Oregon's new "Tesla Tax"?

[deonb]

Does somebody have to come plug your car in for you?

(sorry, PNW humor -- see, Oregon does not have self-serve gas stations, somebody has to pump gas for you...)

I found out last month for the first time that you are allowed to fill diesel yourself. I'm surprised more people don't drive diesels over there as a result.

 

[PLUS EV]

I remember pumping myself at Canyonville. I figured it must have been because it's tribal land. Even there they usually pumped for you, but I think it was self pump late at night and might have been either/or during the day.

Now with the Tesla, I've had the experience of pulling up to a pump to use the squeegee and having the guy run out to pump gas. I've been tempted to say "fill 'er up!" but always passed on that joke for fear he might actually spray gas down my chargeport

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

An ODOT official interviewed on the radio admitted that it doesn't matter if it is a Fiat 500 or a Suburban, the road wear and infrastructure requirements (bridge design, concrete thickness etc) are all driven by semi trucks. They, of course, are heavily subsidized by you and me. Wonder what they will do about the Tesla semi? A road crushing machine that buys no fuel?

However, there is also traffic volume, which leads to additional construction costs for pavement and intersections. Paying for traffic volume is challenging, because it depends on where and when.

 

[melindav]

is no one concerned about the transport bill including the possibility of a I-5 and 205 toll from the Columbia to Tualatin and money going to work in the OC/WL area? I'd much rather have a new interstate bridge and pay a bridge toll on that every day than a per mile toll that covers work 15 miles away from the roads I use. (and I always thought I was not selfish with my tax money going to things unrelated to my own benefit, but this one irks me)

 

[rhumbliner]

wealthier people drive more miles

Do you have any studies to base this on? I've not come across this assertion before.

 

[PLUS EV]

Do you have any studies to base this on? I've not come across this assertion before.

It stood out to me as a baseless assertion as well, but I did some googling and found a little bit of info that indicated people who earn over 100k drive *slightly* more than people who earn 50-100k ish. It should come to a surprise to no one that middle class people drive significantly more than poor people as many poor people can't afford a car or if they have one they can't afford to do much with it other than go to work (which is generally close to home as people aren't really commuting long distances to low wage jobs).

All that being said, I suspect that truly wealthy people making say <500k/yr or <1MM/yr would actually drive less than the middle class or upper middle class. Unfortunately I couldn't find any data separated out that way. Perhaps, it just depends on your definition of the word "wealthy."

 

[MP3Mike]

What's really sad is that basic per-mile odometer-based pricing is technically _easy_. Registrations already have the VIN, odometer reading and, where appropriate, a Registered Weight. No new information to collect, simple information to store.

Nope. People aren't going to allow themselves to be double-taxed. Since I drive ~25% of my miles in Washington I wouldn't pay Oregon mileage tax on those. (I'm paying Washington gas tax for them.) So in Oregon's pilot they put a GPS device on your car to track the number of miles driven in the state. Of course then people complain that they don't want to pay for miles driven off-road or on private roads. It gets complicated.

 

[MikeBur]

Nope. People aren't going to allow themselves to be double-taxed. Since I drive ~25% of my miles in Washington I wouldn't pay Oregon mileage tax on those. (I'm paying Washington gas tax for them.) So in Oregon's pilot they put a GPS device on your car to track the number of miles driven in the state. Of course then people complain that they don't want to pay for miles driven off-road or on private roads. It gets complicated.

And now suddenly you either need multiple gps units, for differing states, or creation of a unifying system. This also doesn't appease my concerns of misuse of data, i.e. Accessible to state agencies without warrant, as well as other "related companies" e.g. Insurance agencies, location based ad companies, etc etc

 

[donv]

Since EVs pay no gas taxes, it seems entirely reasonable to charge an additional registration fee. We need to pay for roads somehow. I believe, but could be wrong, that these revenues are dedicated to roads and infrastructure, in which case this makes total sense.

 

[MikeBur]

is no one concerned about the transport bill including the possibility of a I-5 and 205 toll from the Columbia to Tualatin and money going to work in the OC/WL area? I'd much rather have a new interstate bridge and pay a bridge toll on that every day than a per mile toll that covers work 15 miles away from the roads I use. (and I always thought I was not selfish with my tax money going to things unrelated to my own benefit, but this one irks me)

It could be worse, you could have variable toll bridge crossing and toll lanes that can often go > $10 like Seattle/Bellevue area.

The system needs a significant change overall, imo,

It would be interesting to see if they could remove state road tax on fuel and have some factor of pay per mile, e.g. Unit cost * Distance * (Weight / number of wheels) * (Tested Emissions output or Zero Emmisions Factor)

Trucks would likely need some rebate to balance to ~equal today, though that could be tied to the inverse of number of violations (over weight, time overage, emissions, etc)

Of course this would impact gas-guzzling SUVs, Pickups and RVs the worst, so maybe this is just a crazy idea though!? ;-)

This can get complicated quickly if put on the annual tabs/road tax, e.g. From the U.K. Print Vehicle tax rates - GOV.UK

 

[melindav]

It could be worse, you could have variable toll bridge crossing and toll lanes that can often go > $10 like Seattle/Bellevue area.

The system needs a significant change overall, imo,

It would be interesting to see if they could remove state road tax on fuel and have some factor of pay per mile, e.g. Unit cost * Distance * (Weight / number of wheels) * (Tested Emissions output or Zero Emmisions Factor)

Trucks would likely need some rebate to balance to ~equal today, though that could be tied to the inverse of number of violations (over weight, time overage, emissions, etc)

Of course this would impact gas-guzzling SUVs, Pickups and RVs the worst, so maybe this is just a crazy idea though!? ;-)

This can get complicated quickly if put on the annual tabs/road tax, e.g. From the U.K. Print Vehicle tax rates - GOV.UK

The Seattle to Bellevue toll is exactly what the proposed Oregon I-5/205 toll is modeled after.

 

[ilovemycoffee]

I take it the new $2,500 rebate will work for the Model 3 because of the base price below $50,000. And this will still work even if one ends up with the extended mile version with all the bells and whistles? And that the Model S and X will not get the rebate?

I see there is also a rebate for turning in/crushing a 20 year old car for an EV, if you are low or moderate income. What is the definition of low or moderate income in this bill?

 

[MikeBur]

Yes to Model 3, it's base price is below the threshold and extras do not contribute to this.
No to Model X/S as the base priced is higher.

Re scrap threshold values, I dug in a little

From the bill text: https://olis.leg.state.or.us/liz/2017R1/Downloads/MeasureDocument/HB2017

From section 150 on page 130:

(d) “Low income household” means a household with income less than or equal to 80 percent of the area median income.
(e) “Moderate income household” means a household with income less than or equal to 120 percent and greater than 80 percent of the area median income.

Where:
“Area median income” means the median income for the metropolitan statistical area in which a household is located or, if the household is not located within a metropolitan statistical area, for the metropolitan statistical area in closest proximity to the location of the household, as determined by the Housing and Community Services Department, adjusted for household size.

There are conflicting values for Coos Bay for this, though 2010 Census says median household income was $47,998, from: Coos Bay, Oregon - Wikipedia
You can likely find this more accurately by asking your city.

 

[Thomas Edison]

Nope. People aren't going to allow themselves to be double-taxed. Since I drive ~25% of my miles in Washington I wouldn't pay Oregon mileage tax on those. (I'm paying Washington gas tax for them.) So in Oregon's pilot they put a GPS device on your car to track the number of miles driven in the state. Of course then people complain that they don't want to pay for miles driven off-road or on private roads. It gets complicated.

I put my car on a treadmill and use it as a generator. So my miles are overinflated, There's also that.