Pay-per-mile vs Gas Tax

[The Real Maverick]

As a couple folks have noted, it will not replace the current gas tax, but will add to it.

Currently WA State has the 4th largest gas tax in the nation, at almost $0.53/Gallon.

Note that awhile back WA added $75 to car tab renewal fees for hybrid vehicles to go towards creating additional charging stations for electric cars. So, as a Maverick hybrid owner I am paying to support electric car charging stations!!! My recent renewal fee was $172.00.

That's pretty cheap. Consider yourself lucky.

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[The Real Maverick]

You also have a governor who is spending your gas tax on a high speed rail that has consumed unknown hundreds of millions of gas and other tax dollars and not 1 train has run in that decades long pursuit.

Building trains is hard.

 

[22XLThybrid]

Here in Washington they are proposing to replace state gas tax with a pay-per-mile charge. Claim the EV's and to a lesser extent hybrids are not paying their fare share of the road tax. Supposedly Oregon and three other states have some sort of pay-per-mile program. If you are in one of these states I'd like to hear how it is working out for you. If not, any general comments? In the example I saw if you even average 25 MPG you will pay more with the new plan than you do with Washington's gas tax. There is also talk of just charging hybrids more to register per year. I remember when you were encouraged to drive a car that was good on gas.....

Shortly after I received my Pa. title in 2022 for my hybrid which labeled the fuel as "gas" I was reissued a title that changed the fuel to gas and electric. Which I argued, unsuccessfully, that the car is only powered by gas. It was a pointless argument because the point of the title change was to be able to designate vehicles to tax electric vehicles in the future. But nothing has changed here. "Trucks" cost considerably more than cars for registrations here. And since this isn't anything more than an Escape with a box, It definitely creates a lot less road impact issues than a large SUV. And there really aren't any other small hybrid trucks. I have a feeling something will change in the future when the percentages tip some number, or efficiency continues and they're just not getting road taxes per gallon of gas, which is pretty high here.

 

[pigsareus]

Unfortunately, the wind is blowing in a different direction in many places these days.

My state already has a fuck-the-Hybrid owner annual tax. It's definitely a virtue-signaling tax aimed at vehicles that don't totally propel themselves using fossil fuels. So ironic, in a state with some of the largest known Lithium reserves in the US.

Example: Two vehicles both average ~40mpg. One is a Hybrid and the other is a compact ICE vehicle. Why is the Hybrid vehicle charged an additional annual tax but the compact vehicle isn't, when they both consume the same amount of fuel?

Paying to keep highways maintained is necessary. Switching to an annual tax based on miles driven is the only fair way.

It's a crock isn't it? Plenty of Hondas and Toyotas have been getting 35+ MPG ICE for decades yet nobody suggested a tax on mileage, as a matter of fact we've had 'save the planet - buy econocars' for decades. Now that we have much better overall better MPGs they want to jack up the fees and change the game. That always happens - back when they promoted this they never mentioned oh hey if we do get a lot of high MPG cars we'll likely be increasing taxes on them. In that they all know the estimated MPG on all vehicles they can just slap additional taxes on any that get above some threshold and not just those that are hybrids. This is where we need to absolutely inundate those that are proposing that kind of hybrid discrimination and have them explain why they are only isolating hybrids in this madness.

 

[pigsareus]

Wait a freaking minute!
If revenue’s are falling because people are buying less gas then demand would be going down and price per gallon would be going down.
Vote out the incumbents, they are trying to rob you.

eh, you would think so but the OPEC gang continuously decreases oil production to ensure that the prices stay higher, they've been doing this for at least 6 years.

 

[Scott Asheville]

I'm a big fan of eliminating the gasoline tax and replacing it with either a flat registration "road use" tax, or a mileage tax. I prefer the flat tax because it's much simpler for everyone.

We all pay some kind of infrastructure tax on electricity. Meaning if we want the benefits of a grid connection, we have to pay our part to maintain it. Even if we don't consume a single kWh because we have solar. It seems fair to me.

 

[Solaryellow]

The big question(s): What is the tax supposed to fund and does anyone think it will be used for said purpose?

 

[Steve Jones]

In Virginia (from VA DMV Website): The highway use fee (HUF) helps make up for the fuel taxes that drivers with fuel-efficient and electric vehicles spend less on, because they’re not using as much fuel. This fee supports the Commonwealth Transportation Fund, which helps maintain our roads, highways, transit and airports.

You pay the HUF if you register a:

• Fuel-efficient vehicle, which is a vehicle that has a combined fuel economy of 25 miles per gallon (MPG) or greater
• Vehicle made in a year in which the average combined MPG rating for all vehicles produced in that year is 25 MPG or greater
• Low Speed Vehicles, pay an annual $25 HUF

The HUF’s calculation is based on:

• The vehicle's fuel efficiency (combined miles per gallon (MPG) rating)
• The fuel tax rate at the time the vehicle was registered (updated annually July 1)
• The average number of miles driven by all Virginians
• HUF is 85% of the difference between taxes paid by a vehicle with a 23.7 rating and taxes paid by a vehicle using the manufacturer's combined MPG rating based on the average miles driven by all Virginians

HUF= [((11,600 average miles traveled * fuels tax rate) / 23.7) - ((11,600 average miles traveled * fuels tax rate) / vehicle's MPG rating)] * .85

My 2023 Hybrid has a combined 37 mpg.
According to this chart my annual charge is $46.06. This is in addition to other fees as well.

 

[MakinDoForNow]

So how would that work - when you do yearly tag renewal they confirm your mileage - confirm what you drove past year, and do some makeup tax?
Do that for everyone actually?
That should make DMV lines interesting.

Because I don't see how they would know what MPG someone is getting.

That's as bad as the increased annual tag/registration fee attempting to do the same thing.
I can see the need, just an odd way of doing it.
We have PHEV pricing, and BEV pricing.

And yes - the heavier battery vehicles buying less gas are indeed paying less for the roads - so it is a problem as it shifts more to the gas-only vehicles.
Now usually bad MPG can mean heavier vehicle tearing up road more - so buying more fuel giving more taxes for road repair somewhat makes sense.
But they will find a way to get the funds they need - or people will scream about the bad roads.
Could be interesting how they figure to replace lost revenue if not thru something auto-related.

Texas just started Jan 1, 2025. We will see as it works out. In non EPA emissions counties they dropped the annual inspections ($7 which was moved from the station to the county renewal office forget what the call it but it's now a fee for not getting an inspection). The ev tax is $200/year and hybrid is $100/year. Don't know what the adjustment procedure wound up being but proposal was to be based on miles driven and EPA MPG for your vin#. (AI figure it out). At least on newer cars annual milage AI will find from manufacturer's data base reports. In EPA emissions counties inspections will continue to collect milage off vehicles annually which is reported to DMV.
I am reminded of lawsuit in the 60's, I think where property taxes were collected based on county of residence. Several people in Amarillo had front doors in one county and bedrooms in other county. One county considered the front door address as being your residence and the other county considered master bedroom as your county of residence. Some were taxed twice!! = LAWSUIT!!!!

 

[Ponyprez]

Texas just started Jan 1, 2025. We will see as it works out. In non EPA emissions counties they dropped the annual inspections ($7 which was moved from the station to the county renewal office forget what the call it but it's now a fee for not getting an inspection). The ev tax is $200/year and hybrid is $100/year. Don't know what the adjustment procedure wound up being but proposal was to be based on miles driven and EPA MPG for your vin#. (AI figure it out). At least on newer cars annual milage AI will find from manufacturer's data base reports. In EPA emissions counties inspections will continue to collect milage off vehicles annually which is reported to DMV.
I am reminded of lawsuit in the 60's, I think where property taxes were collected based on county of residence. Several people in Amarillo had front doors in one county and bedrooms in other county. One county considered the front door address as being your residence and the other county considered master bedroom as your county of residence. Some were taxed twice!! = LAWSUIT!!!!

I'm sure someone here in the NM. legislature is trying to come up with yet another way to tax us and squeeze out a little more. So just to get this straight, the government wants us to give up petroleum fueled vehicles, buy astronomically priced E/V's and on top of that, charge us extra for owning an E/V. Heres an idea, lets add a surcharge on electric bills for those that don't own E/V's to offset our cost's. LOL.

 

[RR - All the way]

Seems like it is fair to pay on your usage of total miles/yr. There should perhaps be a factor to decrease or increase your costs based on the weight of the vehicle which affects long term highway maintenance costs.....................

 

[zen_]

Collecting a per mile tax accurately is a minefield, although something obviously needs to change since paying by usage somewhat proportionally is completely off the rails now.

I will be interested to see how states that are ranked high on quality of roads while their fuel taxes are at average levels will handle this.

 

[CajunMick]

Joke. Just want your money. Recalled electric power companies encouraged solar power, under feedback, pay plan. So many did that. So now power companies revenue falling, so they now apply a surcharge tax ti reduce their losses.

so if some don’t drive often (take their bicycles or electric scooters) betcha govt will propose a surcharge tax to make any pay if not driving enough. Can see other red states population grow.

 

[Prickly Pear]

Hey @Milous , the way I read the regs our state tacks on a $75 dollar registration fee to hybrids if they "uses at least one method of propulsion that is capable of being reenergized by an external source of electricity and (b) is capable of traveling at least thirty miles using only battery power". So PHEV's are subject but the Mavericks should not be (yet). I think you might have been getting screwed?

I am OK with a use tax if they can figure out the weight thing. Oregon stated it was difficult to know what the car weighs, which I think is BS. If someone wants to drive a friggin tank that gets ~10MPG and weighs 3 times what our Mav's do they should not be able to get away with paying the same amount. At least a gas tax (with ICE vehicles) indirectly accounts for weight via it's impact on fuel economy.

 

[710-oil-614]

Ohio sucks. lol Dayton awful, as I mentioned earlier I feel like those with no license plates driving around running red lights etc hitting people and driving off bc like 1/3 don’t have insurance literally live consequence free her.

Literally zero police enforcement on the road. I get it, they got drugs etc to deal with. But do your job and enforce the rules everywhere, I only see cops in wealthier areas. None in Dayton doing any road enforcement

I agree. Here in Central Ohio I have zero fear of any law enforcement regarding traffic laws and neither does anyone else.

My infractions are minor - running a red light to an on ramp at 6a when going to the office and nobody around. Going 5-7mph over.

People honestly get shot weekly on the outer belt here in road rage incidents.

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