridges but I would believe the lbs/sq-in should matter for road wear and tear. So should a person get credit for a better tire footprint? Final thought what about mileage on unmaintained roads or self maintained? I lived on a dirt road and our Service Area taxes us to maintain it. Many dirt roads up here and in the desert country too. Just some thoughts. Once again I am fine with a flat fee when the time comes.

Yes, no matter how you do it, there are gonna be some aspects and situations that are not fair. If you try to implement a mileage fee in your home state, then visitors to your state get away without paying. And it adds administrative costs. And in states that don't have annual state inspections to capture the actual mileage would need to rely on self-reporting, which is ripe for cheating. Also, it can get really messy when the car gets sold to someone else.

Gas taxes have quirks too. When you buy gas for your lawnmower or generator, you're paying for roads that those things don't use. But we accept those exceptions because they're minor.

Fixed registration fees don't distinguish between someone that drives the car 30,000 miles/yr or 3,000 miles/yr.

Same with general fund funding (income taxes, sales tax, etc). But that's still the method I'd start shifting toward because the overall benefit of roads is immense for 100% of the populace, whether you drive or not. Even those who don't drive get nearly all their goods and services by road too.

 

[Sikkun]

So I started reading up a bit, and GA is one of the states considered charging tax on public dc charging. I don't think anyone's doing it yet, but for those who rely on public charging, having to pay tax on that as well as an annual registration fee would seem way out of line.

KY, CT, GA all my supercharger invoices have tax charged.

OH, PA, WV had no tax charged.

 

[dbsb3233]

KY, CT, GA all my supercharger invoices have tax charged.

OH, PA, WV had no tax charged.

Yep. Some charge regular sales tax on DCFC. Some have a special DCFC tax. Some charge no DCFC tax. Everyone is trying to figure out the best way forward with the transition to EVs.

There is some validity to the argument that DCFC is mostly for travelers, and a large share of those are from out-of-state. Thus a way to collect from those since they don't pay your state's EV registration fee.

But of course that still catches some in-staters in the same net.

Not that that's a new concept. When you buy almost anything while out of state, you're stuck paying their tax.

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