There's some news going on currently about U.S. States looking to impose new taxes on electric car owners ...
Washington State electric car tax going into effect in 2013 .. they already passed a law requiring a $100/year additional registration fee for electric cars. Later they plan to shift to a per-mile road usage fee.
Oregon considering per-mile road use tax on electric car owners .. Here the Legislature is considering a per-mile fee, and apparently they've already studied it some and are confident for their system.
Virginia Governor proposes eliminating gasoline tax, raising taxes on electric cars ... That Governor proposed yesterday to shift how the highway fund gets money, to eliminate the gasoline tax and add other taxes including an increase to sales tax and a flat $100/year tax on electric cars.
The core issue is that there's a long term shift towards high efficiency electrified vehicles. This means a reduction of gasoline use per mile of driving. It means that because the U.S. highway system is funded by gasoline taxes, this long term shift will reduce the tax income per mile driven. Obviously over the long term it's going to bleed the highway system dry of money, and the government has to change how the system is funded.
What a load of Crap this is. Even if we had 100X as many EVs on the road, they would be insignificant in their impact on highway funds. In fact, they save more money in respiratory-related health costs in urban areas than they 'withhold' from those funds. Now large diesel vehicles, OTOH, are subsidized to an amazing extent, both in what they pay in taxes vs road surface wear they cause, and in health problems they cause and/or exacerbate. These taxes are the Big Energy interests striking back at a potential competitor.
I love the irony...
Normally you assume left wing political thinking favors more taxes, but if the tax target is in a favored class (EV's) then even the political left complains.
How funny. :)
The true "bottom line" is that as "the beast" of government grows it must find food (taxes) to survive.
You can't create "the beast" and then think it won't want to eat !!!
Taxes come with government... the bigger the government, the bigger the taxes and / or debt.
Get used to it... you wanted this.
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Maybe they should cut the Highway employees by 1/2 and save a ton of money from the ones that get to sit on their arses all the time and barely work.
I know people that work for what we call DPW. It is a known joke about trying to get your kid a job on the DPW if they want to be set for life. Good Benefits and great pay and you barely have to work..... yuk yuk yuk
If the idea is to make road tax truly fair on all road users depending on road usage, and wear and tear on roads, then a beeter system should be found.
My proposal would be to simply encode vehicle tyres with a tax receipt, and charge the tax at the point of manufacture. (A recycle 'deposit" could be included).
By this means, all vehicles could be correctly taxed, by an easy collection method .
The advantage of this system would be to encourage local tyre manufacture, thus eliminating the shipping pollution created by imported tyres, and preserving local employment.
marcopolo
If the overall size of "the beast" is small it's easy to find ways to pay for basic things like roads.
The sick thing is that it's estimated that every child born in America today faces roughly $3 million in debt if you count all the promises we have now.
It's just funny... the political left is always talking about increasing the size of government, but when the reality of paying for it comes up the left just tries to dodge the issue.
We are in deep do-do as far as debt... but so far there is almost no recognition of the danger.
Nicolo Machiavelli
CHAPTER XVI
Concerning Liberality And Meanness
COMMENCING then with the first of the above-named characteristics, I say that it would be well to be reputed liberal. Nevertheless, liberality exercised in a way that does not bring you the reputation for it, injures you; for if one exercises it honestly and as it should be exercised, it may not become known, and you will not avoid the reproach of its opposite. Therefore, any one wishing to maintain among men the name of liberal is obliged to avoid no attribute of magnificence; so that a prince thus inclined will consume in such acts all his property, and will be compelled in the end, if he wish to maintain the name of liberal, to unduly weigh down his people, and tax them, and do everything he can to get money. This will soon make him odious to his subjects, and becoming poor he will be little valued by any one; thus, with his liberality, having offended many and rewarded few, he is affected by the very first trouble and imperilled by whatever may be the first danger; recognizing this himself, and wishing to draw back from it, he runs at once into the reproach of being miserly.
Therefore, a prince, not being able to exercise this virtue of liberality in such a way that it is recognized, except to his cost, if he is wise he ought not to fear the reputation of being mean, for in time he will come to be more considered than if liberal, seeing that with his economy his revenues are enough, that he can defend himself against all attacks, and is able to engage in enterprises without burdening his people; thus it comes to pass that he exercises liberality towards all from whom he does not take, who are numberless, and meanness towards those to whom he does not give, who are few.
And if any one should say: Caesar obtained empire by liberality, and many others have reached the highest positions by having been liberal, and by being considered so, I answer: Either you are a prince in fact, or in a way to become one. In the first case this liberality is dangerous, in the second it is very necessary to be considered liberal; and Caesar was one of those who wished to become pre-eminent in Rome; but if he had survived after becoming so, and had not moderated his expenses, he would have destroyed his government. And if any one should reply: Many have been princes, and have done great things with armies, who have been considered very liberal, I reply: Either a prince spends that which is his own or his subjects’ or else that of others. In the first case he ought to be sparing, in the second he ought not to neglect any opportunity for liberality. And to the prince who goes forth with his army, supporting it by pillage, sack, and extortion, handling that which belongs to others, this liberality is necessary, otherwise he would not be followed by soldiers. And of that which is neither yours nor your subjects’ you can be a ready giver, as were Cyrus, Caesar, and Alexander; because it does not take away your reputation if you squander that of others, but adds to it; it is only squandering your own that injures you.
And there is nothing wastes so rapidly as liberality, for even whilst you exercise it you lose the power to do so, and so become either poor or despised, or else, in avoiding poverty, rapacious and hated. And a prince should guard himself, above all things, against being despised and hated; and liberality leads you to both. Therefore it is wiser to have a reputation for meanness which brings reproach without hatred, than to be compelled through seeking a reputation for liberality to incur a name for rapacity which begets reproach with hatred.
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History repeats.
We are in a very liberal age with excessive spending that eventually will end.
But we have a few more years of "liberal bliss".
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