Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski (DEM) to pursue mileage tax
A year ago, the Oregon Department of Transportation announced it had demonstrated that a new way to pay for roads — via a mileage tax and satellite technology — could work.
Now Gov. Ted Kulongoski says he’d like the legislature to take the next step.
“As Oregonians drive less and demand more fuel-efficient vehicles, it is increasingly important that the state find a new way, other than the gas tax, to finance our transportation system.”When the task force’s study and test were in the news in 2006 and 2007, critics worried that the technology could be used to track where vehicles go, not just how far they travel, and that this information would somehow be stored by the government.
A GPS-based system kept track of the in-state mileage driven by the volunteers. When they bought fuel, a device in their vehicles was read, and they paid 1.2 cents a mile and got a refund of the state gas tax of 24 cents a gallon. Read More
What I see here is another way the government can keep track of the American people. Not only that but its been on the news that Obama will raise Fed gas taxes so that the $1.60 we’re paying now will be as high as $3.50 per gallon. This Gov. which is a democrat is thinking ahead of Obama’s tax increase. Do we want the government knowing how many miles our car is driven and maybe know where we went with it?
In principle, “road pricing” along these lines is a good idea, but there seem to be a number of problems with this plan, including the privacy issue. Before too long, though, these problems will be solved with cheap technology (no one knows where you’re going when you buy a subway fare card), and we’ll be paying according to how much we drive instead of according to how much gas we use. Privatizing a lot of highway miles will also be easier. Be nice to get the state out of another line of business.
I don’t like the idea because of the privacy issue plus how will they know if I was driving on a highway or thu the woods, will the mileage stop when I cross over into another state, and how about the older cars! We already pay for a lic plate which is a tax, excise tax when we buy the car and safety inspection fee and a yearly tax per car. The mileage tax may start off at 1.2 cents, but the state will keep raising it!
Sounds like another tax on the poor to me!
Oh, it might be something like a transponder in your car that you activate with a prepaid card. At 2 cents a mile, 20 bucks gets you 1000 miles of driving on state roads. That sort of thing. Harder on the poor? Yeah, but everything about operating a car is “regressive.” Insurance, gas, tires … all account for a higher fraction of household income when houshold income is lower. Probably the only tax that isn’t regressive is an income tax.
And, btw, I’m not advocating higher taxes. It’s just that “road pricing” seems preferable to a high, earmarked gas tax in that 1) it links your tax liability directly to how much you drive, and 2) it makes it easier for private firms to run the highway system, collecting fees in place of the state’s collecting taxes and generally running things better than the state does.
We shall see!