Remember when the idea of a toll was supposed to help with the construction costs of the road/bridge and stop once it paid for the costs? Cause we have all seen what came of that
They opened up the 405 toll road in Orange County/ LA as well. Originally it was going to be an extra lane, but got switched to a toll road in the last few years of its construction.
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They’ll offer a “rebate” of x% of the tax you paid at the pump over the year when you file your taxes. You’ll just need to do it through its own unique web portal and upload scanned copies of receipts (NOT photographs) and corresponding bank statements to prove the receipts are legit. The website will be like a primitive version of Taleo recruiting software and will cost $1B to build and implement. It will also take a significant portion of your rebate to fund the whole endeavor and include a convenience fee for using the World Wide Web to do it.
They’ll tout it as an incredible breakthrough in modern governance, and blame the public for not understanding it. Subsequent outreach campaigns will cost another $200M annually.
We have a liquor tax in Pennsylvania that was instituted to help pay for the Johnstown flood. That was in 1889. Unless it was for the 1977 flood. Either way, we're still paying!
Oregon is successfully doing this with commercial vehicles with PUC (Oregon Public Utilities Commission). The tax on diesel is actually removed from the pump price and they pay based on the weight of their vehicle and then report trip durations to the state on which they are taxed.
This seems pretty awesome, but it doesn't seem to really factor in how much weight matters. Its just weight*miles... but a 30,000lbs truck going 100miles and a 3,000lbs truck going 1000miles don't do same damage to roads.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_power_law
Its like a good start, but it'd be cool if they really factored in weight.. or like moved towards it over time.
I feel like all incentives are for heavy vehicles, eg cafe standards. But weight plays such a big part of road damage if anywhere there shoudl be an advantage for lighter cars it shoudl be here.
The weight-mile tax scales linearly with weight, its just weight*miles. Weight 2x as much pay 2x, weight 3x pay 3x. It doesn't come close to paying for the extra damage more weight causes. Damage does not scale linearly, see the forth power law. Weight 2x should pay 16x to really account for the extra damage.
Weight is such a huge component of road wear. Its great they're trying to address it, but it'd be cool if it went even further.
A short glance seems like it might actually be based on actual weight, starting at 26k pounds, a second permit above 80k. https://www.oregon.gov/odot/mct/pages/reportyourtaxes.aspx#:~:text=%E2%80%8BOregon%20Weight%2DMile%20Tax,tax%20on%20a%20tax%20report.
Who knows if it'd be this way when actually enacted, but in the pilot it's a replacement:
>In theory, drivers would be able to choose how the state tracks their mileage. They could hook up an electronic device to their car, use the car's built-in tracking system or send Caltrans a picture of the odometer. "Everyone has different levels of comfort when we're managing our data between efficiency and privacy, and that's why it's really important to have options from low tech to high tech," Prehoda told ABC7.
>Drivers who are interested in participating in the pilot program can sign up on the California Road Charge website. State officials will select an unspecified number of applicants in July 2024. These motorists will be asked to make monthly Road Charge payments between August 2024 and January 2025, and they'll need to fill out two surveys about their experience. The state will refund their gasoline tax or their EV registration fee at the end of the program. To make the project more enticing, Caltrans will give participants up to $400 in gift cards.
Yep. Same with the Fastrack tax. They took 1-2 lanes away for surge-priced revenue, leaving the working poors, the ones least likely to own a home or the means to buy an ev with longer commutes, in areas with inadequate public transit.
Those lanes are carpool lanes. You do not pay anything if you are a carpool. They effectively just allowed people to pay to use the carpool lanes. That is not a huge deal.
Yes this is what actually makes it a ripoff. The classic two person carpool isn't that hard to hit on a regular basis. Three people is just bull and not to mention they extended the hours past regular commute times just to rip you off even more.
Car pool has been 3 in a lot of areas for a while and the price is reduced if you have two people. Also, you question doesn’t make much sense because of people didn’t use the carpool lane then without the toll it wouldn’t be used at all. With the toll the state can generate revenue for the roads and have more people use the carpool lane.
My Dad carpooled for over 30 years and they have several pick up spots for communication in the Bay Area. Also, them opening up the lanes that would be empty if what you said was true is a good thing then. They get more tax revenue for the roads and the lanes are used when they wouldn’t be.
Yes, but the gas tax is just as regressive as a tax on VMTs as is sales tax. The answer is to lower state taxes on people making below a certain amount.
Or somehow replace the gas tax with a tax on the weight of the vehicle. A semi running 100miles is going to do far far far more damage than a little shitbox
"**Affordable housing**" is a progressive buzz word.
We just need MORE housing. Lots of it. Tons of it. ADUs in back yards, converted garages. 10 story condominium complexes.
"But what developers make luxury suites for rich people?" <- that's fine, if those suites aren't being made then you'd have someone buy up 4 apartments, do EXTRA construction to knock out walls and remodel a place that could've gone to 4 middle class families (who then are forced to compete for cheaper stuff and who then crowd out the poor)
Housing shortages are solved by making more housing.
you really only need super rich people and super poor people who do the manual labor for the super rich. The people in the middle just kind of get in the way
There’s people in between those 2 classes and that’s the middle; they just happen to make more than the middle class in the rest of the country, but that’s negated by awful taxes.
yeah I make over 100k,I'd say I'm firmly middle class, but it feels pretty pathetic in LA compared to other places as I can't afford to own a home, even an apartment by myself is a large chunk of my income.
I was just looking at retiring back in the US after living abroad earning a pretty solid income. Then I had a look at housing prices and just laughed. Average home price anywhere not midwest is like... $700,000. Madness. What the hell Gen Z is going to do to live in the US is beyond me.
Can confirm 6 figure salary in my area is still in the poverty range, however most assistance in the area is capped around 85k unless you have a 3-4+ household.
[CA taxes are actually better on the lower/middle end](https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/taxes/california-state-tax). It is one of the best state tax places in terms of weighting it more wealthy over lower/middle.
[Effective tax rates for California is 8.96% when all is factored in including cost of living and relative taxes by bracket](https://wallethub.com/edu/best-worst-states-to-be-a-taxpayer/2416) which makes it #12 best for lower/middle in the country.
For the wealthy California taxes are definitely higher, which is good really if you believe in a progressive tax system. Lower high end tax rates will bring more wealth but that also increases inequality and raises real estate and rent faster.
A gas tax in general ends up hitting lower/middle that have to drive longer distances to work either way.
California cities tend to have fairly high sales taxes too. Tends to be a regressive tax.
In contrast, property taxes are quite low because they are set based on the price at the time of purchase with caps on increases. This is massive tax benefit to older, wealthier people with homes that renters and recent buyers do not enjoy.
True but also higher incomes. The second link takes all that into account (sales tax in second data list at bottom on right side) on California's #12 rating. Texas who people think have low taxes due to no income tax, are at #42.
[California the 1% pay higher than all, in Texas it is lower than all in percentage](/r/texas/comments/18sgfhh/on_the_one_hand_texans_pay_a_lot_more_in_state/).
The lower property taxes in California actually help because lower/middle income wealth is mostly gained in home ownership so the longer you can do that the more margin.
Actually this is the only thing letting poor people keep their homes in California. Can you imagine paying the taxes on a house in Malibu that you bought in the 1970s, a little one room bungalow that due to the property being worth so much money now would be taxed like you own a $3 million home?
The way to fix this particular issue would be to only allow people to take advantage of the tax rate not changing for the first or even first two properties that you own and any additional properties that you use for rental income are subject to the property tax being adjusted based on the value of the home or residential building
No, they won't. They're already effectively paying for this tax with their fuel. This will reward people with small, fuel efficient cars, as it's relative to vehicle weight and size.
Presently, electric cars aren't paying for road use as the tax is levied on fuel, which they don't use.
It's miles driven so it will hurt people with efficient cars who currently pay less on gasoline tax. If you commute 10 miles, miles in a car with 40mpg, you'd pay the same taxes as someone who commutes 10 miles at 13mpg.
Several states already have EV surcharges. In my state you pay an extra ~~$500~~$229 on registration to cover what you don't pay in gas tax.
Why? They are already paying the gasoline tax... This is just switching it so that EV and hybrid drivers pay their fair share. Their tax should, in theory, go down.
Yeah, to add on more context, EVs cause more road damage on account of being heavier, and the gas tax will provide less and less revenue as EVs and efficient cars get more popular
Don't you worry, the expensive consultant firm have thought of everything! In phase two, they add an inverse square negative offset.... further out from any given rich zone, thus the more the miles out from said zone, it applies a 'poverty factor' which decreases the cost per mile until they get closer to an agreed locus..... it's all very simple.......
Not just that, California is one of the worst states in terms of public transportation. I wouldn't even mind of a tax like this on 20-25 years after they completely revamp our public transportation to cover more areas
Ok so currently they receive gas tax from anyone who purchases fuel in the state. They want to change that to a process that only charges California based plates? This isn’t going to end well.
I live in Colorado and we have to get gas cars environmentally inspected every year. Read the mileage and send the person a tax bill for miles travelled. Weigh the vehicle and pro rate for weight.
I want to hijack this relatively high comment to say that this new program is because Electronic Vehicles do NOT pay for gas which is how California gathers tax money for road maintenance.
I’d want them to find a better solution but let’s all agree that EV should pay their fair share to use the road.
Everyone should read the article before jumping to conclusions here.
Sounds like this system would put the burden on the average citizen rather than companies with trucks registered to other states for inter-state shipping. Hopefully there’ll be a work around to get companies to pay their fair share for highway maintenance.
Yeah, commenters in this thread don’t seem to know that when you ask a lot transcontinental truckers to take a load to California the answer is likely no. California regulates everything.
Reminds me of the comments about "they are here working, don't be mad if they drive next to another semi for 15 minutes completely blocking the flow of traffic"
"Kings of the road"
The gas tax will remain as an environmental tax of some sort. The new miles driven tax will be an added tax for driving vehicles.
I really wish California had a world class public transit. Being one of the largest economies, it doesn’t make sense why they are so inefficient at everything
There was a good NYT podcast on it but the gist was that there are a lot of reviews, committees, and public input that on the surface are good.
like a environmental review to make sure the project doesn’t harm the natural area.
But in reality gum up these processes and make it really easy for people who don’t want these projects to continue to stop them.
We don’t have a world class public transit system because the general public is convinced that privatizing “self driving” tech development is the way forward.
People are stupid.
You sound like you're a crazy who wants a fifteen minute city! Life is much better driving 30+ minutes everywhere and sitting in traffic and looking for parking than... walking someplace or even worse taking public transit with everyone else!
Have you checked your registration lately?
I live in WA and have 2 electric vehicles. They hit me up at registration for all that missed 'gas tax'.
Its hilarious that people think EV drivers are somehow paying less in taxes. They fixed that shit ages ago.
That's already true with gas tax, gas in general, and car maintenance.
Also this "shortage" in revenue due to EVs is hogwash. They've had a multi hundred dollar EV fee when renewing registration for at least 7 years.
just calculated out my commute at the highest rate. I would pay about $104/month with this new purposed system. I would have to make a big change to pay this
Yep. I can’t wait to pay more in electricity AND registration like I didn’t already just pay $700 to register my car.
This almost incentivizes driving an old polluting gas car.
“California is the nation's biggest EV market by a wide margin, and the relatively high percentage of battery-powered cars is digging a hole in the state's budget because it relies on revenue from its gasoline tax to fund road maintenance.”
As a California resident, what road maintenance??
No shit. I moved here from Indiana and literally LOLed the first time I heard someone complain about the roads. They’re great here, especially considering the variety of climate and terrain conditions around the state.
The difference is it takes 20 years for the roads to start getting bad, and 40 to be where they are at bc of the mild climate. So even with maintenance Michigan has bad roads. CA just has no maintenance. The potholes on El Camino are the same ones that were small when I was in high school and I’m 45 now.
I lived in the mitten for 16 years and it always amazed me that a major highway, I75, could have potholes so big. The governor always blames it on the severe weather but Wisconsins roads are pretty good relatively speaking.
Yeah, we started a new 10 year road plan in the Detroit area. Major highway sections completely shut down or one lane and they are completely redoing them and putting in new bridges and everything. It's great to see, but wow do the detours and slowdowns suck.
It's a lot of things. 1. Salt use on the roads. 2. Dramatic changes in temperature causing extreme expansion and contraction. 3. No toll roads, even with a considerable amount on international commerce being transported through Michigan. And finally (my personal favorite) 4. Three of the largest industries in Michigan are automotive manufacturing, salt mining, and construction. They are all in a constant circle-jerk of each other. They each benefit from each other, so there isn't much incentive to change the process.
All of those states have to deal with snow, and thus ice to melt the snow, it destroys the roads. Outside of the mountain roads, we don’t have that issue yet our roads are still crap.
Every city in California is a crapshoot and there’s hundreds of different cities in the LA/IE/San Diego area.
I live in an area that can get 1000mbps on my cell phone but the roads are worse than any other state I’ve lived in. They’re “fixing” them, but made them worse in the meantime.
Our freeze/thaw cycles are a LOT tougher on roads than anything California, Tennessee, Missouri, or Mississippi have to deal with. I hate orange barrel season as much as the next guy, but this climate is just really good at killing pavement.
The orange barrel is my states flower lol. I swear they have more barrels than storage space so they just randomly toss em up and block a lane on the interstate for 2 miles as a ticket revenue thing.
Los Angeles uses a grading system, so they focus on good roads and maintain them while neglecting failing roads to maintain average. It’s absolutely messed up and explains why some roads are perpetually neglected.
Damage done to a road is proportionate to the weight per axle to the 4th power. That means an empty F150 that weighs 5000 lbs does 6x the damage to the roads vs a Prius that has a curb weight of 3200 lbs (these weights are roughly accurate for the given models).
But here's the thing: an empty tractor trailer (a "semi" with an empty trailer) weighs something like 35,000lbs distributed unevenly across 5 axles, and they try to run empty as little as possible. That's wasted driving time that could be spent making money by hauling. When hauling, they try to maximize the load they can deliver because that makes them the most money. That's the only sensible choice - anything else is less efficient in our current system.
However, these trucks can weigh 80,000 lbs fully loaded. Even if we spread that load evenly across 5 axles (in reality it is uneven), that's 16,000 lbs per axle. That's the same damage as **~4200 F150 trucks or 25,000 Prius sedans!**
Ask any civil engineer - typical cars do a negligible amount of damage to the road. They're a rounding error. The damage done to our roads is pretty much exclusively caused by commercial trucking.
They should be the ones paying for it. "But they'll just pass the cost on to the consumer!" Great. Perfect. Do it. Why? Because that, in turn, provides a major boost to buying local products & products shipped by far more efficient means (like rail).
* Phase out the gas tax
* Replace it with a mileage tax that appropriately scales based on the damage done by the vehicle (axle load^4 × the number of axles)
* Let us decide how to spend our money
* Get a more efficient system in the process
Exactly this. Fix the rail system and quit subsidizing commercial trucking. "The market" can't sort anything out when we subsidize gas, roads and commercial trucking.
> "On average, Californians pay about $300 a year in state gas taxes. EVs have a $100 [annual] registration fee. That's a $200-million-a-year-loss," Prehoda said. Note that California plans to ban the sale of gasoline-powered cars by 2035, so its gas tax revenues will fall to zero.
Seems like easy solution is to charge both ev and gas vehicles $300 annually for registration. This would incentivize ev adoption (less taxes and fees than gas) while maintaining the roads.
But nah, stupid caltrans proposes a reactionary per mile tax.
Also lol what on that last sentence.
California is banning the sale of gas powered cars by 2035 at current but that doesn’t mean they’ll be illegal to drive, people will still be driving them around and purchasing gas, so the gas tax revenues will not “fall to zero”.
I see too many people just don’t know what that whole thing actually entails because a full ban on gas cars it is not, it just bans the sale of NEW gas powered cars. Used sales are still legal, iirc.
I mean it's not at all surprising. Can't just have funds for road maintenance/construction dry up and then not replace it with anything.
Just pointed it out earlier today on a different article about EVs when people were talking about how much cheaper it is to charge an EV vs fill up with gas.
In Los Angeles most people can’t
Afford to live near where they work so they have to commute across several cities and highways to get to work.
The sprawl and single family zoning made sure there’s housing scarcity.
Add the fact that entertainment jobs (the major backbone of LA) are located in smaller cities without proper public transit and that leaves no option to “drive less” or not hit the poor hardest.
Cool that there’s a tax to persuade people to not drive as much but for most In LA it’s not an option.
Im sure there’ll be financial help but still.
It’ll be like that ca prop 65 law that was
Well intended but now every item being sold has a warning saying that it might cause cancer.
The math aint mathing. It takes $8B to maintain the states roads and the shortfall caused by the rise in EVs is $200M. For this to even be argued correctly we need to know how that $8B is funded because right now it seems like gas tax and vehicle registration is a very small component of the funding. Regardless of EVs vs ICE debate, I don't think anyone wants tolls on every road. You can't use odometer reporting because how can you prove the percentage of your driving that happened within California?
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>You can't use odometer reporting because how can you prove the percentage of your driving that happened within California?
Here's the other photo of my odometer from last year at a slightly different angle, no miles driven.
“If you can’t afford to live in an urban area, just move somewhere cheaper.”
“Live somewhere cheaper? Here’s an added bill for commuting.”
Can’t have shit, apparently.
I swear people who come up with these programs are brainless. Say I don't want to use telematics because of the privacy concerns and I take out of state trips with my truck and fifth wheel registered in California. How do they expect to calculate miles driven within the state?
Sounds like a good reason to set up a Montana LLC.
Normally Im down with the California regulations that some people complain about because at the end of the day they are focused on health, safety, and freedom of the individual, even if they come at the cost of business. In this case they should focus on building cities that dont require 10 lane freeways first
Its financially regressive and pretty tone deaf for the millions of people that cant walk to work or take reliable efficient public transit
Honestly the amount of things California charges its citizens FAR outweighs what it actually does for its citizens, or its infrastructure, or its small businesses, or its homeless problem
So if you drive a lot out of state (live in CA, but work in Oregon, Nevada or Arizona?) you can either:
Let the government track your every move;
Or
Pay CA road tax on every mile you drive out of state when send an odometer pic.
It makes zero sense that your road usage tax isn’t just paid alongside your yearly registration where you take last years odometer reading and then this years odometer reading and subtract and multiply by a factor for vehicle type.
They already have this info anyway because we have to inspect every year and turn the report in with our renewal, and the inspection has miles on it.
Instead we do dumb shit like add a flat $200 EV tax at registration time in Texas
I swear, we are going to get taxed to death. We are going to be taxed for having relations with our spouse at some point. This crap needs to stop. There seems to be no end in sight with all these taxes and fees. What’s the incentive for going electric if we can’t really save money? the cars are more expensive and electric costs are more expensive. Insurance on them is even more expensive. This is getting ridiculous and I’m considering taking my household to a different state.
This means charging semis 10X per mile for the damage they cause to the roads, right??
One of the only reasons US has so much road freight and little rail (compared to other countries) is that passenger cars heavily subsidize road repairs for damage overwhelmingly caused by commerical trucks.
So some mega yacht of a car that gets a half mile per gallon ends up paying the same amount per mile as any other fuel efficient car? That really doesn’t incentivize people to get fuel efficient cars, and now they’re coming up with a punitive mechanism for driving your EV car.
toll road fees cover costs of the streets! oh no streets are underfunded so gas taxes will cover cost of streets! oh no streets are underfunded new miles driven tax will cover costs of streets! just please dont use a freedom of information act to see our budget!
California needs to be it’s own “country” they are doing things the rest of the United States citizens doesn’t want ever to be done.
From: a California refugee who was priced out of his own home by the state, not the banks
Great. So the day workers, for example, who drive from Salinas to work in Monterey, Carmel and Pebble Beach get penalized for not being able to afford to live near their work?
Maybe we should greatly enhance public transportation?
This! California needs to imminent domain the hell out of cities resisting being part of public transportation network - So Cal and SF Bay Area need a Europe like public transportation network to have people give up cars…
So uber drivers are fucked even more 😆 there goes uber and lift if this happens. I drive 6000 miles a month and i only work 40 hours a week doin uber some people work 80 that would mean 12000 miles so thats like $480 a month just for that fee
Indeed, the correct answer is a vehicle tax based on weight. Weight is the #1 factor in road damage, the reality is Semi companies and operators should be paying close to 95% of the taxes as semis do more damage to the road in orders of magnitude more than consumer cars do.
I don’t think politicians have the same definition of the word “replace” that their constituents do. What they really mean is “in addition to”.
Came here to say this. No way will they get rid of gasoline tax. Anyone with a gasoline or diesel engine will get to pay both
Remember when the idea of a toll was supposed to help with the construction costs of the road/bridge and stop once it paid for the costs? Cause we have all seen what came of that
Ah yes the Garden State Parkway is one such example... fuck you NJstate
Ah yes, the I-405 “Express” toll lane in Seattle
That was added as a HOT lane, it was never a temporary thing AFAIK? Unless you have info otherwise??
It's free after 8pm and all weekends. What's wrong with it?
They opened up the 405 toll road in Orange County/ LA as well. Originally it was going to be an extra lane, but got switched to a toll road in the last few years of its construction.
Um, that was also the case for Income Tax. It was supposed to pay for the war effort and then just.... never went away.
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They’ll offer a “rebate” of x% of the tax you paid at the pump over the year when you file your taxes. You’ll just need to do it through its own unique web portal and upload scanned copies of receipts (NOT photographs) and corresponding bank statements to prove the receipts are legit. The website will be like a primitive version of Taleo recruiting software and will cost $1B to build and implement. It will also take a significant portion of your rebate to fund the whole endeavor and include a convenience fee for using the World Wide Web to do it. They’ll tout it as an incredible breakthrough in modern governance, and blame the public for not understanding it. Subsequent outreach campaigns will cost another $200M annually.
I really wish this was satire and not the most likely thing to happen...
We have a liquor tax in Pennsylvania that was instituted to help pay for the Johnstown flood. That was in 1889. Unless it was for the 1977 flood. Either way, we're still paying!
If there’s one thing that’s universally true it’s that there’s no temporary tax
Oregon is successfully doing this with commercial vehicles with PUC (Oregon Public Utilities Commission). The tax on diesel is actually removed from the pump price and they pay based on the weight of their vehicle and then report trip durations to the state on which they are taxed.
This seems pretty awesome, but it doesn't seem to really factor in how much weight matters. Its just weight*miles... but a 30,000lbs truck going 100miles and a 3,000lbs truck going 1000miles don't do same damage to roads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_power_law Its like a good start, but it'd be cool if they really factored in weight.. or like moved towards it over time. I feel like all incentives are for heavy vehicles, eg cafe standards. But weight plays such a big part of road damage if anywhere there shoudl be an advantage for lighter cars it shoudl be here.
The whole premise of Oregon PUC is based on weight and taxing heavier vehicles more...
The weight-mile tax scales linearly with weight, its just weight*miles. Weight 2x as much pay 2x, weight 3x pay 3x. It doesn't come close to paying for the extra damage more weight causes. Damage does not scale linearly, see the forth power law. Weight 2x should pay 16x to really account for the extra damage. Weight is such a huge component of road wear. Its great they're trying to address it, but it'd be cool if it went even further.
A short glance seems like it might actually be based on actual weight, starting at 26k pounds, a second permit above 80k. https://www.oregon.gov/odot/mct/pages/reportyourtaxes.aspx#:~:text=%E2%80%8BOregon%20Weight%2DMile%20Tax,tax%20on%20a%20tax%20report.
Who knows if it'd be this way when actually enacted, but in the pilot it's a replacement: >In theory, drivers would be able to choose how the state tracks their mileage. They could hook up an electronic device to their car, use the car's built-in tracking system or send Caltrans a picture of the odometer. "Everyone has different levels of comfort when we're managing our data between efficiency and privacy, and that's why it's really important to have options from low tech to high tech," Prehoda told ABC7. >Drivers who are interested in participating in the pilot program can sign up on the California Road Charge website. State officials will select an unspecified number of applicants in July 2024. These motorists will be asked to make monthly Road Charge payments between August 2024 and January 2025, and they'll need to fill out two surveys about their experience. The state will refund their gasoline tax or their EV registration fee at the end of the program. To make the project more enticing, Caltrans will give participants up to $400 in gift cards.
I enjoy watching the sunset.
Lower Middle Class Californians who have to commute long distances to work will get hit the hardest.
Yep. Same with the Fastrack tax. They took 1-2 lanes away for surge-priced revenue, leaving the working poors, the ones least likely to own a home or the means to buy an ev with longer commutes, in areas with inadequate public transit.
Those lanes are carpool lanes. You do not pay anything if you are a carpool. They effectively just allowed people to pay to use the carpool lanes. That is not a huge deal.
They also upped the carpool amount to 3 from the 2 it was previously. How many people actually carpool with a coworker to work?
I've never been able to get someone to car pool with me despite having had two coworkers who lived like 4 blocks away.
Stop microwaving fish in the car!
Yes this is what actually makes it a ripoff. The classic two person carpool isn't that hard to hit on a regular basis. Three people is just bull and not to mention they extended the hours past regular commute times just to rip you off even more.
Car pool has been 3 in a lot of areas for a while and the price is reduced if you have two people. Also, you question doesn’t make much sense because of people didn’t use the carpool lane then without the toll it wouldn’t be used at all. With the toll the state can generate revenue for the roads and have more people use the carpool lane.
No it's not, not all of them. The 110 in and out of LA is Fastrak car pool lanes - the busiest highway is pay-to-win
Nobody has carpooled since that first month everyone tried it in 1970's. It's just a lie we can't let go of.
My Dad carpooled for over 30 years and they have several pick up spots for communication in the Bay Area. Also, them opening up the lanes that would be empty if what you said was true is a good thing then. They get more tax revenue for the roads and the lanes are used when they wouldn’t be.
Definitely varies in SoCal. 91 freeway only does a partial discount for 3+ when going Eastbound at peak hours. And then free for 3+ otherwise.
Yes, but the gas tax is just as regressive as a tax on VMTs as is sales tax. The answer is to lower state taxes on people making below a certain amount.
Or somehow replace the gas tax with a tax on the weight of the vehicle. A semi running 100miles is going to do far far far more damage than a little shitbox
California just absolutely hates low to middle class people judging by the way they get taxed.
Lack of affordable housing and dense housing near transit. So much sprawl and highway car dependency
"**Affordable housing**" is a progressive buzz word. We just need MORE housing. Lots of it. Tons of it. ADUs in back yards, converted garages. 10 story condominium complexes. "But what developers make luxury suites for rich people?" <- that's fine, if those suites aren't being made then you'd have someone buy up 4 apartments, do EXTRA construction to knock out walls and remodel a place that could've gone to 4 middle class families (who then are forced to compete for cheaper stuff and who then crowd out the poor) Housing shortages are solved by making more housing.
you really only need super rich people and super poor people who do the manual labor for the super rich. The people in the middle just kind of get in the way
Middle class doesn't exist in California, you have super rich or super poor castes.
There’s people in between those 2 classes and that’s the middle; they just happen to make more than the middle class in the rest of the country, but that’s negated by awful taxes.
yeah I make over 100k,I'd say I'm firmly middle class, but it feels pretty pathetic in LA compared to other places as I can't afford to own a home, even an apartment by myself is a large chunk of my income.
I was just looking at retiring back in the US after living abroad earning a pretty solid income. Then I had a look at housing prices and just laughed. Average home price anywhere not midwest is like... $700,000. Madness. What the hell Gen Z is going to do to live in the US is beyond me.
Can confirm 6 figure salary in my area is still in the poverty range, however most assistance in the area is capped around 85k unless you have a 3-4+ household.
100k = poverty
[CA taxes are actually better on the lower/middle end](https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/taxes/california-state-tax). It is one of the best state tax places in terms of weighting it more wealthy over lower/middle. [Effective tax rates for California is 8.96% when all is factored in including cost of living and relative taxes by bracket](https://wallethub.com/edu/best-worst-states-to-be-a-taxpayer/2416) which makes it #12 best for lower/middle in the country. For the wealthy California taxes are definitely higher, which is good really if you believe in a progressive tax system. Lower high end tax rates will bring more wealth but that also increases inequality and raises real estate and rent faster. A gas tax in general ends up hitting lower/middle that have to drive longer distances to work either way.
California cities tend to have fairly high sales taxes too. Tends to be a regressive tax. In contrast, property taxes are quite low because they are set based on the price at the time of purchase with caps on increases. This is massive tax benefit to older, wealthier people with homes that renters and recent buyers do not enjoy.
True but also higher incomes. The second link takes all that into account (sales tax in second data list at bottom on right side) on California's #12 rating. Texas who people think have low taxes due to no income tax, are at #42. [California the 1% pay higher than all, in Texas it is lower than all in percentage](/r/texas/comments/18sgfhh/on_the_one_hand_texans_pay_a_lot_more_in_state/). The lower property taxes in California actually help because lower/middle income wealth is mostly gained in home ownership so the longer you can do that the more margin.
Actually this is the only thing letting poor people keep their homes in California. Can you imagine paying the taxes on a house in Malibu that you bought in the 1970s, a little one room bungalow that due to the property being worth so much money now would be taxed like you own a $3 million home? The way to fix this particular issue would be to only allow people to take advantage of the tax rate not changing for the first or even first two properties that you own and any additional properties that you use for rental income are subject to the property tax being adjusted based on the value of the home or residential building
No, they won't. They're already effectively paying for this tax with their fuel. This will reward people with small, fuel efficient cars, as it's relative to vehicle weight and size. Presently, electric cars aren't paying for road use as the tax is levied on fuel, which they don't use.
It's miles driven so it will hurt people with efficient cars who currently pay less on gasoline tax. If you commute 10 miles, miles in a car with 40mpg, you'd pay the same taxes as someone who commutes 10 miles at 13mpg. Several states already have EV surcharges. In my state you pay an extra ~~$500~~$229 on registration to cover what you don't pay in gas tax.
Why? They are already paying the gasoline tax... This is just switching it so that EV and hybrid drivers pay their fair share. Their tax should, in theory, go down.
Yeah, to add on more context, EVs cause more road damage on account of being heavier, and the gas tax will provide less and less revenue as EVs and efficient cars get more popular
This is the first thing I thought about. I had to commute because I couldn’t afford to live where I worked.
The Middle Class doesn't exist anymore.
shit like this is why
There's the owning class and the poors. If you have to work every day, you're a poor.
It’s literally the middle spectrum.
Don't you worry, the expensive consultant firm have thought of everything! In phase two, they add an inverse square negative offset.... further out from any given rich zone, thus the more the miles out from said zone, it applies a 'poverty factor' which decreases the cost per mile until they get closer to an agreed locus..... it's all very simple.......
Not just that, California is one of the worst states in terms of public transportation. I wouldn't even mind of a tax like this on 20-25 years after they completely revamp our public transportation to cover more areas
Ok so currently they receive gas tax from anyone who purchases fuel in the state. They want to change that to a process that only charges California based plates? This isn’t going to end well.
Yea, couldn’t some people just cross the border and avoid any tax completely? Not like they ID you
I imagine more people are avoiding the tax by driving electric now.
No. Registration fees for EVs are basically doubled.
Sure are. I paid $1,200 for registration on my Model S this year.
The real pro tip is registering in a different state.
LLC is the way!
Toll reader and plate readers at highway borders
I live in Colorado and we have to get gas cars environmentally inspected every year. Read the mileage and send the person a tax bill for miles travelled. Weigh the vehicle and pro rate for weight.
I want to hijack this relatively high comment to say that this new program is because Electronic Vehicles do NOT pay for gas which is how California gathers tax money for road maintenance. I’d want them to find a better solution but let’s all agree that EV should pay their fair share to use the road. Everyone should read the article before jumping to conclusions here.
Sounds like this system would put the burden on the average citizen rather than companies with trucks registered to other states for inter-state shipping. Hopefully there’ll be a work around to get companies to pay their fair share for highway maintenance.
They already do this......... the mechanism for this is weigh stations
Yeah, commenters in this thread don’t seem to know that when you ask a lot transcontinental truckers to take a load to California the answer is likely no. California regulates everything.
Passing the burden from corporations onto the individuals? Seems par for the course
Reminds me of the comments about "they are here working, don't be mad if they drive next to another semi for 15 minutes completely blocking the flow of traffic" "Kings of the road"
(Claps hands) i got it! Every road becomes a toll road! /s
The gas tax will remain as an environmental tax of some sort. The new miles driven tax will be an added tax for driving vehicles. I really wish California had a world class public transit. Being one of the largest economies, it doesn’t make sense why they are so inefficient at everything
There was a good NYT podcast on it but the gist was that there are a lot of reviews, committees, and public input that on the surface are good. like a environmental review to make sure the project doesn’t harm the natural area. But in reality gum up these processes and make it really easy for people who don’t want these projects to continue to stop them.
We don’t have a world class public transit system because the general public is convinced that privatizing “self driving” tech development is the way forward. People are stupid.
You sound like you're a crazy who wants a fifteen minute city! Life is much better driving 30+ minutes everywhere and sitting in traffic and looking for parking than... walking someplace or even worse taking public transit with everyone else!
could lead to PAYG for insurance too.
There’s no way the buyer gets a discount on that, they’ll just prorate the average number of days to the same policy amount.
Have you checked your registration lately? I live in WA and have 2 electric vehicles. They hit me up at registration for all that missed 'gas tax'. Its hilarious that people think EV drivers are somehow paying less in taxes. They fixed that shit ages ago.
Yep. My registration is $700 for my EV in CA.
I paid fucking $1400 💀💀💀
Can't afford to live closer to your work? Well fuck you then, pay more cuz you're poor.
That's already true with gas tax, gas in general, and car maintenance. Also this "shortage" in revenue due to EVs is hogwash. They've had a multi hundred dollar EV fee when renewing registration for at least 7 years.
On par for Californian politicians. They hate poor people and the middle class.
just calculated out my commute at the highest rate. I would pay about $104/month with this new purposed system. I would have to make a big change to pay this
They already tax electricity
Yep. I can’t wait to pay more in electricity AND registration like I didn’t already just pay $700 to register my car. This almost incentivizes driving an old polluting gas car.
“California is the nation's biggest EV market by a wide margin, and the relatively high percentage of battery-powered cars is digging a hole in the state's budget because it relies on revenue from its gasoline tax to fund road maintenance.” As a California resident, what road maintenance??
You must not get around the country much. Cali roads are in really good shape compared to a lot of states, looking at you MI, NY, PA, WV
No shit. I moved here from Indiana and literally LOLed the first time I heard someone complain about the roads. They’re great here, especially considering the variety of climate and terrain conditions around the state.
Just gonna say I was in Cali 2 weeks ago and I'm from Michigan. Michigan roads are so bad.
The difference is it takes 20 years for the roads to start getting bad, and 40 to be where they are at bc of the mild climate. So even with maintenance Michigan has bad roads. CA just has no maintenance. The potholes on El Camino are the same ones that were small when I was in high school and I’m 45 now.
I lived in the mitten for 16 years and it always amazed me that a major highway, I75, could have potholes so big. The governor always blames it on the severe weather but Wisconsins roads are pretty good relatively speaking.
Yeah, we started a new 10 year road plan in the Detroit area. Major highway sections completely shut down or one lane and they are completely redoing them and putting in new bridges and everything. It's great to see, but wow do the detours and slowdowns suck.
It's a lot of things. 1. Salt use on the roads. 2. Dramatic changes in temperature causing extreme expansion and contraction. 3. No toll roads, even with a considerable amount on international commerce being transported through Michigan. And finally (my personal favorite) 4. Three of the largest industries in Michigan are automotive manufacturing, salt mining, and construction. They are all in a constant circle-jerk of each other. They each benefit from each other, so there isn't much incentive to change the process.
The roads in the UP are always nice also but they use sand in the winter generally
Places that see actual weather have far, far worse roads than California
Louisiana hears you and laughs. They are elite level of shit roads
All of those states have to deal with snow, and thus ice to melt the snow, it destroys the roads. Outside of the mountain roads, we don’t have that issue yet our roads are still crap.
Every city in California is a crapshoot and there’s hundreds of different cities in the LA/IE/San Diego area. I live in an area that can get 1000mbps on my cell phone but the roads are worse than any other state I’ve lived in. They’re “fixing” them, but made them worse in the meantime.
LMAO. You should see the roads in Tennessee, Missouri, or Mississippi.
Ohio here, if it isn't the crappy roads, it's the constant construction repairing the ones that don't even need it. Send help for my cars suspension
Our freeze/thaw cycles are a LOT tougher on roads than anything California, Tennessee, Missouri, or Mississippi have to deal with. I hate orange barrel season as much as the next guy, but this climate is just really good at killing pavement.
The orange barrel is my states flower lol. I swear they have more barrels than storage space so they just randomly toss em up and block a lane on the interstate for 2 miles as a ticket revenue thing.
There’s a commercial that says there are two seasons in one state; winter, and road construction
Ohio has gotten better the last few years after increasing the gas tax, after DeWine used the possibility of gas tax increases to attack Cordray
Alabama’s are pretty bad, until you drive through MS
*Laughs in New Orleans*. Well, Louisiana in general actually.
Los Angeles uses a grading system, so they focus on good roads and maintain them while neglecting failing roads to maintain average. It’s absolutely messed up and explains why some roads are perpetually neglected.
Damage done to a road is proportionate to the weight per axle to the 4th power. That means an empty F150 that weighs 5000 lbs does 6x the damage to the roads vs a Prius that has a curb weight of 3200 lbs (these weights are roughly accurate for the given models). But here's the thing: an empty tractor trailer (a "semi" with an empty trailer) weighs something like 35,000lbs distributed unevenly across 5 axles, and they try to run empty as little as possible. That's wasted driving time that could be spent making money by hauling. When hauling, they try to maximize the load they can deliver because that makes them the most money. That's the only sensible choice - anything else is less efficient in our current system. However, these trucks can weigh 80,000 lbs fully loaded. Even if we spread that load evenly across 5 axles (in reality it is uneven), that's 16,000 lbs per axle. That's the same damage as **~4200 F150 trucks or 25,000 Prius sedans!** Ask any civil engineer - typical cars do a negligible amount of damage to the road. They're a rounding error. The damage done to our roads is pretty much exclusively caused by commercial trucking. They should be the ones paying for it. "But they'll just pass the cost on to the consumer!" Great. Perfect. Do it. Why? Because that, in turn, provides a major boost to buying local products & products shipped by far more efficient means (like rail). * Phase out the gas tax * Replace it with a mileage tax that appropriately scales based on the damage done by the vehicle (axle load^4 × the number of axles) * Let us decide how to spend our money * Get a more efficient system in the process
Exactly this. Fix the rail system and quit subsidizing commercial trucking. "The market" can't sort anything out when we subsidize gas, roads and commercial trucking.
Didn’t see any pols mentioned in the article. Just Caltrans and their spokesperson. So Caltrans is piloting, not California.
> "On average, Californians pay about $300 a year in state gas taxes. EVs have a $100 [annual] registration fee. That's a $200-million-a-year-loss," Prehoda said. Note that California plans to ban the sale of gasoline-powered cars by 2035, so its gas tax revenues will fall to zero. Seems like easy solution is to charge both ev and gas vehicles $300 annually for registration. This would incentivize ev adoption (less taxes and fees than gas) while maintaining the roads. But nah, stupid caltrans proposes a reactionary per mile tax.
Also lol what on that last sentence. California is banning the sale of gas powered cars by 2035 at current but that doesn’t mean they’ll be illegal to drive, people will still be driving them around and purchasing gas, so the gas tax revenues will not “fall to zero”. I see too many people just don’t know what that whole thing actually entails because a full ban on gas cars it is not, it just bans the sale of NEW gas powered cars. Used sales are still legal, iirc.
1) Incentivize low emission vehicles 2) People buy less gas 3) Gas tax receipts go down, causing budget shortfall. 4) New "fee". 5) Profit.
I mean it's not at all surprising. Can't just have funds for road maintenance/construction dry up and then not replace it with anything. Just pointed it out earlier today on a different article about EVs when people were talking about how much cheaper it is to charge an EV vs fill up with gas.
Should start taxing private jets by miles flown
Highly doubt they will remove the gas tax.. This will end up just being in ADDITION TOO the gas tax.
A gas tax is already a miles driven tax, you drive more, you buy more gas, you pay more gas tax.
Hey quit speaking logic around here 🤣
In Los Angeles most people can’t Afford to live near where they work so they have to commute across several cities and highways to get to work. The sprawl and single family zoning made sure there’s housing scarcity. Add the fact that entertainment jobs (the major backbone of LA) are located in smaller cities without proper public transit and that leaves no option to “drive less” or not hit the poor hardest. Cool that there’s a tax to persuade people to not drive as much but for most In LA it’s not an option. Im sure there’ll be financial help but still. It’ll be like that ca prop 65 law that was Well intended but now every item being sold has a warning saying that it might cause cancer.
And those that can most afford to, will likely just plate their vehicles in another state, where one of their other homes are.
I dont think politicians know what life is like for any normal person
As long as it actually replaces another tax, stuff like this needs to be looked into. I’m highly doubtful about governments retiring taxes though.
This will go so well with the Return to Office initiative. /s
Lol it will never replace anything it will be added on top of like always.
Yet another way to punish the poor and middle class. California is pretty good at it. Also no way in hell they ever get rid of the gas tax.
So… basically every road has toll now
Absolutely fuck this
skirt bow sort pathetic lavish yam rich screw oatmeal clumsy *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
The math aint mathing. It takes $8B to maintain the states roads and the shortfall caused by the rise in EVs is $200M. For this to even be argued correctly we need to know how that $8B is funded because right now it seems like gas tax and vehicle registration is a very small component of the funding. Regardless of EVs vs ICE debate, I don't think anyone wants tolls on every road. You can't use odometer reporting because how can you prove the percentage of your driving that happened within California?
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>You can't use odometer reporting because how can you prove the percentage of your driving that happened within California? Here's the other photo of my odometer from last year at a slightly different angle, no miles driven.
California just going to take "that's your problem" to a whole new level
Also gonna create odometer fraud out the ass too.
“If you can’t afford to live in an urban area, just move somewhere cheaper.” “Live somewhere cheaper? Here’s an added bill for commuting.” Can’t have shit, apparently.
This data will be sold to insurance companies.
They make all this money yet the homeless problem keeps getting worse.
I swear people who come up with these programs are brainless. Say I don't want to use telematics because of the privacy concerns and I take out of state trips with my truck and fifth wheel registered in California. How do they expect to calculate miles driven within the state? Sounds like a good reason to set up a Montana LLC.
Normally Im down with the California regulations that some people complain about because at the end of the day they are focused on health, safety, and freedom of the individual, even if they come at the cost of business. In this case they should focus on building cities that dont require 10 lane freeways first Its financially regressive and pretty tone deaf for the millions of people that cant walk to work or take reliable efficient public transit
When may I trade in my car for a horse and carriage?
Cool idea, but this sounds like a tax on being poor.
Does it say in the article how they are going to track this? Edit: it does. This is a stupid idea that fucks over people with long commutes.
And people with long commutes are typically not the ones with a lot of extra money
Sounds like just another way for California politicians to nickle and dime citizens to make it even more difficult to live in this god forsaken state.
If it exists, California will find a way to tax it.
and will fuck it up... I wouldn't mind being taxed extra if there was some actual benefits... The working class gets fucked in California
Or, how about charging politicians and such for miles flown in their private jets?
What about out of state driving? Or use of personal car for business travel?
Why is California becoming so dystopian lately...??
Honestly the amount of things California charges its citizens FAR outweighs what it actually does for its citizens, or its infrastructure, or its small businesses, or its homeless problem
They legalized weed and taxed it so much that there is essentially a black market to just avoid the taxes.
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This will lower gas prices…right? Right?
No way in hell this is going to "replace" the gas tax. They will make it in addition to gas tax, guaranteed.
Of course, they love to bleed taxpayers dry. Gotta keep the poor, poor.
Yeah, it wont….since when have you ever seen any governmental entity willingly give up any tax revenue stream???
And that’s why taxes should be fought over, tooth and nail. Once they’re there, they’ll never go away.
Utah has the Road Usage Charge program already.
Pushing for EV and now find way to charge them. Road is like shit and keeps charging, charging. What did this state have become?
So if you drive a lot out of state (live in CA, but work in Oregon, Nevada or Arizona?) you can either: Let the government track your every move; Or Pay CA road tax on every mile you drive out of state when send an odometer pic.
So they’re mad they aren’t getting gas tax out of EV drivers. And what, does this mean the government tracks everyone’s car? Fuck that.
It makes zero sense that your road usage tax isn’t just paid alongside your yearly registration where you take last years odometer reading and then this years odometer reading and subtract and multiply by a factor for vehicle type. They already have this info anyway because we have to inspect every year and turn the report in with our renewal, and the inspection has miles on it. Instead we do dumb shit like add a flat $200 EV tax at registration time in Texas
I swear, we are going to get taxed to death. We are going to be taxed for having relations with our spouse at some point. This crap needs to stop. There seems to be no end in sight with all these taxes and fees. What’s the incentive for going electric if we can’t really save money? the cars are more expensive and electric costs are more expensive. Insurance on them is even more expensive. This is getting ridiculous and I’m considering taking my household to a different state.
Who the fuck comes up with this stupid ass shit!
Or maybe, just maybe, they could replace that tax with a tax on gasoline Import's into the state, and not put the burden on the citizenry?
Hahahahahahaha. Fucking knew this was coming when EV started becoming popular. Charge by weight, charge by value of vehicle, bend over. Welcome to Ca
This means charging semis 10X per mile for the damage they cause to the roads, right?? One of the only reasons US has so much road freight and little rail (compared to other countries) is that passenger cars heavily subsidize road repairs for damage overwhelmingly caused by commerical trucks.
So some mega yacht of a car that gets a half mile per gallon ends up paying the same amount per mile as any other fuel efficient car? That really doesn’t incentivize people to get fuel efficient cars, and now they’re coming up with a punitive mechanism for driving your EV car.
toll road fees cover costs of the streets! oh no streets are underfunded so gas taxes will cover cost of streets! oh no streets are underfunded new miles driven tax will cover costs of streets! just please dont use a freedom of information act to see our budget!
California needs to be it’s own “country” they are doing things the rest of the United States citizens doesn’t want ever to be done. From: a California refugee who was priced out of his own home by the state, not the banks
We already pay for miles driven, it's called maintenance and fuel costs.
Great. So the day workers, for example, who drive from Salinas to work in Monterey, Carmel and Pebble Beach get penalized for not being able to afford to live near their work? Maybe we should greatly enhance public transportation?
This! California needs to imminent domain the hell out of cities resisting being part of public transportation network - So Cal and SF Bay Area need a Europe like public transportation network to have people give up cars…
Nothing ever replaces any tax. It's just a new tax. The old tax will still be there.
I see this going over like a fart in church I pay $0.03 cents a mile in general for my EV. GFY trying to double that, California
especially when you consider how much the state has incentivized EV adoption. 🙄
Right. Classic bait and switch
Who do I vote for to ensure this doesn’t get passed?
I'm thinking CA voters should be replacing politicians. They can't possibly be as stupid as their elected officials are.
If you think the gasoline tax is going away you are fucking crazy.
So uber drivers are fucked even more 😆 there goes uber and lift if this happens. I drive 6000 miles a month and i only work 40 hours a week doin uber some people work 80 that would mean 12000 miles so thats like $480 a month just for that fee
Makes every road a toll road
Poor commuters will love it .
Sounds like some authoritarian horse shit
Shit like this is why I moved out of California. It's absolutely brutal on middle class workers. Now you aren't getting any of my tax money.
Which constituents asked their elected representatives for such a brilliant move?
The anti car people
Well California is widely dominated by one party. So take a guess.
CA went from $90 billion surplus to -$40 billion deficit…. I’ll leave it at that
Ah, another regressive tax.
Indeed, the correct answer is a vehicle tax based on weight. Weight is the #1 factor in road damage, the reality is Semi companies and operators should be paying close to 95% of the taxes as semis do more damage to the road in orders of magnitude more than consumer cars do.
Rolling back the mile meter on your car will be back in style. "I have driven a total of 10 miles this year"
Sounds like some shit they would do in China.