Or in other words, we’ll all drive “taxis”, except for the chosen exempt few.
Obama admin. floats draft plan to tax cars by the mile: ‘A vehicle miles traveled tax could be tracked by installing electronic equipment on each car to determine how many miles were driven’
…
The plan is a part of the administration’s Transportation Opportunities Act, an undated draft of which was obtained this week by Transportation Weekly.
It is so spectacularly stupid, I kept waiting for it to show up on snopes.com yesterday. I just couldn’t believe it to be something under consideration. At 500 pages, the idea is one of many in the proposed bill.
Today at 10:15AM EST, the story was updated, and now the White House says this:
“This is not an administration proposal,” White House spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said. “This is not a bill supported by the administration. This was an early working draft proposal that was never formally circulated within the administration, does not taken into account the advice of the president’s senior advisers, economic team or Cabinet officials, and does not represent the views of the president.”
Translation:
…we are shelving the idea until after the 2012 election.
The plan was to put GPS devices on cars that would report the mileage. The Hill writes:
Among other things, CBO suggested that a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) tax could be tracked by installing electronic equipment on each car to determine how many miles were driven; payment could take place electronically at filling stations.
I could see a huge black market for “patches and hacks” and other circumventions developing out of this. It would turn millions of people into criminals.
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I read the entire thing (well, ok, skimmed all 400+ pages), and I didn’t see anything about GPSs or Electronic monitoring devices. There was a section about funding a study to investigate ways in which a mileage tax could be implemented for vehicles which don’t use Gasoline, but that was it. Can you provide page references for the GPS bit?
Simple solution – install a watt hour meter on the electric car/charger and surcharge their electricity usage. Don’t forget to add a pollution cleanup/disposal fee on their battery pack, for the pollution created during the battery construction.
The other aspect of this proposal is that it would absolutely kill the folks west of the Mississippi, who have no choice but to drive long distances. I know a good number of people here in the Colorado area that commute from 30-90 miles each way and a handful that drive over 100 miles each way to get to work. For folks that work in the construction trades for example, they have no choice but to drive to the job site no matter where it is if they want to work.
I personally drive 30 miles each way to work, and have in the past commuted 85 miles each way to get to a job. My previous job was 17 miles from home and it would only take me 4 hours each way if I took the bus to get to work. Only problem, the bus stop was 4 miles from my house, the bus did not run 2 out of the 5 days a week I worked and only ran during the time window when I got to work, but the route shut down by the time I went home.
Larry
Nuh uh; not my vehicle, I want it electronically CLEAN (as in no EMI sources) for radio work (RFI tracking and other experiments) … a mechanical fuel-injection diesel does just that too. No spark and no noise once started … in fact, once (the engine is) started the battery as well as the alternator can be removed … vacuum is used to ‘kill’ the engine via a vacuum circuit actuated via the ‘ignition’ key.
.
It amazes me how often people will screw themselves over, just to get even with somebody else. GPS-based tracking so we can get even with folks driving electric cars? You’ve got to be kidding me. Retaining my privacy, or what little I have left, is well worth whatever fuel taxes they are apparently hosing me for.
My other favorite in this thread is the insinuation that the big trucks should be paying more taxes for all the damage they do to the roads. I’m going out on a limb here, but I doubt there are many 18-wheelers out there being used for personal transportation. The vast majority of them are used for business purposes. That means that they provide a service (transportation) for a fee, and generally try to make a profit doing so. Increased fuel taxes are simply amortized into the freight cost they charge their customers. Who ends up paying it? You do, when the price of everything delivered by truck (which, let’s face it, is just about everything) goes up.
In the end, the consumer ends up paying the tax, regardless of how it is levied. Businesses don’t pay taxes, ever, for anything. They simply pass them along to the consumer as another cost of doing business. The existing fuel tax works because it is relatively simple to collect and is relatively fair in how it is distributed.
Good question; the odo won’t yield a Lat/Long coordinate pair (or altitude) … or a record of those items (over, say, the past month), which, is probably the point …
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Anything is possible says:
May 6, 2011 at 9:00 am
Here in the UK, every car over 3 years-old has to undergo an annual MoT test to check its’ roadworthyness. The mileage is faithfully recorded.
Do you have such a thing, or something similar, in the USA?
If so, an annual car tax based on mileage (not something I am opposed to in principal) could easily be imposed without the need to introduce expensive, and intrusive, electronic tracking equipment…..
That’s why we have a TEA Party.
We Americans hate taxes and believe the federal government is too big already.
It seems to an outsider like me you guys accept more taxes too easily.
Maybe you’re the ones who need a TEA Party. (sarc)
Smokey says:
May 6, 2011 at 2:25 pm
Northern California Bureaucrat,
There’s plenty of spin in that WaPo article. As it turns out, federal highway funding is substantially increasing.
– – – – –
Spending may be increasing, but dedicated Highway Trust Fund revenue is not. I’d rather have roads being paid for by fuel taxes than by deficit spending, essentially running up balance on the national credit card. Here are two paragraphs from that article you linked to:
– – –
The appropriations bill is an important part of the annual funding process; however, it does not solve the underlying problem of not having authorization legislation in place, and it does not address the revenue shortage in the Highway Trust Fund. The highway and transit programs are currently operating under a short-term authorization that expires on Dec. 30. If a long-term reauthorization measure is not enacted by that date, Congress must again approve a short-term extension to avoid a shutdown in highway and transit funding. Highway Trust Fund revenue is insufficient to support the funding level that was approved by the House.
In March 2010, $20 billion was transferred from the general fund to ensure that the Highway Trust Fund could meet its obligations. That funding is projected to support the current funding levels through August 2011. Congress will have to take action to further shore up the Highway Trust Fund to support the increased funding levels in the House bill.
And also just to clarify, I think the idea of a nanny-state government using GPS to track miles is incredibly stupid, short-sighted, and a massive assault on individual liberty.
NorCal Bureaucrat,
Yes, I read that, and it’s part of a systemic problem. House Republicans now have veto power, and the Democrats don’t like it one little bit. So we have gridlock. Good.
I haven’t read all the comments so I’ll probably sound like a parrot but this is just bureaucracy gone mad. The point of the Barry Meters isn’t to raise tax dollars as such but to add a level of bureauracy into the act of owing and driving a car, or green jobs for short.
They already tax gasoline. Isn’t that a type of mileage tax? Just increase the gas tax. Why install electronic gadgets?
All you need is a local GPS beacon that will screw up the signal. With high frequency impulsion generator devices becoming cheaper and cheaper, I expect a hack box fairly soon. Beside, who want to be tracked full time? Sounds like a Demolition Man type of world (w Sandra Bullock and Sylvester Stallone)
I found a website a while ago that was selling GPS tracking devices in case your car got stolen. The same site also sells GPS jammers(easy to do). I guess then the government will set up GPS jammer detectors or make them illegal, just as Australia did with car radar detectors.
If you want the ultimate nanny state New Zealand is the place for you. Car roadworthiness inspections every 6 months. Including any trailers you own (glider, boat general purpose box trailers etc.) A complete pain.
Note that they are using highway money on transit. If they would quit robbing the Highway fund to pay for Light Rail and the rest of their worthless ideas there would be enough money.
Require the GPS units in electric and hybrid cars only. They are the ones not paying their share, not us. Besides they are all watermelons, they wouldn’t object to paying higher taxes, now would they?
This would have a definite impact on my volunteering to help small church schools in required environmental inspections (EPA-AHERA asbestos), & in my teaching efforts in a community college (I travel 50 miles one way). Living in a rural area, this would mean that travelling anywhere is very limited. Since I live on the east coast, I can just imagine what traveling is like for those in the western states.
great idea Sam!
D. J. Hawkins says:
May 6, 2011 at 2:43 pm
Nigel S says:
May 6, 2011 at 2:13 pm
D. J. Hawkins says:
May 6, 2011 at 1:22 pm
Wiki says damage is related to the fourth power of the axle weight (not the square and definitely not the contact area) which is what I was taught too.
I took a look, and it would appear you are correct. MarkW, I was wrong. It is, to overuse a phrase, “even worse than we thought”. Per Wiki, it would appear that in the example we’ve been using, the damage factor is 2,401:1.
It’s been quite a few years since I’ve been in the highway biz, but back in the day the damage multiplication factor for HCADT( Heavy Commercial Average Daily Traffic) was 10,000 to 1 for automotive and even that was considered an underestimate. The real difference is that the heavy vehicles, particularly the not insignificant portion who are running over axle weight, have the capacity to push the roadway beyond its design yield point, which is when the real damage occurs. The problem is exacerbated in areas which experience an annual frost cycle because when the frost leaves the ground the roadway goes through an extended period of vulnerability which is why here in the northern tier states we have weight bans posted every spring, which usually only come off some time between next week and Memorial Day. Semis do pay higher taxes, but no where near to the average burden they place on the infrastructure. But since trying to collect from them on a proportional basis would just inflate the cost of everything transported by truck, which nowadays is just about everything, the present system is accepted. The power of the trucking lobby may factor in to the calculation.
I pay gas taxes every time I fill up the car, BUT the new plan is to add to the extra gas taxes for every mile I travel? So much for, “No new taxes if you make less than $250,000 per year.”
What a STUPID plan, not only will I have to pay for a GPS device I don’t want, BUT I’ll pay extra taxes per mile on top of that. PLUS, the copying of the data from my “Big Brother GPS” will cost money too.
This is a MAJOR disincentive to get a high millage car.
The current system of paying per gallon is simple and easy to deal with, which is why they want to screw it up for us!!!!
Well, this is a stupid idea as Atrios, a well know liberal blogger (who is an economist) has pointed out repeatedly. If we need more revenue for highway maintenance then why not raise the gas tax?
As structured right now, the gas tax does what it should do. Owners of lighter higher mileage vehicles, which do less damage to roads, pay less than owners of heavier lower mileage vehicles, which do more damage. Seems about right. If we need more money, raise the tax so that everyone continues to pay in proportion to the damage they do?
Taxing everyone on a per mile traveled basis, rather than connecting damage done however remotely (via the fact that heavier vehicles pay more tax), seems counter productive. And this does not even bring into consideration the privacy concerns and the cost of equipping vehicles to meld into a pay-by-mile system. Inevitably in our national security state much than just miles traveled will be tracked. I am a greenie, but I am also a civil libertarian and something like this offends me.
Bob Diaz,
The internet never forgets.
This is about tracking people. How long before they fly their true flag, the hammer and sickle.
Actually a 10mpg 4×4 might be an advantage with this system.
It’s the electric go-karts are going to get drilled…
This would simply be a high-tech toll system, with “toll booths” every mile.
Unfortunately, I can see it one day happening. There are certain hidden “advantages” to it. For one, the US Postal Service would obviously be exempted. This would let them keep their rates down compared to private shipping companies (FEDEX, UPS, etc.) who would have to pay. It would give an economic advantage to the “buy local” movement, making imports (from other countries or even states) more expensive the further away you are from the goods’ origins. It would compel people to move back to the cities and give up their commutes, perhaps staving off the bankruptcies many cities face. It would make mass transit economically feasible.
In short, I can see many liberal, PC issues being helped by this concept. I could also see the fly-over states rebelling – and I would be joining them.
What this all boils down to is that they have blown all the money, and now they want more to subsidize digging the hole deeper.
This in NOT what America wants, it’s just another tax that will be spent on useless programs, which being unwanted makes it taxation without representation.
When the kids spend thier allowance for the month in 1 day, then cry for more, the last thing you do is give them more this month. Too bad, wait.
If the Gov. wants more money next year, then don’t spend it so fast this year.
So simple even a politician can do it.
Part of the desire for this is to keep an eye on the masses. Not only can they tell how far that you have been, they can track you back to your favorite extra-legal activity.
This would also but a huge tax on rural people like myself with a 30 mile ride to the grocery store, and double that to the big city.
One angle of environmentalism is to herd us into sustainable little cities where we can be controlled through a shortage of resources and held as a docile population as tyrants prosper. This fits that meme to a tee. Eventually high gas prices, land use issues, and now a road tax conspire to make rural living as expensive as possible.
As far as using GPS, there would be flaws. As one other poster pointed out, signals are blocked by bridges, tall building and other sky obstructions.
I had a little taste of this a few years ago on my snowmobile. I Velcro’d my GPS to the dash and went for a ride, expecting to chronicle distance and top speed. When I returned I was shocked to see that I had ridden 35 miles and had a top speed of 38mph. The ground truth was that I had gone over 150 miles, and had exceeded 100mph at least 4 times.
The GPS couldn’t keep up between the heavy forest, the blockage from the windscreen, and the rapid changes in speed and direction. Admittedly it was a $99 yellow GPS, but it indicated flaws that could be exploited through creative antenna blockage and so on.
Paying out monies to individual jurisdictions would become burdensome too. I was in 3 counties in less than 50 miles today. County A gets $0.12, County B gets $0.07… It would become a problem requiring significant infrastructure and computing power to resolve and distribute collections to each entity.
Then there are people like me that won’t own a car that tattles on you. I’d rather rebuild a 20 year old car than have Big Brother watching my every move like throttle and brake position, speed, top speed, and so on.
OnStar=not in my car.