Washington State Pay by Mile Tax

[Moogie423]

http://www.king5.com/story/news/loca...mile/20134161/

The TLDR is that due to higher fuel efficiency vehicles, the taxes gained by taxing gasoline have been declining. That tax was the main source of funding for road repair and maintenance. The proposed change would charge people by the mile, using GPS or another way to track how many miles you drive.

Currently, the fuel tax in Washington is 37 cents a galon. A tax of 2 cents a mile would theoretically raise just as much revenue as that fuel tax. The new model of course does favor those who drive older, less efficient vehicles in terms of taxes charged per mile.

Personally, I have mixed feelings about this proposed change. Unless you drive a vehicle that gets 18 or less miles-per-gallon, you will be paying more in taxes. On the flip side, at least on the eastern side of the state, the roads are in desperate need of more funding for repairs. Currently only major roadways see repair and maintenance on a regular basis, while the smaller, yet still widely used roadways are neglected to the point that it feels like driving off-road in the middle of a city.

Here's a short article about a White House survey of US roads from earlier this year, placing Washington near the bottom in road quality.
http://www.ksfc.org/spr-news-feed-en...n-road-quality

How do you all feel about this proposed mile tax?

[87Octane]

Can't really argue that's fair. I think it should be a formula of weight of vehicle + mileage personally. That's the best way to measure the "abuse" done to the road (to a less precise extent - the environment - excluding old lightweight shitboxes of course, they would slip by). They are doing the same thing where I live shortly.

[Nilinor]

Ya, it wont pass. I am from washington, I will not use that, how the hell will they plan on tracking every vehicle anyways? Assign EVERY PERSON IN THE STATE with a transmitter to be installed? Do you realize how much money that would cost?

I dont see this working, what about when im not in state? what about out of state drivers? Rental cars?

This is a joke, and should be treated as such.

[87Octane]

Ya, it wont pass. I am from washington, I will not use that, how the hell will they plan on tracking every vehicle anyways? Assign EVERY PERSON IN THE STATE with a transmitter to be installed? Do you realize how much money that would cost?

I dont see this working, what about when im not in state? what about out of state drivers? Rental cars?

This is a joke, and should be treated as such.

Not sure about Wash, but where I come from, *I* am the person who gets your mileage off your ECU, and I do it every year at tax time. Even if your state has no official means of collecting that data - realistically it won't be long until all insurance companies require an OBD port logger :\

They are just "testing" them now to lower your premiums when you demonstrate you aren't speeding for X amount of time (GPS tracked by speed limits), then you mail it back. At least until the cars themselves start sending data wirelessly.

It's coming, eventually.

[Yunru]

That can be fixed easy. Take 10% of cash you use for military and use it too fix the roads.
Better quality roads = faster transport = faster taxes (due too more people driving)

[Arthas242]

Not sure about Wash, but where I come from, *I* am the person who gets your mileage off your ECU, and I do it every year at tax time.

and who is going to read that number? gotta pay them.

since it's a government job easily $50,000+ a year at min per person (probably 100k knowing government waste).

also how do you track who has paid and who has not.

whelp gotta OVERPAY a place millions of dollars to develop a system to record numbers and process them as entered.

This law is a joke.......

also it is a regressive tax. Poor people tend to drive older cars which get less miles per hour.

(i am conservative) I thought liberals were all for progressive taxes?

[Moogie423]

Can't really argue that's fair. I think it should be a formula of weight of vehicle + mileage personally. That's the best way to measure the "abuse" done to the road (to a less precise extent - the environment - excluding old lightweight shitboxes of course, they would slip by). They are doing the same thing where I live shortly.

Vehicles aren't the only source of road damage. Seasonal temperature changes contribute a fair bit. Salts and other deicers used in the winter severely harms the roads as well. I do agree that there should be an extra tax on large vehicles, like shipping trucks due to their much higher average weight when load hauling and much higher uptime on the roads.

[GreatOak]

I don't like it, but it's not like it would be worse than the situation in Illinois.

[Reeve]

Seems to me that removing the fuel taxes in favor of a mileage tax would just result in more people buying gas guzzlers, which is the opposite of what you want. If you need more revenue but want to keep people away from gas guzzling cars (and maybe encourage more mass transit too), just increase the gas tax.

[Endus]

also it is a regressive tax. Poor people tend to drive older cars which get less miles per hour.

What?

Unless you're saying all wealthy people drive sports cars far in excess of the speed limits, this is a nonsense phrase. Older cars get worse mileage per gallon, but they're fully capable of driving the same speed as more modern vehicles.

And shifting from a mileage tax to a distance tax is, explicitly, a shift to a less regressive option.

[melodramocracy]

That can be fixed easy. Take 10% of cash you use for military and use it too fix the roads.
Better quality roads = faster transport = faster taxes (due too more people driving)

Even easier, stop dipping into road funds for other shit, at both a federal and state level. Frankly I don't want to hear one iota of poverty crying by gov't officials until they sort that out.

[Moogie423]

Seems to me that removing the fuel taxes in favor of a mileage tax would just result in more people buying gas guzzlers, which is the opposite of what you want. If you need more revenue but want to keep people away from gas guzzling cars (and maybe encourage more mass transit too), just increase the gas tax.

I think raising gas prices would not help as much, Washington already has the 8th highest price of gas in the US, 6th if you don't include Alaska and Hawaii which will always take the top 2 spots. I'm not saying that a mile tax is the best idea, or even a good idea. But I am tired of driving terrible roads. In the last 10 years, the amount of money I've had to pay in vehicle repairs due to those bad roads is far greater than what I would have payed in a mile tax.

[Citizen T]

What about people that do the majority of their driving out of state? Regional sales, commuters that live near the border, etc. You are then penalizing these tax payers because they still have to pay gas taxes for those same miles in those other states. I know double taxation is like a wet dream to some of you, but it's inherently unfair.

[petej0]

How do you all feel about this proposed mile tax?

Short of another funding method, I dont mind it. My problem with it is that it isnt just replacing the old funding with a new method but also raising the tax. Significantly in some cases. If you have a car that gets 30 mpg and drive 12,000 miles a year under the current method of .37 a gallon you are paying $148 in taxes. Under the new system of .02 per mile you are paying $240 in taxes. It sounds like a way to "hide" a tax increase.

how the hell will they plan on tracking every vehicle anyways? Assign EVERY PERSON IN THE STATE with a transmitter to be installed? Do you realize how much money that would cost?

The story states tracking by GPS, which I dont understand how it would work (who supplies the GPS, how they will bill using the GPS approach), not to mention privacy concerns if the state is able to track the location of people. More details would need to be supplied.

I think a more feasible (yet probably easier way to evade tax) approach would be to have your mileage submitted yearly when you have your car inspected. And have a bill sent to you at that time. The inspection station would submit the mileage to the state and the state would send you a bill and payment voucher to pay your tax in like 3 or 4 payments.

[Moogie423]

What about people that do the majority of their driving out of state? Regional sales, commuters that live near the border, etc. You are then penalizing these tax payers because they still have to pay gas taxes for those same miles in those other states. I know double taxation is like a wet dream to some of you, but it's inherently unfair.

There would have to be a system in place to exempt out of state travel for a mile tax to work and not be challenged. If they go with the GPS route, it would be simple enough to have the GPS stop tracking miles if the coordinates are outside of the state. The problem would be out of state people driving in Washington.

[petej0]

What about people that do the majority of their driving out of state? Regional sales, commuters that live near the border, etc. You are then penalizing these tax payers because they still have to pay gas taxes for those same miles in those other states. I know double taxation is like a wet dream to some of you, but it's inherently unfair.

That is an issue.

[Gheld]

How is this anything but a complete shortsighted logic fail?

If Washington State replaces the gas tax, with devices to track people's mileage (and presumably they could only enforce such a system on Washington State motorists) then either A. Everybody coming from out of state would have to stop at some station to have a tracker installed. Or B. They would lose out on tax revenues from any out of state visitors.

[Citizen T]

There would have to be a system in place to exempt out of state travel for a mile tax to work and not be challenged. If they go with the GPS route, it would be simple enough to have the GPS stop tracking miles if the coordinates are outside of the state. The problem would be out of state people driving in Washington.

Fair enough, but I really doubt that the citizenry will go along peacefully with a GPS tracker being required on their vehicles.

The problem with out of state people driving in Washington would be even more exaggerated by people near the border (i.e. Portland OR, Coeur D'alene ID for two examples) driving a few miles to fill up in WA state to save 37 cents per gallon. I know my van holds 24 gallons so a fill up would save me about $9.

[petej0]

How is this anything but a complete shortsighted logic fail?

If Washington State replaces the gas tax, with devices to track people's mileage (and presumably they could only enforce such a system on Washington State motorists) then either A. Everybody coming from out of state would have to stop at some station to have a tracker installed. Or B. They would lose out on tax revenues from any out of state visitors.

Yeah, having a moment to think this through it is a big fail. In a short amount of time we have come up with the most basic of issues. Is there any other detailed info on how this would work? Or would WA state drivers just be asked to pay the share of tourists and out of state commuters?

[Independent voter]

A civil engineer once told me that cars don't hurt roads as nearly as much as tractor trailer trucks.