By Tsvetana Paraskova – May 13, 2019, 12:30 PM CDT 
A bill at the Illinois legislature proposes to raise the annual registration fee for electric vehicles (EV) from US$17.50 to US$1,000 and to more than double the gas tax from 19 cents to 44 cents per gallon, under a plan to fund infrastructure advanced by Democrat State Senator Martin Sandoval.
According to the bill, introduced at the Illinois General Assembly, owners of fully electric vehicles “shall register the vehicle for a fee of $1,000 for a one-year registration period,” under the proposal that strikes out the current “In no event may the registration fee for electric vehicles exceed $18 per registration year.”
The bill also proposes to increase significantly the gas tax in the state, as well as the license fees.
The proponent of the bill, Martin Sandoval, argues that this is a plan to raise funding for much needed infrastructure improvements in the state, while EV owners and gasoline car owners alike are unhappy with the proposed legislation, for different reasons.
“We haven’t updated our gas tax since 1990. We haven’t had a capital bill in over 10 years. It’s time to modernize our transportation funding formula to make it sustainable and consistent,” says Sandoval, adding that “Our transportation system has been underfunded for far too long. We’ve been kicking this can down the road for decades and it’s time for us to finally step up and find a solution.”
According to Rivian, an EV developer which is considered to be a potential future rival to Tesla and which owns a factory in Illinois, the proposal for such high EV fees would discourage EV technology.
HT/Sara
Edit: The big disconnect in state tax (for example, wikipedia shows lower numbers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_taxes_in_the_United_States ) values seems to be whether sales tax is included. I quote the high number, as that represents all of the state’s taxes on gasoline, not just the excise tax.
That’ll help sales. Go for it.
Here is website showing Chicago IL gasoline taxes
https://capitolfax.com/2019/05/16/receipt/
I have never been able to understand state and federal budgeting.
If you have a gasoline tax of 20 cents to the gallon ten years ago, and you have twice as many drivers now, you should be collecting twice as much money to fund infrastructure. EXCEPT, they keep enforcing stricture mileage standards, so cars don’t need as much gas, so now you are collecting less money per mile driven. 44 cents a gallon for an average person driving 10,000 miles per year, at say 30 miles per gallon…that’s $147 a year.
If you collect $1,000 to register an electric vehicle per year, then no matter how little or much you drive it you pay the same. But what about electric cars from neighboring states? They get a free lunch. You also discourage people from buying the very thing you keep saying they ought to buy.
What you really want is to collect money based on use of roads, not gas or registration as a proxy. This leads to self-funding toll roads which everyone seems to hate (but not me). Tolls work for gas and electric cars, and work well for advanced highways. Everyone has to pay them, so no free lunches. Now all the “public” has to fund is the lesser roads through taxes.
Illinois needs to get a grip on spending before it raises taxes. Yeah, they will need to raise taxes, but if you just keep spending wildly then raising taxes solves nothing. Start trimming and shutting down government programs that do little. Get in control of pension spending. Start paying off debt.
“We haven’t updated our gas tax since 1990.”
Wat a poor unfortunate boilerplate argument based on the logic that negative events *must* be provoked.
Like, “it’s been decades since the last incident, so guys, get going into one already !”
(implicit palmface)
There is no perfect road usage fee system.
The advantage of a fuel tax is it captures road use by people driving through, including trucks. A registration fee only covers vehicles registered in the state.
Something must be collected from EV owners to compensate for not paying fuel taxes, but with others commenting above I think $1,000 is unreasonable. I strongly suspect the average EV is not driven as many miles per year as the average ICE vehicle, and I think something in the $200-$400 per year range would be reasonable.
I don’t believe EVs should be subsidized with tax credits, but I don’t believe they should be penalized with unreasonable usage fees either.
$18 to $1000 is quite a hike.
President Trump just yanked 1 billion back from Kali’s Browndoggle high speed rail
Looks simple, the state isn’t interested in having electric cars dip into the power grid. They certainly are too light to damage the roads in contrast to heavy trucking commerce. Thus an incentive to not own one…or two…lol ….that is registered. Think about the 4th Amendment as well.
https://wearechange.org/u-s-supreme-court-says-no-license-necessary-to-drive-automobile-on-public-highwaysstreets/
Yes, it doth appear the Constitution of the United State is once again being trampled upon. How many revolutions must one have? We will eventually run out of places to move as large cities, primarily made of genetic mutes (aka socialists) dictate state politics.
I wonder if gas taxes would be less popular if they were expressed in terms of dollars per tank. A tax of 44c/gal is $4.40 for a 10 gallon fill-up. It’s roughly $5 every time you go to the pump.
As a resident of said state, the method of the pols here is to propose something astronomical and then pretend to ‘compromise’ down to something merely outrageous. As we all know, one truck does the damage of 1,000 to 10,000 cars. Raise Road Diesel taxes in that proportion over gasoline.
Also unfortunate, this proposed tax money goes to the General fund. Never to be seen again.
Illinois is a great state to be from!
In Illinois many municipalities (Chicago AND Cook County) have their own taxes in addition to federal and state.
Rather clumsy first toddler steps by the overlords towards their ultimate Nirvana of mileage taxation methinks. After all they have to be seen to be level playing field and fair (except when it comes to renewables dumping practices of course) Give them something to squabble over with equity and later we can come over the top of it all with a fairer and larger mileage tax. Yes Minister 101.
this is why dems want us to all use EVs they can tax us more.
and for the record I am registered independent and do not vote according to a letter beside a candidates name.
I would suggest a wealth tax surcharge on EVs as long as it’s Illinois. Make that $5,000 per year. A tax on Cubs fans is also on the table.
What a bunch of crap. It’s not about funding “infrastructure”. It’s about trying to fund debt in that bankrupt state.