Senate, House Bills Aim to Kill $7,500 Electric Vehicle Tax Credit, Add New EV Tax

We just ditched such a subsidy here in Ontario, Canada. IMHO, the only EV that should be getting any type of subsidy are ones that "regular" people can actually afford. If you're plunking down $100K for a Tesla here in Canada, you don't need a subsidy of $12,500 from taxpayers. My next car will be an EV but I'm waiting for prices to match ICE vehicles before I purchase.

There shouldn’t be subsides for anyone. But that’s my own view. I’ll start looking in 2025 for a newer truck. My current truck will be 21 years old at that point. With Toyota wanting most models to have electric choices by that time I am hoping the Truck line up will have something decent. Otherwise I’ll suffer with a 20+ year old paid for truck.

One way or another they will take our money. So I guess I should just open my wallet.
 
Fast reactors can consume uranium waste and convert it into very short lived radioactive materials (radioactivity essentially gone within 200 years) and very long lived, not so radioactive materials (mostly harmless radiation). It's old tech, needs more safeguards to use safely, but doesn't need additional fuel to be mined because it can use current uranium waste. Fast reactors can generate up to 20 times more power from the same lump of fuel as a regular reactor. We've probably got enough waste to power this country for the next thousand years or so on just fast reactors.

I see more promise in the molten sodium solar power stations though as a long term renewable source. It is one of the few green techs that can actually function as a baseline power source, barring a local volcanic eruption blocking out the sun for weeks on end.

yup , when people talk about nuclear, they always forget that there is a lot of new nuclear tech, or that they like to refer to the idiocy of Fukushima. (idiocy stemming from elite Japanese refusing to listen)
 
Tax by weight, not by fuel type.

How about the fact that ICE cars pollute the air leading to a higher incident levels of Cardiovascular illness, Respiratory illness,
Allergy-related illness,
etc. And the related expenses on state and gov to deal with those issues. So until they can figure out how to burn gas cleanly, yeah tax by fuel or emissions.
 
LOL do it. Give Tesla all the rebates and ruin any other car companies ability to match them once Tesla's rebate runs out and the other car companies never got to use theirs.
 
Also, for the add more lanes to the highway argument, it would just get filled immediately. Already in any big city there are tons of people that just avoid driving anywhere during rush hour, if there were an extra three lanes that might not be the case. Those people could immediately fill the extra capacity until the roads were saturated enough for the "screw it i'm not sitting in that traffic" group of people to stay at home once again during those times.
 
Remove the tax from the gas and place it on the tires. Or on all vehicle sales right out the gate have the tax not based on vehicle cost but weight then it doesn’t matter what is fueling it.

So base the tax on vehicle weight. That way the guy driving 25,000 miles a year pays the same as the guy driving 2,000 mile a year. :rolleyes:

A tax on electric or plug-in hybrids makes sense.
The tax should be based on the battery capacity. That way a large SUV with a 200 mile range would pay more then a small car with a 200 mile range.

Any car with a battery below a certain size should not be taxed, such as standard hybrids that get all their energy from gas.
Federal funds pay for highways, and hybrid mileage on the highway isn't much better than a standard ICE, so they are paying for most of their share already.
 
I actually support a fuel tax because it's still typical that the heavier vehicles do consume the most fuel and cause the most road wear on average. However I think we should probably be logical and just flat fee the darn thing for vehicles in tiers.

Your vehicle runs on petrol/diesel? You pay the lowest tier of registration/plate fees, based on an average mileage of 15k miles for personal cars, but the most fuel taxes, and as we all know taxes go up over time.

Your vehicle is a hybrid? You pay X middle tier flat fee to plate it. This is based on an average mileage of 15k miles a year, a bit more than the average, but less fuel taxes.

You own an electric vehicle, you're in the top tier for costs to plate, again based on a 15k mile a year usage and that's it. Why? You don't pay fuel taxes.

That may be fine if you drive 15,000 to 20,000 miles a year.
What about all the people who don't?

I have a short commute so I only put 6,000 miles on my car last year. I made the decision years ago that I didn't want to waist hours of my life sitting in traffic, even though my living expenses are much higher. now you want to raise my registration to subsidize people who drive more than me?

Even worse, what about people who have an extra car they rarely drive? Now their registration will be much higher too?
My wife (who has no commute since she can no longer work) only put 2,000 miles on her car. Why should her registration cost more?


No, stick to the gas tax. If someone want to drive a large SUV, then they pay more with the additional gas they use.
If someone want to drive a small car or a hybrid, then they pay less since they use less gas.

If someone wants to drive an electric or a plugin hybrid, then they need to help pay for the roads too, since the are not paying gas taxes.

FYI: I drive a hybrid, but if the state put a yearly tax on hybrids, my next car would likely not be a hybrid. The extra tax would likely consume any money I would save due to the higher mileage due to the low number of miles I drive.
 
A 35K (for the top trim) Nissan Leaf is only for the elite? What kind of Micky Mouse horse shit kind of description is that?
 
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Get rid of all of the vehicle subsidies, tax credits, tax rebates, etc. Every one I have seen, the higher cost to buy the vehicle, appliance, or gizmo that qualified for the credit almost exactly equaled the credit. So all the government was doing with the credit was setting a price floor for the thing in question. They weren't really helping people buy the car or gizmo. This became apparent when the EV subsidy expired/lowered at the end of 2018 and Tesla magically lowered the prices on their cars to compensate.

As for the road tax, at least for the over the road chargers at fuel stations, should be easy to add a tax to each KWH dispensed from a charger much the same as a tax per gallon is applied to each gallon of liquid fuel. Maybe home chargers get a pass as most electricity bills already include tax for cities,counties and states.
 
lets see

already have

car property tax (depends upon state)
tolls (depends upon state)
inspection fees (depends upon state)
registration fees
wheelage tax (depends upon state)
gas tax

and states cannot make this work?


LET ME GIVE YOU A CLUE: quit spending money on stupid stuff like bridges to nowhere, light rail, bike trails (unless you want to tax the bike riders), etc that are all money wasters. Bussing can be added in there as well, time to charge people what it actually costs to run/maintain them...

Sadly once the gov't (state/local or fed) has a tax on a something it's never going away. Here in NOVA there is the Dulles Toll Road. Originally it was only supposed to be a toll in order to pay for the road itself and the inner lanes for transport to Dulles International Airport. That toll has never gone away and will never go away. If you take that to/from the Dulles Airport it's free but the toll road itself just went up again on Jan 19. It's now a $1.50 or a $1.75 each direction. I remember when it was $.50 about 15 years ago. The problem is people don't stop using it (me included as it cuts my commute to work by about 25+) minutes each way. With the most recent increase I've now modified my commute just a bit in order to not pay as much per day, but others won't do that.

In the last 18 months or so they changed HOV on 66 into DC so that price fluxes for non-HOV drivers based on number of cars on road and time of day. I know people, with more money than brains, who happily pay the $36+ for the morning commute into DC to save an hour on that commute. We're a sheep people.
 
It's all mute, there is enough oil and natural gas for 5 lifetimes. It's only going to get better with time. EV's are a make you feel good novelty. With normally aspirated gas engines getting more and more efficient and oil becoming more and more available.

But how efficient are they really? I am not well versed on the topic but I thought no one is even close to 40% in their best case scenario. Good fuel is wasted on these things in economic terms but it's worse because we also have to breathe all this junk.
 
I agree it needs to die, but not because of who it benefited but because I believe any item that needs to be propped up with a tax break is a failed venture. If somebody managed to lobby the government that their product should be exempt and not all the others as well then there has to be some back room deal we aren’t aware of. Those are never good for the little guy.

So you think all automobiles need to die... After all, it is one of the most subsidized consumer goods in the entire world.
 
This is stupid until the fund for highways is mandated to only be allowed to be used for highways. Not anything else, including toll roads or 'emergencies' or budget shortfalls. Until then, the bill wont solve the problem it pretends to say it will and instead just looks like a thinly veiled attack on non-ICE tech coming out of an oil rich producing state.

Even better would be a tax on the defense budget (since our highway system is primarily a matter of national security and was created to aid in the country's defense). This tax would be 5% of the defense budget allocation. That should fund the highways plenty, given the above issue also getting mandated.
 
I'm a huge proponent of alternative fuels, but the EV subsidy needs to die. It only benefits the wealthy, and hinders road maintenance. I'm all for creating an EV tax, anyone following EVs has known an EV tax would have to come eventually. I'm lucky to live in an area with cheap electricity, thanks to an abundance of natural gas and coal and huge solar potential. I can buy a CNG vehicle, which I plan to do next fiscal year as I begin to buy new fleet vehicles for my business . There are CNG stations all over the region my fleet drives. It's about aa two year break even point for me, definitely doesn't make sense for all, on vehicles that will be used for at least 5 to 10 years. That's 3 to 8 years of basically driving for free compared to petroleum. Our energy use needs a huge overhaul, with more options and alternatives available. EVs are part of those alternatives, but there's no reason they should be subsidized any more.

While we are at it, how about updating gas tax (accounting for about 20 years of inflation since the last update)? Oh, and extra tax to pay for negative effects of car emissions in cities on human health.
 
So you think all automobiles need to die... After all, it is one of the most subsidized consumer goods in the entire world.
Why is it subsidized? Why should it be? Are they non competitive products? Do they sell them at a loss? Are the manufacturers unable to build them in an affordable manner? What subsidies already exist on traditional motor vehicles that don’t for electric?

If you subsidize one you subsidize all or you can’t subsidize any, other wise it’s no longer a fair system and the market is inherently rigged, and in a rigged market the consumer is always the looser.
 
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So you think all automobiles need to die... After all, it is one of the most subsidized consumer goods in the entire world.
They would not die, they would get more expensive and actually have to compete on price/features/reliability/etc. Of course that only works if every country with an auto mfg eliminates subsidies and tax breaks. Since pretty much all of them give credits/subsidies as needed to prop up their own manufacturers, this is a moot point.
 
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Sadly once the gov't (state/local or fed) has a tax on a something it's never going away. Here in NOVA there is the Dulles Toll Road. Originally it was only supposed to be a toll in order to pay for the road itself and the inner lanes for transport to Dulles International Airport. That toll has never gone away and will never go away. If you take that to/from the Dulles Airport it's free but the toll road itself just went up again on Jan 19. It's now a $1.50 or a $1.75 each direction. I remember when it was $.50 about 15 years ago. The problem is people don't stop using it (me included as it cuts my commute to work by about 25+) minutes each way. With the most recent increase I've now modified my commute just a bit in order to not pay as much per day, but others won't do that.

In the last 18 months or so they changed HOV on 66 into DC so that price fluxes for non-HOV drivers based on number of cars on road and time of day. I know people, with more money than brains, who happily pay the $36+ for the morning commute into DC to save an hour on that commute. We're a sheep people.

Same thing with the bridges in the Bay Area. They uses to be 50 cent tolls 20 years ago, and was just supposed to pay off the cost of the bridges. They are now at $6 and will be $8 by 2023 I believe.
 
Why is it subsidized? Why should it be? Are they non competitive products? Do they sell them at a loss? Are the manufacturers unable to build them in an affordable manner? What subsidies already exist on traditional motor vehicles that don’t for electric?

If you subsidize one you subsidize all or you can’t subsidize any, other wise it’s no longer a fair system and the market is inherently rigged, and in a rigged market the consumer is always the looser.
Subsidies or incentives should be used intentionally to influence consumer behavior. For example, if we as a nation decide that we should make some attempt to slow global warming and Electric Vehicles are a way forward (<argument for if they are or not is not a focus of this reply>), then you'd want to put something in place to make manufacturers and consumers head that direction that the free market won't provide.
You have to watch how things are written to limit how much exploitation there is of initiatives, but the core idea of altering behavior that the free market is not facilitating shouldn't be dismissed as a useful tool.
 
I knew from the headline, this was the work of HardOCP's in-house leftist. Notice he has chosen to use the word "tax" in this instance, and not "subsidy" to the electric car industry, which more accurately describes what the credit was.

That's the headline of the actual article, and, have you been in the Soapbox? Your opinions would be highly valued there.
 
you can always propose wheat and corn cost as much as manufactured goods, then benefits and tax will be balanced out ....../s

Two of the most subsidized crops in America. Maybe if corn was priced accordingly there wouldn't be ethanol in my gas and HFCS in everything. Also wheat is propped up for export which is declining.
 
How about we get rid of the EV subsidies, and while we're at it, get rid of the $8+ billion annual oil subsidies, just to level the playing field.
 
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I am aware that the OP posted a news article that is basically politics, but the rules about politics outside soapbox still stand. If you can not discuss the subject without discussing politics do not post in this thread. There are no more warning after this post.
 
my 2018 ford focus get 42 mpg on non-ethenol fuel, I drive 30000 miles a year in a midwest climate, my POS puts out a measly 125 HP, there is no tax or credit I would take that would take away any HP I already have, the the amount of stupid I have to floor it to get around and leave behind trumps money I would have "saved" any day of the week, the comments previous are petty and useless, no use case yet has been stated where a EV actually was beneficial by carbon or monetary
 
Actually they've had to move onto other funding because gas taxes tend to be static. Want to raise the gas tax, expect to hear a howl no politician likes. This is like the fuel taxes for aircraft: they don't change very often because various interests howl. So what do they do next? They change it to tolls which is just a tax by another name, but then do everything plausible to make sure every other way (other than the tollway) is at least twice as slow, narrow, and twisty as f***. Another thing they do (and this is even more common) is keep raising the registration costs of vehicles.
They really need to do away with vehicle ownership translating to funding roadways. If you have 10 cars (you're a collector) why should you pay for 10 registrations that fund the roads? You're only going to drive one at a time. If you have 0 cars, why aren't you paying for funding the roads? If you take a bus, or consume ANYTHING that was 99.999999% probably brought to your city via a huge HEAVY semi truck & trailer that causes more damage to roads than thousands of cars, maybe 10s of thousands of cars, so yeah you're destroying the roads almost as much as someone driving a car, or mail/packages, or the big trucks that do electricity, phone, cable, water, etc all of them screw up the streets. Roads are vital infrastructure, they aren't luxuries, each area needs to set aside their own monies for dealing with their roads as they see fit rather than throwing it all into a big fund that gets redistributed in some weird formulaic way. Increase local taxes, well your'e getting a break on gas taxes, but I get it, the average person is too stupid to realize that and would simply see it as another tax, even if at most in a state like Taxifornia that would only translate to $300 or so per person.
 
The biggest problem with the subsidy is that it really only lets wealthier people (who could already afford the car) buy it for cheaper.


You are thinking too short term. It helps wealthier people get the car by encouraging them, but that also helps accelerate the market by having state governments put their fingers on the scale. Tesla sells its zero emissions credits to other automakers that rely more heavily on trucks and SUVs, and that helps to accelerate the transition to electric transportation, helps Tesla get the capital costs needed to build factories and eventually turn a profit. It starts with wealthier people, but we see the costs of electric cars with a certain range coming down and they will continue to reach lower and lower price points. If we did not encourage more electric car sales using the government to tilt the scales, it would take longer to get the transition going.

But now, I expect almost all vehicles sold to be fully electric within 2 decades. Every single one of you ICE holdouts, will bend your effing knee and love electrics because they are superior.

Every year battery chemistries improve, cheaper materials are sourced and honed to be able to be used in new cells. Capacity of the batteries rises. In 2020, Teslas roadster gen 2 is slated to have a range of up to 621 miles, in another 2 decades I'm pretty sure we'll see electric cars with battery packs that can easily top a thousand miles of range. So much for range anxiety.


Why NOT work to make the transition faster rather than slower? If it were up to me, I'd renew the tax credits, so that people with lower incomes that came later could still get the boost.
 
Describe, in detail, what precisely are the subsidies you claim are available to ICE powered cars? And to answer the rest of your rant, "Oh, it's got Green in the name, so it must be motivated by a desire to save the earth" rather than enrich certain companies that support the "correct" politicians. The US emits lower carbon emissions than it did 40 years ago, with a much smaller population. In the meantime, China, India, and the third world are rapidly increasing their emissions.

The net pollution that results from rare earths mining, the high level of loss in electric transmission, and the emission resulting from the only reliable source of power, ie, fossil fuels, do not add up to "green" anything. See Europe's 40 year self delusion regarding the environmental benefits of diesel fuel, and the incredible amount of additional expense forced on their populations, for what turned out to be far worse for the environment. Follow the money first, and not stupid slogans and shallow thinking.

You want to be green? Support modern, safe, nuclear power generation, like pebble reactors.


I do support pebble reactors, and continued research on fusion reactors, and solar and wind. I want it all, anything that is cleaner. But this notion that we ought not allow government to put a finger on the scales is just off. If we as a society decide that we want more of something or less of something, creating subsidies or costs via the state allows the creativity and ingenuity of the markets to adapt and come up with solutions. I was listening to a guy talking about the flaws of capitalism, but one of the benefits he mentioned was that capitalism has a sort of evolutionary aspect to it. Where in order to survive under stress, you often get mutations (new discoveries after research dollars are spent) to avoid and get around those constraints. And once we set the constraints, we can let companies figure out how to get their profits, in ways that are aligned with other things we prefer in society. Like say, less pollution.
 
You are thinking too short term. It helps wealthier people get the car by encouraging them, but that also helps accelerate the market by having state governments put their fingers on the scale. Tesla sells its zero emissions credits to other automakers that rely more heavily on trucks and SUVs, and that helps to accelerate the transition to electric transportation, helps Tesla get the capital costs needed to build factories and eventually turn a profit. It starts with wealthier people, but we see the costs of electric cars with a certain range coming down and they will continue to reach lower and lower price points. If we did not encourage more electric car sales using the government to tilt the scales, it would take longer to get the transition going.

But now, I expect almost all vehicles sold to be fully electric within 2 decades. Every single one of you ICE holdouts, will bend your effing knee and love electrics because they are superior.

Every year battery chemistries improve, cheaper materials are sourced and honed to be able to be used in new cells. Capacity of the batteries rises. In 2020, Teslas roadster gen 2 is slated to have a range of up to 621 miles, in another 2 decades I'm pretty sure we'll see electric cars with battery packs that can easily top a thousand miles of range. So much for range anxiety.


Why NOT work to make the transition faster rather than slower? If it were up to me, I'd renew the tax credits, so that people with lower incomes that came later could still get the boost.

I think you are overly optimistic on battery tech. Advances are made seemingly every few months, but so far I don't think any of them have demonstrated real world viability.

The Roadster can get its 600+ mile range because it has a profile that has both lower coefficient of drag and small cross-sectional area. It doesn't have much to do with improved battery capacities. Upcoming electric pickup trucks can get 300-400 mile ranges because they are using batteries that are twice the capacity of a Model S 100.

Unless we can get all manufacturers to get on board with standardized batteries for rapid swaps on long trips, battery tech will not be superior to ICE. Personally I would like to see biofuels take off. We have many naturally occurring renewable sources of methane, and methane burns extremely clean.
 
EV cars so far are the domain of the wealthy. Not sure how this helps the rich? Other than migrating the taxes to income taxes which the wealthy dodge and the burden drops to the Working Class.
 
I'd personally like it be based on vehicle weight. You drive a SUV or crossover then your registration costs more because these vehicles are heavier. This would hopefully encourage manufacturers to use lighter materials since vehicles have gotten heavier due to safety regulations.

But more importantly to tax fleet vehicles since their trucks are far more heavier and financially benefit more from other people paying road taxes. Especially with all the Uber and delivery trucks running around, which just eat up the roads more. It's expensive enough to drive a car, they don't need to go after regular people.


Tax by weight, not by fuel type.
Seems fair, although I would have a sliding scale for trucks, unless you want delivery costs (which impact all goods sold in America) to skyrocket.
 
Remove the tax from the gas and place it on the tires. Or on all vehicle sales right out the gate have the tax not based on vehicle cost but weight then it doesn’t matter what is fueling it.

This would likely kill the motorcycle industry which is already dying....
 
I think you are overly optimistic on battery tech. Advances are made seemingly every few months, but so far I don't think any of them have demonstrated real world viability.

The Roadster can get its 600+ mile range because it has a profile that has both lower coefficient of drag and small cross-sectional area. It doesn't have much to do with improved battery capacities. Upcoming electric pickup trucks can get 300-400 mile ranges because they are using batteries that are twice the capacity of a Model S 100.

Unless we can get all manufacturers to get on board with standardized batteries for rapid swaps on long trips, battery tech will not be superior to ICE. Personally I would like to see biofuels take off. We have many naturally occurring renewable sources of methane, and methane burns extremely clean.

The roadsters boost in range is mostly because it's supposed to have a battery pack that is 200kwh, most of that is likely due to eating the cost of cramming more batteries into a smaller area. With the higher sticker costs, certain options become more feasible economically. As for battery improvements, it's been listed to be around 5-8% a year now. That adds up over time.

https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-th...trend-if-any-regarding-energy-to-weight-ratio

Battery tech WILL completely replace ICE, and it will be faster than people realize. And eventually we'll start to see electric planes for shorter regional hops, and then eventually longer range flights.
 
The roadsters boost in range is mostly because it's supposed to have a battery pack that is 200kwh, most of that is likely due to eating the cost of cramming more batteries into a smaller area. With the higher sticker costs, certain options become more feasible economically. As for battery improvements, it's been listed to be around 5-8% a year now. That adds up over time.

https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-th...trend-if-any-regarding-energy-to-weight-ratio

Battery tech WILL completely replace ICE, and it will be faster than people realize. And eventually we'll start to see electric planes for shorter regional hops, and then eventually longer range flights.

600 mile range with a 200 kwh battery means the Roadster has some pretty bad aerodynamics. Where did all the extra drag come from, spoilers that make it able to drive upside down in a tunnel at speed?

Also, 3-6% year over year improvements is nowhere near enough to quickly replace ICEs, let alone replace ICE flight. Keep in mind that tech like this will eventually suffer the same demise as Moore's law, where improvements become much harder to make as the easy stuff is picked off. Just like CPUs, batteries will need a big revolution in design to break through the barriers that exist currently.
 
The biggest problem with the subsidy is that it really only lets wealthier people (who could already afford the car) buy it for cheaper.


Wait up, wasn't I reading awhile back how people were essentially buying Leaf's for almost nothing?

I forget the State or the City where this was happening.
 
I'm sure this makes sense to someone but the auto market isn't doing well and EV's are super over priced, much like the rest of the auto industry. Imposing a tax will likely hurt EV auto sales. They could just tax companies who abuse the roads with heavy trucks that literally tear up the roads and create pot holes. Especially SUVs where they typically weight 6,000 lbs and Americans have a hard on for SUVs and not cars lately.


Some issue here;

The first one, a single battery for an EV creates as much pollution as 5 years of ICE use on the road. Now I'm all for clean energy, but if the cure is worse than the problem I'll pass.

I get that the subsidies were intended to use tax payer funding to drive EV development and adoption. But if the plan worked, and there are certainly a lot of EVs out there today, then maybe the plan worked and it's time to cut that incentive, mission accomplished, good job.

And there is nothing wrong with asking EV owners to help foot the bill for roadway upkeep is there?

BTW: I am looking up that first comment myself to see if I am off the reservation or not, a friend gave that to me, I need to allow that he might be mistaken.

2 angles on this;

1st https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017...lectric-cars-carbon-sustainable-power-energy/

2nd https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/electric-cars-are-not-necessarily-clean/


If you ask me, this technology is simply not there yet. We are rushing to adopt a technology on a global scale that is simple not currently better, and in fact, will likely cause more harm than good.
 
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