# Mileage tax idea would use GPS in cars to track drivers' usage
# Transportation Secretary LaHood calls it an idea "we should look at"
# Transportation Department says Obama will not pursue the tax
# Oregon carried out a pilot program and deemed it "successful"
It's so bad that even Obama doesn't want to pursue it.
Kojiro, what's up with Oregon doing this? Did you pay GPS tax?
Oregon did run a pilot for this, on some kind of voluntary participation or something. The idea is it would replace the gas tax. Gas tax is supposed to fund roads, but drivers of low MPG vehicles have long complained that they bear the burden of unfair taxation simply because they consume more gas for less use of the roads. So instead of a gas tax, some people think it would be more fair to tax per mile instead of per gallon. I think commercial trucking and delivery companies are behind the idea, since they pay a crap load of tax on gas. It would more properly tax people on the basis of how much you actually use the roads instead of how much gas you burn. And possibly, because of the GPS, send the tax funds collected to the correct state/town in which you drove.
ReplyDeleteOh and also this quote from the article is probably a big reason Oregon piloted it:
ReplyDeleteThe problem stems in part from something good: More and more Americans are buying vehicles that have better gas mileage. That means less gas tax money from each car, though the car is causing the same amount of wear and tear on the roads.
All the hippies in their hybrids and bio-diesels means the state is losing a lot of gas-tax money for road upkeep.
You could also argue that larger, heavier vehicles naturally have lower MPG and cause more wear and tear on roads, so the current gas-tax system is actually more fair, in that sense. I dunno.
ReplyDeleteI just don't like the idea of the government knowing where I am all the time. I'd rather it was an odometer reading tax. Why the hell does it gotta be a GPS tax.
ReplyDelete