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If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

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Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#91
post #11

Having recently shopped for an EV, I did find that there are a lot more options in the US if you’re looking for larger vehicles. It’s a shame because many smaller models exist abroad, they just don’t want to bring them here (e.g. the VW ID.3). What’s also funny is in many parts of Europe, their idea of a “small” car seems to be very different from ours. I’ve heard people there classify cars like the Honda CRV or the…

I own an ID.4 and live in the US. In my opinion, the ID.4 is enormous and handles like a barge. For perspective, I used to drive a Corolla as my commuting car. In hindsight, I kinda wish I would’ve just waited for a current-year Nissan Leaf to be in stock. But, I had burned out on looking for Leafs between dealerships blatantly lying to me and trying to sell me 5+ year old Leafs for roughly the MSRP of a brand new one.

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#93
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government, at best, and excluding any other criticisms, is a middle man. At the very least, it absorbs money and decreases efficiency. 1) Government taxation model. Tax payer X makes $100. The government takes $40 (excluding for now the additional taxation on every purchase, sale, savings, etc). The government spends $20 of that just to fund itself. The government spends the other $20 on whatever. X has $60, and…

Yep, totally agree that government is both expensive and wasteful. Absolutely no disagreement there. Let’s say we do away with government and regulating companies then, in the interests of efficiency and liberty. What’s the state of play a few years into that experiment, do you reckon?

Perhaps just free markets, and individuals determining how those markets go. Individuals funding local community assets as they see fit.

Perhaps a cartel like situation such as the Hanseatic League.

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#94

Strange they skipped the step of 1) taxing cars which cause more injuries per mile, 2) taxing resources (including externality cost) so that if you use more, you pay more. Instead they are taxing a pretty bad proxy for those actual policy goals. i.e. this incentivizes companies to reduce weight rather than add safety measures, and to use light materials regardless of if they cause more environmental damage. Hypotheti…

In the early 70s, insurance companies were able to severely curtail the power levels of cars coming out of Detroit by pricing in the actual risk. If a car causes lots of injuries, then that needs to be priced into the insurance. Eventually, that won’t be a car you can buy.

[dead]

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who is being hurt? Deadly machines? This is a very unpleasant curmudgeonly take. The context of this discussion is regarding road use and wear and tear.

Have you taken a look at the road fatalities in the US recently. People are quite literally being killed at an increasing rate. And these oversized cars are directly more deadly. You might not care about putting lives over appearances. But others do.

I notice that you submitted a link to encourage deflating the tires of large vehicles.

> Our aim is to make it impossible to own a huge polluting 4x4 in the world’s urban areas. To do that, we need people everywhere deflating 4x4 tyres, week-in, week-out.

absolutely unhinged activities.

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#96
post #4

Agreed, all road taxes should be based on weight and miles driven. Make sure that it is non-linear, since road damage and weight aren't linear. And make sure that it affects fuel delivery trucks in the same way that it affects other heavy vehicles. Anything else would be plainly unfair.

Here in Norway we do have a weight tax. It's linear for normal cars[1] and paid once, for heavier vehicles it's yearly and quite non-linear[2]. edit: doing a quick fit, it seems to just be quadratic with weight though, while damage goes more like the fourth power as noted in sibling comment. As for miles driven, AFAIK there's nothing direct non-linear there, just some duty and taxes on the fuel. [1]: https://www.skat…

Is weight tax the same of different for electric and internal combustion cars?

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#97
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the truckers will all go bankrupt I still think the alternative to pay per weight*distance is good - trucks should be last-mile delivery, not the primary source of transportation for goods in North America. Cargo trains are much better in many different dimensions, even more-so if they're electrified (Though, that's an impossibility in this market)

Tell me you've never worked in logistics without telling me you've never worked in logistics.

We put a lot of effort into not using rail for freight, it stands to reason that if we actually set our minds to it we could start using it more again.

(At least, I think that the argument you’re making is about modern logistics and modern rail freight being surprisingly incompatible. But it’s hard to tell since you haven’t actually provided a rebuttal.)

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#98
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America has income taxes, sales taxes, gasoline taxes, property taxes, corporate taxes, I could go on. And clearly taxes that fund roads are soon going to need to be completely revised, since they can't all come from gas anymore. Whatever the gas tax is replaced/supplemented with, I would be surprised if it doesn't take into account vehicle weight, since the whole point is to fund road maintenance. And remember that…

I would just like to mention for the non-Americans here that "America has tax" is a gross and possibly useless oversimplification. There are federal taxes, which generally will be levied uniformly across the country. There are state, county, and municipal taxes, of which the rates will all vary as well as whether any specific tax is levied at all (eg: Oregon has no sales tax). Certain taxes will be levied by multiple…

In USA, income taxes are not apportioned uniformly. Sales tax, property tax, and most everything else is applied uniformly based on price. I still can't believe there was a civil war about slavery, yet the government takes my work product as if I am their slave.

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#99
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except the additional cost via health care either publicly or private via insurance premiums. Two wheel motorcycles today as they stand should be outlawed.

And so should bicycles too. The per-mile injury rate, the stat used when comparing a given journey, for bicycles is several times higher than that of motorcycles. And skateboards... they are per-mile death traps. Rollerblades are likely more dangerous per-mile than driving drunk while smoking. If you have to cover a given distance, the safest is not always the slowest. Often the faster means limits risk exposure and…

The skateboarding and roller blade trips are quite short though, no?

Injuries per minute or per hour seems like a more apt unit to compare

Re: If You Want a Car This Heavy, You Should Pay Through the Nose

#100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, totally agree that government is both expensive and wasteful. Absolutely no disagreement there. Let’s say we do away with government and regulating companies then, in the interests of efficiency and liberty. What’s the state of play a few years into that experiment, do you reckon?

I live in a town where the "roads" are private property and everyone has an easement to travel on everyone else's piece of what look like roads. Most of town budget goes to "road maintenance". Everyone understands their role, roads are maintained, and if government misbehaves we will chop our taxes and do the roads ourselves. By not owning the "road" property, government is kept in check and are our servants. There a…

Love it - an excellent solution for a local problem. Sounds far more optimal for you guys than having government involvement.

I consider that fine evidence that we over-regulate in some areas. I reckon there’s also a lot of evidence that we under-regulate in others. By contrast, I don’t think it’s evidence for a general proposition that any reduction in regulation is a priori a good thing - despite what the Murdoch press would say.

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