Comment by winrid
1 day ago
Probably the weirdest thing about this is the state doing something that results in it getting less tax money. This was lobbied for by the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Union of Concerned Scientists.
1 day ago
Probably the weirdest thing about this is the state doing something that results in it getting less tax money. This was lobbied for by the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Union of Concerned Scientists.
I assume you mean about buying less (taxed) gas.
Never fear, California is also talking about shifting to a mileage baded road tax because EVs (which they heavily incentivized) saving money on gas can't go untaxed.
That seems reasonable, no? The goal is for road users to pay for their use of public roads. Gas tax used to be a decent proxy for road usage, but with EVs it's not anymore, so we need something else. Reading people's odometers is a better reflection of their road use.
Of course you can't tell if they were driving on public roads, or just driving around in a circle in their backyard for hours... but that uncertainty exists for the gas tax too.
> California is also talking about shifting to a mileage baded road tax because EVs (which they heavily incentivized) saving money on gas can't go untaxed.
EVs in CA have a special $121 tax to make up for "don't pay gas tax."
The mileage-based road tax is for other reasons.
Gas tax has always been a proxy metric for mileage in order to implement usage based costs to help offset the many billions of dollars California spends maintaining roads every year.
Gas as a proxy for mileage breaks down with widespread EV usage, so even though they are a benefit for many reasons with incentivizing, they still require expensive road upkeep so should not be immune from usage taxation.
Or, spitballing here, let the gas tax reprieve be the incentive and don't offer a rebate for EVs. Regardless, gas tax is a stupid way to pay for roads. Everyone uses roads, whether they drive on them or not.
And, they won't be repealing the gas tax. They'll be adding a mileage tax on top of the gas tax.
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