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US Contemplating 'Vehicle Miles Traveled' Tax
dawgs72 writes "This week the Congressional Budget Office released a report saying that taxing people based on how many miles they drive is a possible option for raising new revenues, and that these taxes could be used to offset the costs of highway maintenance. The proposed tax would be enforced through the use of electronic metering devices installed on all vehicles. The mileage tax is being considered instead of an increase in the gas tax in order to tax hybrids, EVs, and conventional automobiles equally."
So, um, how are they going to split that between county, state, and federally-funded roads?
Infrastructure is infrastructure. Everyone benefits from having it. Putting this kind of administrative overhead on it just makes it more expensive *and* takes away the benefit.
I think the real problem is that people mostly can't afford to live close to where they work. This leads to a lot of inefficiency, as they waste lots of time and energy driving back and forth from their cheap suburbs to the higher rent districts that pay just barely enough to survive if you live a neighborhood a tier or two away. Relatively cheap transportation sorta creates this situation, but there has got to be better ways to solve this than by making transportation more expensive with all of this metering equipment.
Make cities denser, cheaper, more accessible to families with better schools & playgrounds, etc. Get rid of suburban sprawl by zoning more parks and greenways. Maybe build some summer cottages / timeshares so people can still get away "to the country". Done! All the other countries are doing it :-P
Isn't this already covered by the gas tax, which is inherently incurred on a "per mile" (gallon, really) basis?
Anything that can be taxed, will. Those things which can not be taxed will be fined.
Shouldn't we be encouraging people to use less gas? An excise tax on gasoline is an excellent way to do so.
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I ask this quesiton sincerely-- I honestly would like an answer from those who agree with this.
If I lived in Arkansas, and I only drive on local roads in state, and I do 3-4000 miles a year doing so,... why would this be justified by either Constitution or 10th amendment? I dont mean to troll or attack, but I cannot conceive of why this should be federally managed. I am not against seatbelt laws or think that all regulation or social programs are evil, but honestly, shouldnt there be a limit to what the Fed deals with?
OK, so let me get this straight. They want to create a GIANT system with many layers of government, to take more money based on actual miles driven. But we already have that - called a gasoline tax. At least with the gas tax I have an incentive to buy a more fuel-efficient car if I must commute (I must, far too). With this I would have much less. I think this is just to avoid being the "bad guys" that raise the gas tax. I thought one of the points of the gas taxes was to encourage efficiency.
Win-win!
That being, that they (State and federal governments) are spending too much money already.
How about they do something a little more useful, like impose a moratorium on new expenditures until the economic crisis is over?
Oh dear-- I just imagined government workers being cautious with other people's money! How silly of me!
"these taxes could be used to offset the costs of highway maintenance...The mileage tax is being considered instead of an increase in the gas tax in order to tax hybrids, EVs, and conventional automobiles equally."
If this were really the case then the gasoline tax is both a great proxy for miles driven and the weight of the vehicle (heavier vehicles consume more gasoline and also damage roads more per mile). It also fosters the purchase of lighter, more fuel efficient vehicles.
Taxes have been cut multiple times since the early 80s, while spending has increased. I'm all for cutting taxes, AFTER we get our spending under control. The govt should only be able to cut taxes if receipts > expenses AND there is no current deficit. It'll be a long time before our budgets are balanced unless we lay off the entire military or let poor people start dying in the streets. Had we been a little more responsible over the past 30 years none of this would have been an issue.
It's called an odometer.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
Let me start by saying, flat out, that I'm not trying to troll or start a war here, but what exactly would you have them cut?
It's a fact that most fiscal conservatives, when asked what they would have the government cut can't name a single program to cut that is both A) large enough to have an impact, and B) not political suicide to cut. Would you take benefits away from people on a fixed income, who were promised and rely on that income and those benefits to make it through the month? Would you cut spending on military and defense? Would you tell young people that Social Security won't be there for them when they are elderly, and then tell them to keep paying in anyway? Cut funding for sciences and eduction? NASA?
It's very easy to say "we should be spending less". It's a lot harder to identify areas to be cut that will make a difference and that people aren't so passionate about that the cuts won't be reversed in 4 years or less.
like impose a moratorium on new expenditures until the economic crisis is over?
Great idea! Slow down economic activity until economic activity speeds up!
SpyDock: Scientific Python in a Docker container
Road damage goes as the 4th power of the axle weight so a Honda Insight does essentially no damage. An Escalade does do damage. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road#Maintenance
I'd rather not see a miles traveled tax. It would be better to have a new vehicle fee proportional to the expected life of the vehicle and the 4th power of the axle weight. That cost gets passed along proportionally in the further sale of the vehicle.
Indeed.
The CBO reports on all sorts of things. The existence of this report only means that one person in congress asked them for a report. It does not mean that congress as a body is even considering such a thing, much less likely to do it.
For "nerds" a lot of people sure are susceptible to propaganda.
People who cavalierly wast resources should be paying this burden, not us people who are stuck with commutes, but thoughtful enough to buy vehicles which are misers on gas consumption.
I'm confounded when I drive through suburban neighborhoods and see 80% of the homes have at least one Pickup/SUV in the driveway - most of these are never going to be used for construction or off-road. They're the modern equivalent of the Station Wagon. If gas is so cheap these people are commuting with these, and I see them in large percentages on my daily commute, then gas is still too cheap. Get off that addiction, people!
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Anything that monitors my car will not sit well with me.
Oh wait, or anyone at all.
Unless you have a car that was built pre-OBD2 (older than 1996) your car already has this in place. PID 31 records how many miles your car has traveled since it was last reset.
I can leave doors open all day, I have left windows on the lower level of my home open all day, simply because of where I live which is the suburbs
Big city schools, yeah that is where its at, if at is graduating a small portion of your students and generally getting stomped by most schools in surrounding counties for GPA/SAT and graduation rates. Top it off with more chances for gang activity and I think you begin to see why people might not want to live in them.
You live your life and let the rest live theirs. NYC is special because of rent control and the like which has gone further than many other cities. Or perhaps you would prefer San Francisco which has nicely driven nearly all blacks from the town by pricing them out of the mark with new building rules and restrictions on what can go where.
Cities work for some people, they don't work for everyone. Atlanta is almost to racial parity but is that a good thing? It is a simple reason really, the city is getting too expensive for the poor to live in it and the poor are majority minority here. Yet people say "move to the city" which brings more yuppies who tear down or gut nice row homes jacking the costs to live in the neighborhood
Back to the story. It was to be expected with the push for better mileage vehicles that the method of taxation must change. Why they need meters I will never know, they can just do inspections and check your mileage. Of course with meters and GPS they can tell which roads you used. It all comes down to one thing.
Instead of spending the money they get and doing well with it they are forever looking for new sources and usually spending it before they get it
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* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Not exactly-- What I have a problem with is not people becoming more educated, being able to afford their own homes, or to ensure quality education for their children, as many left wing pundits would claim about me.
What I have a problem with is senators and other government employees creating subsidy programs in both military research expenditure budgets, and in technology and infrastructure budgets that generate conditions that destroy actual market competition, with the goal of enriching themselves through enriching the corporations they offer the subsidies to (Shock, horror, Senators can own stock!).
"You just dont want to pay taxes so little Timmy O'Toole can get new crutches!" is a red herring. What I really dont want to pay taxes for is so Dick Cheney can get richer from killing people in Iraq, or so government regulators can get spiffy pension pension plans, while people are starving and suffering contrived forclosures (remember that leak about bank of america?) and losing everything.
Basically, I dislike being told I hate the poor, while watching senators do land grabs and Cesar spout soliloquies while Rome burns to the ground.
Clear enough for you?
We have a larger navy than the next 11 countries combined, and 9 of those are our allies.
Step 1) Reduce navy to the save of the next 5 countries combined.
We have more agriculture department employees than there are farmers.
Step 2) Eliminate all farm subsidies and cut the agriculture department to the bone.
We fight too many wars
Step 3) Stop fighting wars and eliminate supplemental war expenditures.
Stop fighting the "war on drugs" and every other "war on..." that we have been loosing since the 1960s. Get over it already.
Step 4) Stop prosecuting and start taxing vices and victimless crimes.
I currently work as a defense contractor, and I know first that the government is incompetent and defense spending is largely wasteful.
Oh dear - you just imagined a government providing no safety net to citizens and no confidence to investors until some vaguely-defined point in the future! How silly of you!
State and federal governments are not spending too much money - if anything, they're not spending enough (and not only that but they're taxing the wrong people to get it). The job of the government is to provide for the security and well-being of its citizens. Cutting spending during a massive economic downturn is absolutely no way to do that job. Providing help through stimulus and job creation is.
I swear, it's like the only lesson all the small-government starve-the-beast meatheads learned from the Great Depression is to have a couple of wars when your country is going to shit.
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...Just tax tires.
The more miles you drive, the sooner you have to replace your tires, and the more tax revenue they get, regardless of your means of propulsion.
And as a side benefit, the kind of stupid, potentially unsafe behavior that wears out tires more quickly will financially penalize the idiots doing it even further.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.