anyone else looking forward to the influx of new users?

[Vwbeamer]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Schemes like paying wealthy people to purchase EVs are braindead. Only corrupt or ignorant people would pursue such a dumb idea. It lacks any specific goals, so you know it's nonsense.

.

I agree, only the upper middle class can afford EVs and take advantage of the tax credit, but it funds the R&R of EVs.

Where I live in Mid Georgia, 9 out of 10 vehicles are trucks....including mine.
These Vehicles are going to around for a long time, even if production stopped today. There is going be massive interest in increasing the economy of these trucks.

I'm generally against taxes and favor free markets. But I wouldn't be opposed to a increase in fuel taxes and a tax on tires.

I'd rather have a tax on tires than Government tracking me to see how many miles I drive. This would allow them to tax EV drivers for road repair.

[oil pan 4]

Not really.
HHO generator scams, vortex generators, gas pills, run your car on water scams.

Tractor trailers cause almost all the vehicle related damage to the highways. Slapping additional taxes on motorists isn't going to make the roads better. If I thought paying more taxes would result in more or better services, I would. Doing so would be doing the same thing and expecting a different result. If you give the government more money it appears to fuel fraud, wast, abuse, lavish salaries, encourage insolvent retirement programs, bloats the bureaucracy upper ranks making them top heavy, then to justify their existence these people who don't appear to do any work just sit around dream up more/new red tape, which leads to government over reach and a system so convoluted it takes years to accomplish anything and it gets to the point where no one in the department can explain how any of it works.

[rmay635703]

Roads being a public good should be funded out of general funds to force accountability, and indeed 90% of road funding is not from registration fees or gas tax
as long as a special road registration tax exists it can be used as an excuse to avoid budgeting appropriately and avoid liability for choosing not to devote money to roads.
If road taxes and registration did not exist you could vote out legislators who choose to budget other things over roads or have a conversation about what is getting the overall tax money.



A used BEV can be had for $2000 on up
But who is going to pay a $665 title+registration on a $2000 car that can’t drive more than 50 miles at a time in good weather?
Would be similar to saying a moped instead of paying a biannual fee of $23 should instead pay $665 because it gets too good of mpgs

In Wisconsin there WERE people who bought the $2000 BEVs before the taxes kicked in, they disposed of them after the tax took effect

Instead of subsidizing the purchase price just get rid of the extra taxes on the car and some people will buy the old limited BEVs
If we want to tax BEVs we should be looking at luxury taxes (not road tax) if we are indeed worried about evs over a certain price point not paying their fair share (whatever that is)

You would likely find that in many areas very few have paid for an expensive bev.
There are only 3500 BEVs out of millions of cars in my state, seems irrelevant to road funding.

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by Vwbeamer

I agree, only the upper middle class can afford EVs and take advantage of the tax credit, but it funds the R&R of EVs.

Where I live in Mid Georgia, 9 out of 10 vehicles are trucks....including mine.
These Vehicles are going to around for a long time, even if production stopped today. There is going be massive interest in increasing the economy of these trucks.

I'm generally against taxes and favor free markets. But I wouldn't be opposed to a increase in fuel taxes and a tax on tires.

I'd rather have a tax on tires than Government tracking me to see how many miles I drive. This would allow them to tax EV drivers for road repair.

The tax credit ultimately allows the manufacturer to increase the sales price and pocket the profit (or lose less profit to meet emissions regulations by selling EVs). We saw the price massively reduced for both Tesla and GM EVs once they lost the federal tax eligibility. In fact, the Bolt can be had now for quite a bit less without any subsidy (~$24k) than before when the subsidy was in place.

I'm for taxation when a specific anti-social behavior needs to be curtailed, or when crucial services are required and best handled at the governmental level rather than privately.

If a heavy tax on tires were levied, people would run their tires to the steel belts, wheel theft would increase, and harder compounds that compromise handling performance would be preferred. Taxing tires is another one of those "schemes" I keep talking about where people try to be too smart by taxing at the micro level (specific products) rather than at a high level (income or sales tax).

As pointed out below, the correct way to fund infrastructure is from the general fund, because it's crucial and everyone depends on it.

Originally Posted by rmay635703

There are only 3500 BEVs out of millions of cars in my state, seems irrelevant to road funding.

It cost more to dream up an extra fee, implement, and administer it for so few BEVs than they will ever recover.

[oil pan 4]

I'm glad new mexico isn't as sophisticated as some of those high tax states.
If they implement an absorbent EV tax I'll sell the leaf and get a diesel gate VW that hasn't been "fixed" and then modify the fuel system to roal coal on demand.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Vwbeamer

I agree, only the upper middle class can afford EVs and take advantage of the tax credit, but it funds the R&R of EVs.

Not all EVs are $50,000 - $100,000

Last month the 260 mile Bolt EV was $26,000 with 0% financing for 72 months.
Hyundai Ioniq EV for $33,250 - $7500 credit = $25,750.
Nissan Leaf $32,700 - $7500 = $25,200.
The Mini EV for $30,000 - $7500 = $22,500.

Add in state and utility incentives and some EVs drop below $20K.

Plug in hybrids are another option with some reasonable prices:

Ford Escape PHEV $32,650 - $4840 = $25,810.
Prius Prime: $28,200 - $4500 = $23,700.
Ioniq PHEV: $26,700 - $4500 = $22,200

Originally Posted by Vwbeamer

I'd rather have a tax on tires than Government tracking me to see how many miles I drive. This would allow them to tax EV drivers for road repair.

The US vehicle fleet averaged 24.9 mpg in 2019. Say a set of tires last 50,000 miles

50,000 / 24.9 mpg = 2008 gallons of fuel x $0.184 federal fuel tax = $369 in fuel taxes. That is how much tire tax would need to be added to a set of tires

I can see that big of a lump sum payment being popular. It would be even less popular if you got a non-repairable flat the week after you got a new tire and had to pay another $92 in tire taxes.

The federal government would not need to track location to collect a fee per mile tax. We have the option of a fee per mile in Oregon. One way does track location and only bills for miles driven in the State of Oregon on public roads. The other doesn't track location and only reports miles driven base on the car's OBDII data.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

If a heavy tax on tires were levied, people would run their tires to the steel belts, wheel theft would increase, and harder compounds that compromise handling performance would be preferred. Taxing tires is another one of those "schemes" I keep talking about where people try to be too smart by taxing at the micro level (specific products) rather than at a high level (income or sales tax).

True. My mother-in-law bought some off-brand tires with a 100K mile warranty. Hardest compound tire I've ever seen and they were dangerous when new. Driving on wet roads was like driving on snow.

Originally Posted by redpoint5

As pointed out below, the correct way to fund infrastructure is from the general fund, because it's crucial and everyone depends on it.

That's the correct way to fund everything.

[redpoint5]

Good to see the Ioniq prices coming down to reality. It was way overpriced for the battery size offered, and still is to some degree. On the Bolt forum people are getting a new 260 mile range EV for low $20s.

Somewhere around the $20k point I'm tempted to get my first new vehicle. I'm holding out to see what will happen to used Bolt prices once the 6+ months of pent up inventory is released (stop sale ended).

[JSH]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Good to see the Ioniq prices coming down to reality. It was way overpriced for the battery size offered, and still is to some degree. On the Bolt forum people are getting a new 260 mile range EV for low $20s.

Somewhere around the $20k point I'm tempted to get my first new vehicle. I'm holding out to see what will happen to used Bolt prices once the 6+ months of pent up inventory is released (stop sale ended).

This month's GM offer is $10,500 cash back. Add in the $2500 Oregon rebate and you are at $23,000. No other Oregon or local rebates that I know of. (The $3000 Costco discount expired last month)

For some reason PGE only does rebates on the Leaf. I've seen them kick in up to $3500

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by Vwbeamer

I think this will drive traffic to this forum, I'm kinda looking forward to it.

I'll be kind of surprised if it happens.

We've seen two major influxes of new members when gas prices spiked significantly in 2008 and then again in 2011/12.

Going strictly by "hits", EM peaked in 2012. Hits declined pretty steeply each year since then, leveling off in the past few years at roughly 1/6th of 2012 numbers.

But things have changed quite a bit since 2008-2012.

1) The biggest change: the average vehicle's fuel economy today is A LOT better than it was back then.

2) And back then there were no mass market EV's. (Never mind cheap, used EV's!) And far fewer hybrid options. (Never mind cheap used ones!)

3) Also: forums as community/info platforms have been declining for years. People would much rather peck at their phones on InstaFaceTokApp than create a forum account and interact with a website. (We had a member join MirageForum last week who said he was seriously surprised to find an active "old school forum" for the car!)

4) Also also: the usual correlation between gas prices & forum traffic seems to have broken. Despite the sharp rise in gas prices from the lows of 2019 there hasn't been a corresponding increase in membership or visitors lately. (OK, that may be because prices haven't hit psychologically important numbers yet.)

All that said, I'll be genuinely surprised if we see a meaningful up-tick this time. Sure, we'll get a few noobs, and that'll be fun. The place definitely takes on a different vibe when it's not just the hardcore been-there-done-that efficiency nuts hanging around.