California, calls and signatures needed to stop EV fee's of $165 per EV per year!!

[cpa]

Great point. But we follow that logic we'd need to double the existing gas taxes, and probably treble the taxes on diesel (ask London!). And while we're at it we could increases taxes for every "externality" (as the economist call them) for every product, from beer to butter. That would be a perfect world from the view of an economist, but it's never going to happen.

{snippity snip}

Here's another idea. Require the car itself to keep track of miles driven in each state and report it quarterly to some clearing house. All EVs are network connected and have GPSs (or could have at negligible cost). So the car knows where it is driving and can accumulate the miles driven in each state and then report it, just the VIN and miles driven in each state, to some clearing house which could report to the taxing jurisdictions and probably net out the inter-state payments as well.

This method puts a little burden on the manufacturer, none on the owner, automates the entire process and would not infringe on privacy issues. Include hybrids in the requirement, though I suspect their days are numbered.

We all want good roads and we can't expect to get them for free. If you don't like the amount of the tax, or how the tax dollars are being spent, take it up with your elected representative.

Trucking companies that operate in multiple states must apportion their income to the states in which they pass through for the purposes of paying income taxes to those states. That is the generally accepted method for transportation companies for the several states to collect state income taxes due. Before the advent of the interwebs and other things, there were private companies that would contract with commercial trucking companies to determine the annual miles driven through the various states. If my memory serves, the trucking companies would send the routes (Los Angeles to Cleveland; Cleveland to Atlanta; Atlanta to St. Louis; St. Louis to LA), and the dates driven. This company would determine a reasonable route for the driver and accumulate miles driven in whichever state.

Your suggestion above very closely imitates a practice that has been going on for a long time; likely since Congress passed Public Law 86-272 in the late '50s. I see no reason why we cannot have a similar reporting method for assessing, collecting and distributing road taxes using GPS or some other similar means. I would assume that anonymity could easily be maintained. They would know that you crossed the state line, but they would not know where nor where you are. But then, perhaps I am too naive.

 

[AB4EJ]

I spoke with members of ALDOT and AL PSC, who I run into in meetings from time to time. I gave them a recommendation on such a tax for EVs in AL. Since there are only a couple hundred (at most) EVs in the state, the decision was made that it would be more trouble than it would be worth to do anything on an EV road tax (at least for now), So for now I get away with it. I will say, though, that the ad valorem tax (as part of registration/plate renewal) on such a heavy and expensive car more than makes up for the road tax...at least in AL...

 

[ohmman]

Like @Ulmo, I was a participant in the California Road Charge Pilot program (just ended). I also used the ODB dongle and Azuga, but I plugged it into my Tesla and completely forgot about it. I never received a single alert about speed/consumption concerns, etc. I got my "invoice" (fake money) and a few requests for surveys.

I do think the privacy concern is real, though. While I love the flexibility of this system - being able to tax vehicles appropriately, include incentives by vehicle type if desired, etc. - I think there will be serious resistance to adoption based solely on the concerns about privacy. I let them know this in my survey responses, but the easy solution escapes me.

If we can work around this constraint, I think it's the clear winner for taxing all vehicles that use our roads. It's better than a gas tax, it can tax vehicles more commensurate with their road stress levels, and just seems more fair overall.

 

[cpa]

Color me naive. Why is there so much concern about our privacy while we are on the road? We forfeit most of our privacy when we are in public. Police have license plate scanners running in many of their vehicles. Many departments do not purge the data, or purge the data after a lengthy period of time. California has the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System. Any police officer, dispatcher and DA investigator can access your personal information. License plate data is cross-referenced to the registered owner. While it is a crime to use this information for unofficial purposes, many agencies look the other way if the information is used for personal reasons. There are roadside cameras along all major highways and freeways, and on many secondary ones. Surveillance cameras abound, from convenience stores to ATMs to strip malls to just about everywhere. The fact is, we are not living in the 1950s any more.

Do your taxes with TurboTax? Do you really think your data is private? Intuit has your data--they have to in order to zap it across cyberspace to the IRS. They have my client's data too, cuz I use their professional grade software. What they do with that data is another story, but the fact is, they have it. Read their privacy statement and the license agreement you must accept before using TurboTax.

You computer experts will have to enlighten me about the "location services" that pops up on my iphone whenever I turn it on or use it for certain things. My Luddite brain believes that if location services is active, then my phone knows where I am, and any program that I access knows where I am. And if my phone knows where I am, I would think that something else would know where I am, and that information is easily obtained by the authorities with a warrant or with my consent.

Finally, with (guessing) 225 million or so licensed drivers in the United States, and possibly 175 million or so vehicles, I think that it is a colossal waste of resources to have a group of spies tracking us and all the mileage that we drive. Only the wicked flee when no man pursueth.

So, I see nothing wrong with some sort of GPS indicator when I cross the state line. I would think that the data would be filtered enough to indicate that I was in Oregon, just not exactly where in Oregon. State lines are delineated and fixed, and that information can easily be programmed without revealing the exact geographical coordinates.

 

[ohmman]

Color me naive. Why is there so much concern about our privacy while we are on the road? We forfeit most of our privacy when we are in public. Police have license plate scanners running in many of their vehicles. Many departments do not purge the data, or purge the data after a lengthy period of time. California has the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System. Any police officer, dispatcher and DA investigator can access your personal information. License plate data is cross-referenced to the registered owner. While it is a crime to use this information for unofficial purposes, many agencies look the other way if the information is used for personal reasons. There are roadside cameras along all major highways and freeways, and on many secondary ones. Surveillance cameras abound, from convenience stores to ATMs to strip malls to just about everywhere. The fact is, we are not living in the 1950s any more.

Agreed that privacy erosion is a real thing. Despite that, I think it's healthy to question anytime you give more of your privacy away.

So, I see nothing wrong with some sort of GPS indicator when I cross the state line. I would think that the data would be filtered enough to indicate that I was in Oregon, just not exactly where in Oregon. State lines are delineated and fixed, and that information can easily be programmed without revealing the exact geographical coordinates.

I couldn't figure out whether they were getting odometer miles from the ODB information or from the GPS. Considering they mapped each trip, it seemed to me that they relied upon the GPS to calculate traveled miles. If so, they wouldn't be able to "generalize" my location without compromising accuracy in the mileage estimates. Even if they use the odometer, it might pose a difficulty for those who live right on state borders and drive on both sides of the state line regularly.

I'm not sure what the exact answer will be, but if "fairness" is an important factor, this solves things nicely. I suppose we'll see how it progresses.

 

[Gizmotoy]

In general I disagree with the position that "Thing X has eroded your privacy and so therefore you have no right to privacy", but this passage kind of stuck out as particularly unusual:

Finally, with (guessing) 225 million or so licensed drivers in the United States, and possibly 175 million or so vehicles, I think that it is a colossal waste of resources to have a group of spies tracking us and all the mileage that we drive. Only the wicked flee when no man pursueth.

What makes you think we need a group of spies to accomplish this? The technical means to accomplish this are already in place, the devices are cheap, and the ongoing costs are minimal. GPS tracks require practically no storage space. Your entire driving history could fit on a CD.

The technological and cost requirements are extremely modest for what amounts to full-scale location tracking of a substantial portion of the population. And then consider that those costs will be completely offset and then some by the taxes they generate. Is it still a waste of resources if it's "free" and fully automated?

Agreed that privacy erosion is a real thing. Despite that, I think it's healthy to question anytime you give more of your privacy away.

Indeed. At the least you should be examining what you're receiving in return for the reduction in privacy. In this case: you get to pay a tax. Not a great trade-off.

 

[Eclectic]

Great point. But we follow that logic we'd need to double the existing gas taxes, and probably treble the taxes on diesel (ask London!). And while we're at it we could increases taxes for every "externality" (as the economist call them) for every product, from beer to butter. That would be a perfect world from the view of an economist, but it's never going to happen.

Here is what I've heard proposed:

1) Tax electricity. This would be nice as it penalizes "kWh guzzlers" and benefits "kWh economy". This is the most analogous to the current gas tax. The problem is that the existing infrastructure can't differentiate the kWh consumer, the grid doesn't know an EV from a baking oven.

2) Tax some proxy for road impact, like tires. No really any great proxies.

3) Tax mileage at a rate that considers the weight of the vehicle based on some well documented cause/effect relationship between vehicle weight and road wear.

a) The weight piece works fine for passenger cars, probably not quite so well for trucks (unloaded weight versus loaded weight), but without all the data it's hard to say. I supposed the truck tax could make some assumptions about average load, but since pickups are the most popular vehicle in the U.S., there will be a lot of debate about whether they drive around empty or full.

b) Tracking mileage automatically in real time triggers a big privacy concern. Tracking it manually is a nuisance (based on my experience in the CA pilot) and has issues with out of state driving which are even worse in smaller states where people cross state borders more frequently.​

Here's another idea. Require the car itself to keep track of miles driven in each state and report it quarterly to some clearing house. All EVs are network connected and have GPSs (or could have at negligible cost). So the car knows where it is driving and can accumulate the miles driven in each state and then report it, just the VIN and miles driven in each state, to some clearing house which could report to the taxing jurisdictions and probably net out the inter-state payments as well.

This method puts a little burden on the manufacturer, none on the owner, automates the entire process and would not infringe on privacy issues. Include hybrids in the requirement, though I suspect their days are numbered.

We all want good roads and we can't expect to get them for free. If you don't like the amount of the tax, or how the tax dollars are being spent, take it up with your elected representative.

All this talk about fairness and paying fair shares is interesting. As I recall from the political campaigns, the slogan of "pay your fair share" has nothing to do with paying for what you use or the impact of your lifestyle. Instead, it's all about redistributing wealth. So from this, if we want to make sure that EV owners pay their fair share, it should be based on income and wealth, not on the actual impact EV ownership has on roads and the environment.

 

[ohmman]

All this talk about fairness and paying fair shares is interesting. As I recall from the political campaigns, the slogan of "pay your fair share" has nothing to do with paying for what you use or the impact of your lifestyle. Instead, it's all about redistributing wealth. So from this, if we want to make sure that EV owners pay their fair share, it should be based on income and wealth, not on the actual impact EV ownership has on roads and the environment.

Conflate much?

 

[Ulmo]

Color me naive.

It's not long before they are drilling down much deeper into your personal life and sending you to jail or giving you a bad credit report based upon what some sensor picked up in their logs.

Disclaimer: I forgot my GPS tracker device in a rental car for the speeding section, and those records are for someone driving that I never met in a car I do not own. The other ones are not me driving and the GPS tracker was not in my car. I had no driving represented by the above two screenshots. An old coworker friend of a relative wanted to find out how "bad" they are at driving, so I let them try it out, so I blotted out their addresses. I took driver's ed and studied the driver code. 8MPH/s is not illegal.

Yes, I tracked down the vehicle of the persons who were renting to get the device back. The first person said no, and the second person a few days later also said no. They both had the same excuse: they wanted to return the vehicle in the same condition they rented it in. The second one turned the device into Lost and Found at the car rental, and I got that back from the car rental agencies. Everyone was very courteous and nice. Both renters and the family of the first renter looked freaked the heck out. Neither excerpt above is from either renter (different rental periods). I learned of a very nice suburb called Lafayette, nestled in the hills between Hell and Walnut Creek.

I confirmed in this car rental company Lost & Found experience what I earlier started to learn that many car rental companies use the same pool of cars; they just scan the one you sat in and link it to the agreed rate and clock you in and out and don't care which agency is using it, and the cars get passed around from and to agencies as randomly as wind across water. I assume the corporate agreements of the agencies and pools and how they relate is well defined within their systems, but the occasional customer never sees evidence of that. Someone rear ended the car behind my rental car months ago which hit my rental and I had a deductible rebate check (at-fault insured covered) mailed to me a few days ago that was from some holding company.

 

[nikeykid]

$100 a year under proposed new infrastructure plan EDIT: that would start in 2020

The governor and legislative leaders want to raise $52 billion to fix California roads through a big increase in the gas tax along with higher car registration fees and a $100 charge on emission-free vehicles, a person told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

The 10-year plan would boost gasoline excise taxes by 12 cents a gallon -- a 43 percent increase, said the person who has direct knowledge of the proposal but sought anonymity because details were being officially announced later in the day.

The plan also includes a sliding fee on vehicles, with owners of cheaper vehicles paying less.

For the first time, owners of zero emission vehicles would pay a $100 annual fee, since they use public roads but don't pay gasoline taxes.

-- The $100 annual fee on zero emission vehicles would start in 2020 and raise $200 million

Source: AP Source: Gas Tax Funds $52 Billion California Road Plan

 

[whttiger25]

I agree a fee makes sense eventually, but not until there are enough EVs on the road that the government decides to stop incentivising them. Because what is the point of providing an incentive that competes with an added fee?

 

[suraj1194]

Too bad they didn't also extend the validity of the white decals up to 2020.

 

[Oceanwolf]

Yes. If we also have a bicycle tax. They may not damage the roads but the cost of upkeep in terms of lanes etc is not a small amount. They may say they do provide a green transportation, well we do too.

 

[ohmman]

Yes. If we also have a bicycle tax. They may not damage the roads but the cost of upkeep in terms of lanes etc is not a small amount. They may say they do provide a green transportation, well we do too.

I think there is more to it than just the amount of cash spent on bike lanes. There's also the fact that, in some cases, those bikes are getting vehicles off of the roads. Most of those vehicles are ICE vehicles that have negative externalities associated with them. Alternatively, many cases of cycling are leisure, in which case there's a societal cost associated with someone's leisure choice. So adding a fair bicycle tax would be complicated, to say the least.

 

[Ulmo]

Well buses at least have the potential to reduce the number of cars on the road. And they are critical for poorer urban families who cannot afford a car and a place to park it.

In my many decades experience of using buses, this wasn't true: poorer people still needed cars, and the only ones in buses were disabled or extremely disadvantaged (i.e., too ugly and stupid to keep a job) people (except for extremely super ultra high density urban areas like NYC, SF). But that was in the past; now, poorer people use Uber-like services, like Uber, Lyft, & Tesla Network, and even the prior disadvantaged bus riders could switch over to those individualized services.

The problem with buses was that they never got you anywhere fast and healthy enough. That's why no one able-bodied and able-minded and not too ugly just couldn't use them. (I'm not picking on ugly people; the Uber like services will actually help them the most, since they have the most to gain from the increased opportunities enabled by individualized services only Uber like transportation can offer (i.e., they're fast enough), compared to the simply disabled or stupid people who basically have charity and welfare, but even they would probably gain from individualized services).

The large semi trucks are the ones that really haven't been paying their fair share.

Agreed.

 

[stopcrazypp]

In my many decades experience of using buses, this wasn't true: poorer people still needed cars, and the only ones in buses were disabled or extremely disadvantaged (i.e., too ugly and stupid to keep a job) people (except for extremely super ultra high density urban areas like NYC, SF). But that was in the past; now, poorer people use Uber-like services, like Uber, Lyft, & Tesla Network, and even the prior disadvantaged bus riders could switch over to those individualized services.

The problem with buses was that they never got you anywhere fast and healthy enough. That's why no one able-bodied and able-minded and not too ugly just couldn't use them. (I'm not picking on ugly people; the Uber like services will actually help them the most, since they have the most to gain from the increased opportunities enabled by individualized services only Uber like transportation can offer (i.e., they're fast enough), compared to the simply disabled or stupid people who basically have charity and welfare, but even they would probably gain from individualized services).

No way is Uber even close to a bus. A bus costs around $2 per ride and $70 per month in most areas. UberX minimum fare is $4-7. And I think Uber has made things worse in terms of car usage and road damage (as relevant to this discussion). It'll be interesting to see actual studies of this on car displacement, but I don't really think it can be argued that buses don't displace car usage at least somewhat.

And the urban areas I'm talking about are exactly places like NYC and SF, where parking is at a premium.

As for the spiel about ugly/stupid people, I'll just assume you are joking. I ride the bus regularly in SF and I don't see any prevalence of ugly/stupid people. There are plenty of white collar folks riding the bus.

 

[brucet999]

In principal I would be for EVs paying a per-mile road use fee if I could be assured that it would be spent to maintain and build roads and not used to pay for Governor Moonbeam's pet high speed train to nowhere. Our roads would be fine right now if the legislature had not stolen highway funds for the past 40 years to pay for their wasteful general fund spending schemes.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Yes and no.
Yes, pay a yearly fee, but no, not a fixed fee.

My car has a unique identifier called a VIN.
My car has a regulated device called an odometer that measures distance traveled .
I register my car once per year.
I have my car inspected once per year.
It is not a hard problem to resolve.

Fix the broken system.

 

[apacheguy]

This measure will be voted on this week so be sure to get on the phone with your representatives to express your thoughts.

 

[Mark Z]

The projected fees for driving an EV in California are a bargain compared with "driving" an autonomous car in California. Take a look at the autonomous fees and the insurance required in this draft California DMV form:

https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/c...-9221-b3ca979fbf51/ol321draft.pdf?MOD=AJPERES