people as possible to go with hybrids or electrics.

On one side we have roads. On the other we have the air you breathe. I get the point of road maintenance, but that somehow needs to be levied without removing the benefit to the consumer of gas-efficient cars.

Only a use tax wouldn't get in the way of one of the few measures we are taking to reduce emissions.

Middle Eastern wars? Caused by petroleum. The corrupt power elite running our country? Financed by petroleum. Putin? Financed by petroleum.

And yes, there is also that little thing about CO2 levels rising to levels that will soon be incompatible with life, and the burning of the eart.

discourage planet-raping monster vehicles and encourage fuel efficiency.

The Kochtopous strikes! The tentacles are everywhere. Grab, grab, grab. Insert here, etc.

dis-incentivize such purchases in this way? Of COURSE it's the gas corps doing this.

The gas tax in Ohio is $0.28 a gallon.

15K miles per year and 30 mpg.

If I buy a hybrid that gets 40 MPG and drive 12000 miles a year I would pay $84 a year in tax. That is $45 difference not $100.
By the same reasoning a person that has a gas vehicle that gets 40 MPG rather than 26 MPG he should also pay the same fee.

Since you drive less then average and you already have a car that gets good gas mileage.

At 26 mpg and driving 12k a year, you'd burn up 461.5 gallons per year and pay a combined federal and state tax of $216.

At 40 mpg and driving a distance of 12k, you'd burn up 300 gallons per year and pay a combined federal and state tax of $141.

A difference of $75 in tax per year.

"Owners of plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles now have to pay $200 a year in registration fees. Owners of standard hybrids must pay $100."

https://www.cleveland.com/open/2019/05/ohio-owners-of-electric-hybrid-cars-say-new-taxes-fees-are-punitive.html

If you drove the average commuter distance of 15k a year. it'd be a wash. You'd save about $100 in gas tax but spend $100 on the fee.

Where you come out ahead in buying the hybrid is you'd be spending far less on gas itself because of the difference in mpg.

According to the article, the bill that sets the new hybrid/electric fees also raises the gas tax.

Comparisons with the new fees should probably be made using new gas tax.

By my calculations, the gas tax saved by a hybrid owner driving about 15k a year is close to the same as the fee.

Looking at your first example:

From the figures at the top of the top chart:

18.4 cents (Federal)
28.0 cents (Ohio current)
10.5 cents (Ohio increase)
--------------------------------
56.9 cents (combined Federal + Ohio, after the increase takes effect)


Also, note that I made a mistake in my previous post, in step 2. I'll correct that now, but it doesn't affect my point.

I'm looking at the envelope where I did my calculations and can easily see my mistake.

I shouldn't get involved in these discussions since my wife has to double check my adding for me now when we play Yahtzee.

Which is probably cheaper then a hybrid to begin with and one doesn't pay the hybrid fee. The estimated mpg would be about the same . 40 mpg on the highway.

Closer to 60mpg with a little effort. A 35mpg Civic doesn't compare.

There appears to be a $7k cost difference between a 2020 Prius and a 2020 Civic. With the added cost, there'll be extra tax and probably a greater insurance premium and one will pay more interest on the difference so the monthly payment will be higher.

https://www.toyota.com/priusprime/

https://automobiles.honda.com/civic-sedan

And estimated mileage for the Civic is 38 mpg highway with some owners reporting 40 mpg highway and even higher.

https://fueleconomy.gov/feg/bymodel/2020_Honda_Civic.shtml

Everyone who uses the roads should contribute

few things people are willing to do to reduce emissions.

of encouraging efficient vehicle purchases.

get an equal and fair method of taxing, who knows what they'll settle on.

additional tax every year to keep up the roads. So if I buy a gasoline car lets say a Honda Civic that gets 35 MPG and my neighbor has
a F-150 pickup that gets 15 MPG I would also pay less gas tax. Shouldn't they add additional tax to my Honda Civic? I think this smells like the Koch brothers and ALEC.

would be roughly proportional to the weight of the vehicle so I have no issue with a F-150 paying more tax than a small car like a Civic.

... so for the most part large vehicles get off paying far less than they should...

I agree that it's probably quite a bit greater than proportional but to the 4th power seems high (using that figure, a vehicle twice as heavy would do 16 times the damage). Large vehicles also tend to have longer wheelbases which helps and, more axles + bigger & more tires which also help by distributing the load.

Got a cite on that? I would be interested in reading it.

I agree though that large vehicles don't pay their fair share (although we tend to get some of that back thru reduced trucking costs).

I should a have been a bit more clear, the rule I had been referencing is that it's proportional to the fourth power of axle weight, so more axles would tend to reduce the wear...

You can find it on Wikipedia, along with their sourcing
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_axle_weight_rating

and a bit of talk about the determination of this at this page - where it goes into the orgins of this rule in a report put out by the highway engineers at The American Association of State Highway Officials, in the 50's and 60's, where they ran emperical tests to measure road wear.

http://www.cyclelicio.us/2014/fourth-power-rule-road-tax/

The exact conditions and measure of wear can play a big role in that however. A more recent paper, from the Texas Dept of Transportation in 2001, that looks at differences between more flexible and more rigid pavement, as well as different measures of wear - cracking vs. rutting, shows that the exponent can go down for some measures, e.g. the rate of cracking goes like axle weight squared, but rutting like axle weight to the 8th power.

https://ctr.utexas.edu/wp-content/uploads/pubs/2122_1.pdf

So, as is to be expected, real world data is messy, but what does seem to hold up is that road wear increases very rapidly with vehicle (axle) weight

That’s great stuff.

It is refreshing to see an argument supported with data.

Thanks much for giving us that info - learned something I would not have expected.

I'll never look at axles quite the same again,or more likely I'll be looking more at axles period.

hybrid owners are going to have pay an additional $75 to pay for electric charging stations. If they had labeled the additional fee as road fees AND charging stations I wouldn't object. But just to fund charging stations which we don't use really annoys me.

If the best the more expensive hybrid can get is 40 mpg and you only drive 12k a year, I think it'd make more sense for you to buy the Civic. The difference in gas consumption would be about 43 gallons in a year . Looking at gas prices in Ohio, you'd save about $93 a year in cost of gas. Is that amount worth difference in price between the two vehicles?

"While the 2016 Honda Civic is not a hybrid, it brings plenty of frugality to the compact sedan market. Featuring an EPA-estimated 31-city and 43-highway mpg from the optional 1.5L four-cylinder turbocharged engine, the Civic is an impressive car. "

https://www.carmax.com/articles/best-high-mpg-cars#versa18

I ended up buying a lightly used hybrid Lexus for much less money.

rear view sensors, taxes and tags and it was over 27k. Instead I got a used Lexus ct200h with only 15000 miles and lots of features. Drove it off the lot for 21k.

FYI, I bought a Prius new in 2007. Right now it has about 220k on the odometer. Every year, I've averaged over 50mpg. In the winter, I get around 50-51. In the warm weather, it's around 52-53. Before retirement, I used the car for itinerant work. I got the state reimbursement rate of over 50 cents per mile. Before the Prius, I drove a Honda Accord (1994) and got a very decent 30mpg. But the difference between the two has saved me thousands of dollars for buying the Prius. My itinerant work before retirement gave me the amount of savings that paid for about a quarter to a third of the cost of the Prius when I bought it. Now, the Prius still runs great and I haven't had to replace the large battery in the back. Like all cars, the Prius has "features" that are minor annoyances, but generally, I'd buy another one in a heartbeat.

they tax a hybrid or an electric to make up for the gas tax they lose. By the using that same logic they should charge a fee for a fuel efficient gas vehicle also. Why is it they want to single out the hybrid or electric.

Which is probably the most fair method in raising money to maintain our highway system. The more miles one drives, the more wear they put on the roads so they pay more. It won't matter if the vehicle is a hybrid, all electric, fuel efficient like the Civic of a gas guzzler.

That really makes the problem clearer, doesn't it?

Nobody likes those answers.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=12863673

Bicycles, bicycles... and sailboats.

Car culture is unsustainable. We ought to be rebuilding our cities such that car ownership is unnecessary, even undesirable.

The problems are political, not technical.

We could ban the manufacture of new fossil fuel vehicles tonight and our economy would not collapse.

We'd figure out how to make it work in less time than it took to knock down Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in World War II, and we'd be saving the world.

a fuel-efficient vehicle.

won't be punished for buying a fuel efficient vehicle. Why should I pay more for a hybrid that may even get less milage? If they want to charge to repair roads it should be on weight and mileage driven.

You will definitely benefit from buying a hybrid or EV, no matter how much people try to take those benefits from you.

I'm not sure what models you're looking at, but the Prius is likely the best-engineered car in the world given its purpose (being efficient with gasoline). Incredible car if that's what you're wanting to do. EXTREMELY reliable. Well over 50 mpg (link below) just driving normally. And its total cost of ownership over 5 to 10 years is basically the same or lower than other economical cars.

Check this real-world mileage out for the 2019 Prius:

http://www.fuelly.com/car/toyota/prius/2019

You can get a conventional car that gets similar gas mileage for less. The money you save in purchase price, sales tax, hybrid fee, insurance and interest can be donated to you favorite environmental groups. You can also donate the money you save from getting better gas mileage.

Better mileage than a Civic, and not very expensive. Even brand new.

And I'm the one who expresses astonishment when anyone says a 30k car is cheap. Not for my budget.

miles on a car and keep them for many years the hybrid cost more I think. Then there is another thing the batteries
will eventually go bad and I hear they are very expensive. The hybrid RAV 4 costs at least $2000 more than the gas one
and you save I think $2000 over 5 years in gas and then add the $500 road tax it doesn't add up to me. Then there is resale value
I wouldn't want to buy a used hybrid taking the chance in buying batteries for $2500.

I looked at hybrids and didn't see an economic advantage. You do need the high mileage and mainly in the city where regen braking comes into it (which seems to make them pretty popular for taxis).

Last edited Sun Jan 12, 2020, 12:11 AM - Edit history (1)

so you do it because it's the right thing to do if you can afford it
And they are much more reliable now it's been a few years, long term might be an issue, 7 years and longer but most cars depreciate in reliability

The deduction was one of those diminishing calculations that were used to bring the hybrids into the market. The newer the car, the smaller the deduction that I could claim. Earlier models got a bigger deduction.

I bought a great Ford C-Max that I love...no good deed goes unpunished here in Ohio...republicans bleed you ....

Make hybrids cheaper to run, just tax fuel more. Drive the big gas guzzlers off the road, do the world a favour.

The US has cheap gas anyway.

https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/gasoline_prices/

Check UK, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong.

When we get to the point where we've put such a significant dent in gas use that gas tax revenue declines (and assuming those taxes ACTUALLY get spent on roads, which they quite often don't- the connection between gas taxes and roads is already very loose), after the huge party we have celebrating saving the world we can talk about using one of many sources of governmental funding to strengthen road infrastructure.

Assuming we don't just raise gas taxes, which would be in line with our general public policy of discouraging use of non-renewable, fossil fuels.

At 26 mpg and driving 12k a year, you'd burn up 461.5 gallons per year and pay a combined federal and state tax of $216.

At 40 mpg and driving a distance of 12k, you'd burn up 300 gallons per year and pay a combined federal and state tax of $141.

A difference of $75 in tax per year.

"Owners of plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles now have to pay $200 a year in registration fees. Owners of standard hybrids must pay $100."

https://www.cleveland.com/open/2019/05/ohio-owners-of-electric-hybrid-cars-say-new-taxes-fees-are-punitive.html

If you drove the average commuter distance of 15k a year. it'd be a wash. You'd save about $100 in gas tax but spend $100 on the fee.

Either with a GPS tracker of some kind or annual verification of the odometer. Then all vehicles will pay an equal share for roads and such.

How does your idea advance our climate change policy?

A rich guy in a $100,000 EV shouldn’t pay zero road taxes while a poor person in a 25 year old Honda Civic still has to pay tax at the pump.

in a way the rich guy in the EV isn't? That "poor person" you're referring to is damaging our environment and our children's futures. Why shouldn't the rich guy who's making better ecological decisions get a benefit from that? Why shouldn't ANYONE who's making the right choices benefit from that?

Also, not all EVs are $100,000, or owned by rich people. In fact, most aren't- not even Telsa's (which you apparently want to hate badly). I own an EV with an MSRP of less than $36K, and it cost me way less than that after incentives. There's no reason anyone who can afford to buy a new car shouldn't be able to afford an EV. They are quite accessible to middle class people.

They aren't paying close to their fair share of tax to maintain the road system. An 18,000 lb semi does 410 times as much road damage as an average passenger car and over 1200 times as much damage as a Prius.

https://streets.mn/2016/07/07/chart-of-the-day-vehicle-weight-vs-road-damage-levels/

who help the environment

their enormous planet-raping living rooms on wheels to get them to the grocery store. Because reasons.

And welcome to DU!

that they don't really need. That is what they do in Europe. If we were really serious about reducing fossil fuel usage, we would raise gas taxes by a couple dollars a gallon or more.

As long as gas is under $3 per gallon, people will continue to buy gas guzzlers

I was sick of getting 24 mpg.

that should also be considered. Personally prefer all electric. Batteries are constantly improving.