New proposal to tax mustachian cars in Oregon!

[ncornilsen]

This seems very unlikely to pass, but makes me wonder who's coming up with this stuff?

https://olis.leg.state.or.us/liz/2017R1/Downloads/MeasureDocument/HB2877/Introduced

[ketchup]

Am I reading that right?  $1000 tax every five years for owning a 20+ year old car?  The fuck?

Wait, a 1997 car is 20 years old now? That can't be right...

[Ayanka]

(8)  This  section  does  not  apply  to  motor  vehicles  registered  as antique  vehicles  under ORS 805.010.

Sounds like there is a way to get out of it though.

[ncornilsen]

(8)  This  section  does  not  apply  to  motor  vehicles  registered  as antique  vehicles  under ORS 805.010.

Sounds like there is a way to get out of it though.

Not really... unless you want to only drive it parades or to car-shows.

[Bracken_Joy]

Ugh. Why not just make emissions standardized across the state? We have tons of areas that don't do emissions testing, and I assume this is a corollary for emissions concerns? Maybe efficiency?

Friggin annoying if this passes. Not that we'll be impacted, but a lot of my relatives would be. And TONS of old F150s out here still on the road. Nothing rusts out (no salt on the roads, etc) so there are still tons of old cars around. =\

[Just Joe]

They have the same antique registration rules here (another state). There ought to be something in between daily driver (full emissions and inspections) and parade vehicle status.

What if you want to take the car for a weekend trip out of town? I'm not sure I want to risk an accident far from home where there obviously weren't any parades on antique plates. Insurance might not pay out.

I'd venture a guess that most people with antique collector cars don't drive them more than a few thousand miles a year at most. That trip out of town for us would be less than 500 miles even if we spent the weekends driving the backroads on sightseeing trips.

I get wanting to take 90s cars off of the daily driver rolls. I can't help but wonder if this is about selling more new cars than emissions. Won't these cars just age out eventually?

[Ayanka]

(8)  This  section  does  not  apply  to  motor  vehicles  registered  as antique  vehicles  under ORS 805.010.

Sounds like there is a way to get out of it though.

Not really... unless you want to only drive it parades or to car-shows.

Inhere its 25km, thanks for the heads up.

[Xlar]

Thankfully the bill is now dead: http://jalopnik.com/proposed-oregon-bill-would-tax-people-with-cars-20-year-1792227249

Looks like we're not the only ones who think it's crazy!

[Metric Mouse]

Ugh. Why not just make emissions standardized across the state? We have tons of areas that don't do emissions testing, and I assume this is a corollary for emissions concerns? Maybe efficiency?

Friggin annoying if this passes. Not that we'll be impacted, but a lot of my relatives would be. And TONS of old F150s out here still on the road. Nothing rusts out (no salt on the roads, etc) so there are still tons of old cars around. =\

I would imagine that standardized emissions would come with its own problems. Not always a perfect solution. Probably for the best this bill died.

[Bracken_Joy]

Ugh. Why not just make emissions standardized across the state? We have tons of areas that don't do emissions testing, and I assume this is a corollary for emissions concerns? Maybe efficiency?

Friggin annoying if this passes. Not that we'll be impacted, but a lot of my relatives would be. And TONS of old F150s out here still on the road. Nothing rusts out (no salt on the roads, etc) so there are still tons of old cars around. =\

I would imagine that standardized emissions would come with its own problems. Not always a perfect solution. Probably for the best this bill died.

Only Portland and Medford have any emissions testing at all, to my knowledge. But yes, I am very glad this bill died.

[I'm a red panda]

If it's that they need to increase revenue, it seems like they are going to try to find it somewhere...gas tax, inspection fee. Someone will still get hit.

[Hargrove]

In Japan, they actually tax you after 5 years I heard. And pretty hard. Gotta love the Toyota lobby?

A 1985 Chevy Blazer carried me through all but last year.

I inherited it, and the frugal thing seemed to be to keep driving it as long as it worked well, at the time. Well, at the time, I didn't have another option. College, cross-country, work commute, city trips, whatever.

The awesome thing was that it never stopped working well. Hundreds of thousands of miles. It can't count high enough to tell. I still have it because it costs virtually nothing to own (I rarely drive it since this year). It almost never broke down - it would just work... less, very occasionally. The first transmission shredded itself into the transmission pan going cross-country, drove back 17 hours anyway, and took 7 seconds to shift a gear, but still did it. It would be worth nothing to sell. It gets 20mpg, which is awful next to my subcompact. I have given people jumps whose cars were older than my battery, and I changed the transmission just that once, fourteen years ago. It has its 2nd carburetor but stock engine, 2nd alternator, last emissions 5 or 8 years ago was somehow on the highly clean scale. I never paid more than 1k or 2k to repair it in a year or two, excepting the one transmission.

It's a lil' rusty.

[Travis]

Wasn't it Oregon that was tossing around the idea of taxing for miles driven because so many people were buying fuel efficient vehicles and tax revenue was dropping?

[Bracken_Joy]

Wasn't it Oregon that was tossing around the idea of taxing for miles driven because so many people were buying fuel efficient vehicles and tax revenue was dropping?

Yes, but I don't think that went anywhere.

A lot of cities voted on additional gas taxes instead this last round. I know Portland's passed, an additional $0.10/gal took effect this January. Not sure where else. (And frankly, so much of the Portland metro area isn't actually Portland, I don't think it's going to be a huge burden up there). The tax that luckily did not pass in Portland was going to pretty heavily target small businesses to pay for road repair. I much prefer the idea of a direct tax on use, personally.

[ncornilsen]

If it's that they need to increase revenue, it seems like they are going to try to find it somewhere...gas tax, inspection fee. Someone will still get hit.

They'll keep trying. Despite that oregon's total revenue per capita is in the top. 5 or 6 in the country, our politicians mismanaged it and now finds itself in a funding hole. I never vote to give more money to people who prove they can't manage it.

[Just Joe]

In Japan, they actually tax you after 5 years I heard. And pretty hard. Gotta love the Toyota lobby?

A 1985 Chevy Blazer carried me through all but last year.

I inherited it, and the frugal thing seemed to be to keep driving it as long as it worked well, at the time. Well, at the time, I didn't have another option. College, cross-country, work commute, city trips, whatever.

The awesome thing was that it never stopped working well. Hundreds of thousands of miles. It can't count high enough to tell. I still have it because it costs virtually nothing to own (I rarely drive it since this year). It almost never broke down - it would just work... less, very occasionally. The first transmission shredded itself into the transmission pan going cross-country, drove back 17 hours anyway, and took 7 seconds to shift a gear, but still did it. It would be worth nothing to sell. It gets 20mpg, which is awful next to my subcompact. I have given people jumps whose cars were older than my battery, and I changed the transmission just that once, fourteen years ago. It has its 2nd carburetor but stock engine, 2nd alternator, last emissions 5 or 8 years ago was somehow on the highly clean scale. I never paid more than 1k or 2k to repair it in a year or two, excepting the one transmission.

It's a lil' rusty.

There are some videos of people touring Japanese junkyards. Some of those "junk" cars are better than the cars driven on the streets of my town. You can buy a used JDM engine and ship it to your house here for $600-$800 (depending on which engine it is). Cheap enough way to replace a worn out engine in your favorite Japanese car here in the states.

The Japanese gov't makes it expensive to own older cars. Got to keep the car industry going.

The waste in this world is just mind boggling - all just to keep the paycheck machines going.

[talltexan]

before we hate on Japan, consider the urban density of Tokyo...if someone is driving a car in that mess, you want it to be as new as possible to minimize emissions.

I searched for data online, but the quickest data I can find are somewhat old: https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/onh00/bar4.htm

However, if you believe this chart, Japanese cars are driven less than half per year what American cars are, and Japanese households own 20% fewer cars (or at least they did in 1997). I'd love to view more recent data.

[Hargrove]

As new as possible... to minimize... emissions?

Not as electric as possible, as hybrid as possible, as catalytic-converter-updated as possible, not as-recently-emissions-tested as possible...

But as new as possible?

If that were their plan, it would be the worst environmental conservation strategy ever conceived after graphite nuclear cooling rods.

[Metric Mouse]

As new as possible... to minimize... emissions?

Not as electric as possible, as hybrid as possible, as catalytic-converter-updated as possible, not as-recently-emissions-tested as possible...

But as new as possible?

If that were their plan, it would be the worst environmental conservation strategy ever conceived after graphite nuclear cooling rods.

Well, it would make sense if emissions have been improved over time. Perhaps if the government mandated emission reductions on newer vehicles, this law would serve its purpose

[sol]

Washington already charges an extra $100 $150 per year to register an EV, over the normal cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle. 

edit: the EV registration fee increased 50% this year.  Thanks Republicans!

[BDWW]

Washington already charges an extra $100 $150 per year to register an EV, over the normal cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle. 

edit: the EV registration fee increased 50% this year.  Thanks Republicans!

So EV owners shouldn't contribute to road maintenance?

[sol]

Washington already charges an extra $100 $150 per year to register an EV, over the normal cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle. 

edit: the EV registration fee increased 50% this year.  Thanks Republicans!

So EV owners shouldn't contribute to road maintenance?

Everybody should contribute to road maintenance.  Should EV owners contribute more than everyone else?

I personally contribute more to my city's road maintenance budget than most people, because my property taxes are thousands of dollars per year higher than average.

If you really wanted to raise revenue from the people who do the most damage to roads, you would charge semi trucks approximately 90% of all road maintenance costs.  Passenger cars are virtually harmless by comparision, no matter how they are powered.

But this is s dumb argument anyway.  Approximately 30% of my transportation taxes go to the ferry system, which I don't use at all and only subsidizes rich people who live on islands.  And approximately 0% of it goes to bike paths, which I use almost every day.

It just seems dumb that the state gives a sales tax exclusion for newly purchased EVs, but then taxes them extra every year after that.  This is how we end up with bloated government, with one party passing regulations to undo the regulations passed by the other party. 

[BDWW]

Washington already charges an extra $100 $150 per year to register an EV, over the normal cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle. 

edit: the EV registration fee increased 50% this year.  Thanks Republicans!

So EV owners shouldn't contribute to road maintenance?

Everybody should contribute to road maintenance.  Should EV owners contribute more than everyone else*?

I personally contribute more to my city's road maintenance budget than most people, because my property taxes are thousands of dollars per year higher than average.

If you really wanted to raise revenue from the people who do the most damage to roads, you would charge semi trucks approximately 90% of all road maintenance costs.  Passenger cars are virtually harmless by comparision, no matter how they are powered.

But this is s dumb argument anyway.  Approximately 30% of my transportation taxes go to the ferry system, which I don't use at all and only subsidizes rich people who live on islands.  And approximately 0% of it goes to bike paths, which I use almost every day.

It just seems dumb that the state gives a sales tax exclusion for newly purchased EVs, but then taxes them extra every year after that.  This is how we end up with bloated government, with one party passing regulations to undo the regulations passed by the other party.

Just curious on your perspective. I agree it's not ideal, but I don't necessarily think it's a terrible idea to make sure EVs pay their way. I definitely agree that trucking should pay a significantly larger share.

*Using WA as an example, current gas tax 62.9c a gallon 10,000 miles per year (low average, US is actually closer to 12,000) in a car that gets 30 mpg =  10,000 /30 * .629 ~ $210 dollar total tax.  Discounting federal ~ $148.5 tax. Looks fairly equitable at first glance for WA, but federal is still losing revenue.

[gimp]

FYI, this bill was killed pretty shortly after it got into the news. Like, within several hours.

[kimmarg]

They have the same antique registration rules here (another state). There ought to be something in between daily driver (full emissions and inspections) and parade vehicle status.

Some states have 'Ag plates' (Agriculture). There's a limited amount of driving you can do and it can't be for non 'farm' work but in exchange the registration is cheap and the inspection is limited to just safety (e.g. does it have brakes) In the northeast Ag plates are most often seen on aging pickup trucks that are used to plow in winter and haul hay in summer. 

[yachi]

In Cali, where we have required emissions test every 2 year (costs $50) they have various  programs that will pay you to junk your old car and pay you to do it. Here's one in my area that would allow me, as a low taxable income person, to get $9500 to junk my 2001 Ford Ranger to get an EV (used or new), $6500 for a hybrid, $4500 for a high mpg car or $4500 towards a bus pass. There are other programs in place as well that don't require you to buy anything but pay you $1000 - $1500 to junk your old car.
https://www.replaceyourride.com

How many times can you buy and junk a $1500 car for $4500 toward a bus pass before your no longer a low taxable income person?

[Just Joe]

They have the same antique registration rules here (another state). There ought to be something in between daily driver (full emissions and inspections) and parade vehicle status.

Some states have 'Ag plates' (Agriculture). There's a limited amount of driving you can do and it can't be for non 'farm' work but in exchange the registration is cheap and the inspection is limited to just safety (e.g. does it have brakes) In the northeast Ag plates are most often seen on aging pickup trucks that are used to plow in winter and haul hay in summer.

That wouldn't work well on a little Porsche 914 or Austin Healey Sprite... ;)

[Chris22]

I do think there's a larger discussion to be had regarding the fact that vehicles that are older tend to pollute more, and these vehicles are often in disrepair and belong to poorer people who can't afford something newer (or MMMers who are too cheap to buy something new).  Yes, you can discuss lifecycle pollution, etc, but at some point it really is better to get newer, more efficient vehicles to replace older more-polluting ones.  I also think there needs to be some sort of hobby car exemption; my toy car is now 15 years old, and though it was an LEV in its day (Low Emissions Vehicle) it's certainly not as clean as a new car.  But it gets driven maybe 2000-3000 miles a year, and is in perfect mechanical condition; it is not a significant polluter in a way that a broken down old beater from the same year that someone drives 30 miles a day in.  It's an interesting issue for MMMers, where "saving the earth" and "don't spend a lot" sort of start to conflict.  You can say "drive less" and that fixes part of the problem from an MMM perspective, but it's hard to legislate that as a solution.

[Bracken_Joy]

I do think there's a larger discussion to be had regarding the fact that vehicles that are older tend to pollute more, and these vehicles are often in disrepair and belong to poorer people who can't afford something newer (or MMMers who are too cheap to buy something new).  Yes, you can discuss lifecycle pollution, etc, but at some point it really is better to get newer, more efficient vehicles to replace older more-polluting ones.  I also think there needs to be some sort of hobby car exemption; my toy car is now 15 years old, and though it was an LEV in its day (Low Emissions Vehicle) it's certainly not as clean as a new car.  But it gets driven maybe 2000-3000 miles a year, and is in perfect mechanical condition; it is not a significant polluter in a way that a broken down old beater from the same year that someone drives 30 miles a day in.  It's an interesting issue for MMMers, where "saving the earth" and "don't spend a lot" sort of start to conflict.  You can say "drive less" and that fixes part of the problem from an MMM perspective, but it's hard to legislate that as a solution.

Yes, but to have a fair discussion of this you need to find the break even point with the materials that go into a new car- first, the raw materials, but second, the burden of parts made all over the world coming together, being assembled, being shipped again, etc.

I don't have much background in this, but some quick googling brought me this:

A 2004 analysis by Toyota found that as much as 28 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions generated during the lifecycle of a typical gasoline-powered car can occur during its manufacture and its transportation to the dealer

From: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/when-used-cars-are-more-ecofriendly/
And further reading: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/green-motoring/11187483/New-or-old-which-is-greener.html and https://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/2010/sep/23/carbon-footprint-new-car

Anyway, just be aware of the assumptions at play here.

[Metric Mouse]

Washington already charges an extra $100 $150 per year to register an EV, over the normal cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle. 

edit: the EV registration fee increased 50% this year.  Thanks Republicans!

So EV owners shouldn't contribute to road maintenance?

Everybody should contribute to road maintenance.  Should EV owners contribute more than everyone else?

I personally contribute more to my city's road maintenance budget than most people, because my property taxes are thousands of dollars per year higher than average.

If you really wanted to raise revenue from the people who do the most damage to roads, you would charge semi trucks approximately 90% of all road maintenance costs.  Passenger cars are virtually harmless by comparision, no matter how they are powered.

But this is s dumb argument anyway.  Approximately 30% of my transportation taxes go to the ferry system, which I don't use at all and only subsidizes rich people who live on islands.  And approximately 0% of it goes to bike paths, which I use almost every day.

It just seems dumb that the state gives a sales tax exclusion for newly purchased EVs, but then taxes them extra every year after that.  This is how we end up with bloated government, with one party passing regulations to undo the regulations passed by the other party.

Would it be more fair to tax the semi drivers, or the people who buy the cheap junk transported by the semi drivers? I mean, very few people are using a tractor trailer as their commuter - they're almost exclusively hauling things for other people. I would think it would be much better to heavily tax the people purchasing goods hauled by semi, as it is the root of the problem.

[Bracken_Joy]

Washington already charges an extra $100 $150 per year to register an EV, over the normal cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle. 

edit: the EV registration fee increased 50% this year.  Thanks Republicans!

So EV owners shouldn't contribute to road maintenance?

Everybody should contribute to road maintenance.  Should EV owners contribute more than everyone else?

I personally contribute more to my city's road maintenance budget than most people, because my property taxes are thousands of dollars per year higher than average.

If you really wanted to raise revenue from the people who do the most damage to roads, you would charge semi trucks approximately 90% of all road maintenance costs.  Passenger cars are virtually harmless by comparision, no matter how they are powered.

But this is s dumb argument anyway.  Approximately 30% of my transportation taxes go to the ferry system, which I don't use at all and only subsidizes rich people who live on islands.  And approximately 0% of it goes to bike paths, which I use almost every day.

It just seems dumb that the state gives a sales tax exclusion for newly purchased EVs, but then taxes them extra every year after that.  This is how we end up with bloated government, with one party passing regulations to undo the regulations passed by the other party.

Would it be more fair to tax the semi drivers, or the people who buy the cheap junk transported by the semi drivers? I mean, very few people are using a tractor trailer as their commuter - they're almost exclusively hauling things for other people. I would think it would be much better to heavily tax the people purchasing goods hauled by semi, as it is the root of the problem.

In theory though, by taxing the supplier, you incentivize alternative shipping methods. Ex, perhaps a return to more rail travel? Whereas taxing the end product directly, you affect purchaser behavior, not seller behavior, and there's less room for 'the behavioral nudge of incentives' there- because a purchaser can really only opt to purchase, or not purchase, in that scenario. And the latter isn't great for economic growth.