From today's (5/29) Wall Street Journal.

 

Who would have thought?

 

Which again begs the question, why is there a gas tax and not a mileage-based tax instead? A tax on gas just subsidizes EVs.

 

If electric vehicles and their fuel were under the same tax/legal regime as everyone else - (without the incentives/subsidies/mandates/etc) - who would buy electric vehicles? Would Tesla even exist? It's part of the social engineering effort to get rid of internal combustion engines.

 

Another A-lister writing on topics full of what amounts to plausible sounding opinions. Meh.

https://ahumblepoliticsblog.wordpres...llysia-finley/

 

Mileage based tax favors bigger and poorer mileage vehicles. Our state is looking towards a mileage based tax and you better bet they’ll keep the gas tax.

We have the second highest gas tax in the nation, we were promised new bridges and great roads. After the fact they’ve diverted about 1/2 to the State Police, to pay pensions. Retirement at 50 y/o, full health care, 80k a year.

 

I just filled today, $7.96 per gallon at todays exhange rate. Normal price here for equivalent of your 93 octane, nothing spectacular.

 

I think this would be difficult to implement in practice. How is mileage recorded and reported? How many of us would be honest about how many miles we've driven? Will someone be inspecting our odometers every year to verify how much we've driven? Do we want electronic devices in our vehicles reporting wirelessly the mileage to some government authority?

 

No, it really isn't. You can't disconnect the speedo on any car built in the last 25 years without making the ECU go apoplectic. And for states that have annual safety inspections, this is a no-brainer. I'm open to other suggestions that get me out of subsidizing the roads for EVs.

 

Easy EV,s pay based on mileage at inspection. The rest of us pay gas tax.

But watch, gas tax will stay. And a mileage tax will be added as well. They are even pushing to toll bridges now in PA. While the turnpike has tripled in tolls and is going bust.

 

This is easier said than done. It isn't just whether or not a state requires safety inspections but what their specific rules are. Some states leave it up to localities. Others only require the inspection every few years, not annually. Some states, like mine, have no inspections at all.

Most states that have inspections have varying rules regarding what specific vehicles must be inspected (how old they are, for example). To get all 50 states into compliance on something like this would undoubtedly be a huge legislative nightmare as action would be required in 50 jurisdictions, not just one at the federal level. As we always like to say, motor vehicles are regulated at the state level, not the federal.

https://www.motorbiscuit.com/a-surpr...e-inspections/

 

How about skipping the whole mileage-based tax altogether and come up with a way to add a surcharge (a "tax") to the electricity purchased to recharge an electric vehicle just like we add a surcharge now to the cost of every gallon of gas? So many cents or dollars per kilowatthour or something similar. This should be easy to do at dedicated charging sites as the only thing done with electricity purchased there is recharge electric vehicle batteries.

It would be a little more complicated for the electricity consumed at home to recharge a vehicle because it's not possible to separate out the electricity purchased to recharge a vehicle from the electricity used by everything else at the house. But a little thought on this should be able to come up with a solution. Perhaps all that's needed is a separate electric meter for the home recharging station so the exact amount of electricity the vehicle consumes can be measured.

The best approach here is something that avoids inconveniencing the car owner by requiring inspections or the filling out of forms or whatever. Better is something that happens automatically in the background the way the fuel tax does now.

 

Just wait. Since the state won’t be collecting tax at the gas pump on electric vehicles, they will raise the price on those vehicles registration, license plates, raising the electric rates, they will find a way to collect the lost revenue.

The gas tax is suppose to pay for road repairs and maintenance. Electric vehicles use the same roads as ICE vehicles do. I hope they have the same smug look hen they pay their bill.

 

At a guess home owner could be forced to put in separate electric meter for charging vehicles and then taxed.

 

Thats nothing new, gas was 5 bucks a gallon 18 months ago when we vacationed there.

We went on a Nevada/Arizona/California vacation. We landed in Vegas, rented a car, and went sightseeing. One of stops we made was a old mining town called Oatman Arizona. When the mine dried up, all the miners packed up, but left the mules. Every day, decedents of those mules come down from the mountains to be fed by visitors. Once they had enough to eat, they went back to the mountains.

Once my wife and kids had all their fun feeding the animals, and I spent a little time looking at the atlas, I realized we were very close to Needles California. Those of you who read the old Peanuts comics no doubt know Needles is the town where Snoopy’s brother Spike lives. Had to check that off my list!

We stopped for fuel in Arizona. We could see a 4 lane highway following the Arizona/California state line. We could clearly see the gas prices in California, they were over 2 dollars a gallon more than Arizona. What shocked me is the number of people filling up at those stations. Assuming your car has a 15 gallon tank, that’s over 30 bucks more to fill your car in California than Arizona. I would gladly drive a mile out of my way to save at least 30 bucks!!!

I only mentioned the Oatman Arizona/Needles California part of the story hoping someone in readerland might recognize the area or highway. The California gas stations were crowded! If I’m at a gas station selling gas for $4.50, and from where I’m standing I can clearly see a station selling it for 2 bucks, I’m going to the cheaper station!! Why on earth do California residents not buy gas in Arizona, especially if it’s less than a mile out of the way?!

 

I'd tax the drivers license yearly, not the gasoline, incentivize it by discounts for good driving.

 

A thought about the milage tax. Oregon has had a pilot program asking for volunteers for this. I believe they plugged something into the port under the steering column that was tapped into the cars computer and recorded the miles driven. In my town of Medford we have an air quality station that plugs into that to make sure we're within tolerances before getting out tags renewed. I'm guessing they could have the EV cars stop in there at a regular basis to pay their fees. We'll see what the future holds but I've been watching the price at the pump go up every time I fill the tank.

 

I read an article several years ago that detailed who pays the most and who does the most damage. Turns out passenger vehicles do little or no damage to roads, and large trucks account for almost 100% of the damage. And guess what, larger trucks are mostly exempted from highway fund fuel taxes, and the motoring public pays the majority of the bill.

 

Sure, the only thing being recorded is the mileage you drive. 🙄

I see those little modules that plugged into the OBD port in cars at the junkyard, usually with progressive insurance logo on it. I occasionally take my truck to the dragstrip, if I had one of those in the truck I wonder how long it would take before I got a nasty message from my insurance agent? You KNOW they will record far more than the mileage.

 

That is exactly right. In designing pavement thicknesses, all the vehicles are equated to a equivalent single axle load (18,000 lbs) a small car is equivalent to 18 passes of that single axle load. So a semi causes (or requires a thicker pavement) significantly more damage to a pavement. Actually 24 cents per gallon on diesel fuel flows into the Federal Highway Trust Fund (18 cents on gasoline). The is also a Federal tax on truck tires that flows into the trust fund. The issue the fund is having is that fhe fuel tax has not increased since 1993 while CAFE standards and construction costs have increased.

 

True, but if taxes were raised for truckers, Who would end up paying them in the end? Us.

Same argument with the "tax corporations more" crowd. The end user pays ALL the taxes.

 

Here is a brilliant solution to that problem: close all the tax loopholes, get rid of the ridiculous over-compensated executive bonuses, and make cooperations get back to the business of producing quality stuff, instead of making decisions that do nothing but look good for the next board meeting.

 

been to oatman,few times,cant remember the hwy. i know i got a speeding ticket coming off ,rte66 right after i turned and headed for kingman. oatmans a very cool place

 

Wasn't CA bragging about a $60 billion surplus? When does it end?

 

Yes, they do, and it's more like $75 billion.

https://www.politico.com/states/cali...urplus-1381195

 

From someone living in CA. I paid $4.999/gal for premium 91 octane yesterday.

The price got my attention, but my wife & I were talking about the annual Summer rite of gas prices mysteriously rising every year like clock work on Memorial Day. Just like all those turkey news stories around thanksgiving or radiator overheating threads here.

This may be just the beginning of the next wave of inflation. As the Feds print money for their various purposes, its important to remember the purchasing power of a dollar is never fixed.

One of the implications of inflation is that our memories of what things cost will get less & less accurate.

At least we can enjoy our old cars.
Cheers
cf

 

I think a certain administration is making gas pricey to make electric cars look more affordable.

 

People think our family is strange the way we vacation. We pick a general area, get a hotel in the center of our travel circle, and then visit areas within that area. Or we will pick a destination, and find things along the eat to do or see to break up the trip into mini vacations.

When we went to Nevada, we visited meteor creator, Boulder Dam, Vegas, Oatman, Kingman, Racheal Nevada, Area 51, and traveled as much of Route 66 as possible.

It amazes me the number of people my age who have never been out of the state. I got bit by the travel bug not long after high school. I realized we live in a big country with lots of things to see.

 

As more electric cars hit the road, less fuel needed and consumed. Can't tell me that they are going to accept selling less fuel and getting less overall. Of course not. Used to a certain book of business and raising fuel prices keeps their money coming. Prices of fuel will continue to rise as more electric cars are purchased.

 

For as long as I can remember! Gas is always higher on springtime holidays travel. And summer. EV making gas more costly, maybe so. Maybe a gut of gas one day, may drive it down. Who knows!

Its not like the USA is the only ones buying EVs. Its the whole world! Worldwide there is something like 7 or 8 million on the road. 3.1 million sold last year. This year, all signs for a huge increase in EV sales. All the car makers are going that way. I even hedged my bet and put down money on the 2022 Ford electric truck. If the Cybertruck bombs.

It's just out with the old and new with the new. Technology marches on, like it or not.

 

Yep. Hang on. Now back to Oldsmobiles!

 

This line is technically and fundamentally incorrect. The goal of government here is limiting individual freedom AND separating the same individuals from as much money as possible for their own good. There is nothing excepting hype presenting this topic as a forgone conclusion.

 

Too political for me to answer here. Not going there!

 

What he said!!! ^

Lets stop the political bitching before ANOTHER thread gets closed.

 

You handful of members who seem determined to transform this board into another likeness of FB can't make technical points which stand scrutiny, so as on FB these same users resort to seeing these and really any topic through a political lens. The mods and super mod here allow you to vent your petulant views at length BEFORE declaring a thread political and closing it. If about six of you might get lost, the topic here could remain 'Oldsmobile'. The rules of the 'general discussion' forum seem to permit this group of whining members quite a bit of ranting latitude. Why? Advertisers and other users in balance certainly don't demand it.

 

Topics in this forum do not have to "remain Oldsmobile." The title of this forum is "Discuss your Oldsmobile or other car-related topics." Certainly the price of gasoline is a "car-related topic" and thus is a valid subject for a thread here.

 

Who drags any topic posted here (in recent times) across a political line then muddying the water of what is and isn't political in terms of allowed discussion? This isn't a free speech venue necessarily. It's not the topic as much as somehow those who must weigh it against current events which then sours the discourse. The topic does NOT remain 'Oldsmobile' or other car related topics, regardless of motive and intent.

 

Gas and other petroleum products. Has always been supply and demand of crude oil. The output of OPEC and other world events. And fed, state, and sometimes city taxes.

The latest now is criminal hackers. It maybe against our constitution. We need to be hunted them down, no matter where and kill if needed. Hackers are a clear and present danger. Put am end to this ****. its this nation, national security. How I feel about it.