Oregon governor looking at GPS-based mileage tax to fund roads
By Donald Melanson 
posted Dec 31st 2008 4:03PM
posted Dec 31st 2008 4:03PM
Electric cars and other fuel-efficient vehicles certainly have plenty going for them, but all that reduction in fuel consumption also has the side effect of reducing the money earned from gas taxes, which has prompted folks like Oregon governor Ted Kulongoski to turn to some alternative solutions to keep those funds rolling in. In the case of Oregon, Governor Kulongoski is proposing a mileage tax that would eventually replace the gas tax altogether, and make use of GPS units to determine just how far each person travels and bill them accordingly (Oregon is proposing a 1.2 cent per mile tax). To assuage privacy concerns, that information would apparently only be collected when the driver fuels up, and actual travel information supposedly wouldn't be tracked. Obviously, that system would only work if everyone had a GPS, so the governor is proposing an increase in the standard gas tax in the interim, with drivers already equipped with a GPS unit eligible for a refund on the taxes paid. All of this also still has to pass the Oregon legislature to become law, but it certainly wouldn't be the first time that the state broke with convention.
It's a good thing that Oregon can't just have auto inspectors read the odometer.
Dude, you just shut down any potential for me getting hired by these clowns. That was idea. Damn ... lol ...
Not high-tech enuf.
Right, that makes sense because noone ever accumulates miles on their car outside of their own state.
Then there would be a better reason t get your clock turned back.
C'mon Boarderwoot, it's the matching "PRINCIPLE" of taxation, not the matching stalk-your-ass-so-it-can-be-a-hard-and-fast-rule of taxation. No, no.
yes, but then people would get taxed for miles they might have driven out of state, not on oregon roads.
The real problem with this is you are execting all Oregon citizens not only to own a GPS, but actually know how to operate it to track mileage. good luck with that.
gas tax does the same thing. when i go to MA, they dont check my odometer at the border to see how many miles i drove in their state and then charge me a tax. i pay the tax through gas, which ends up going usually to my state, NH. but for ever person like me who drives in MA w/o paying tax, theres someone who drives in NH w/o them paying tax to my state. besides, lets be realistic, hardly any of the gas tax goes towards paying for road repairs. for most states, infrastructure is the first place they pull money from, especially in the northeast. come up some time, we have terrible roads.
If a car is registered in Oregon it pays Oregon mileage tax. Makes sense to use the odometer to me. In some states you pay a "property tax" on any vehicle that resides in that state no matter where you drive it mostly. Same thing, pretty much.
[and if one used a GPS I can see a GREAT market for Foil Beenies:
The point is not tracking mileage, the point is to track you. Imagine the endless possibilities of the government knowing everywhere you've been, when you were there and how fast you were driving? Don't think for a moment this is private data, all it takes is a court order from a judge to get your info.
Infact, every year when they review the data they could just mail you tickets by cross referencing your speed with where you were to the speed limit on that road, sweet!
@jason,
Principle or not, if I live on the border of my state and do all my driving in the state next door why should i pay tax to my home state where i hardly use the roads especially if the neighboring state has lower taxes? In oregan the tax currently is $0.25/gallon with a 30mpg car thats .83 cents per mile in which case they'd be getting taxed more with this new system. In Illinois with the second highest gas tax at almost 40 cents a gallon its about 1.3 cents a mile. So infact, he's suggesting to tax you one of the highest in the country orver what they currently pay. If I want a product (which you can relate to a product as "miles driven") in another state and the tax is cheeper, why not go to the other state if it's within reason? Does it make sense for me to get penalized for making a more economic decision? Why do you think people buy all their shit online? (and yes I realize that when you buy a car you pay tax in the county that you live in regaurdless of where you buy your car but that's pretty much the only istance.)
No Boarderwoot, it makes no more sense than the alternative where out of state truck drivers will pay nothing while you pay increasingly more to cover the damage they do.
Except that sheer simplicity makes it WAY more economical to implement.
I think most truckers drive through a state on the highway which most use federal money to pay for.
I like the breakdown per gallon/mile somebody posted. What's the cost of implementing GPS, and the tech to read all those? That's the real question. I think the plan is somebody's wet dream to get tracking in every car.... then law enforcement, etc will justify the other things.. speeding tickets and police tracking..
Why not do what most states do, raise the tax, then rebate high volume users like truckers part of the money so they don't go under. Frankly, after Gas went to $3.50+ another $0.25 cents tax wouldn't even be noticed but would go a long way to balancing budgets. He is right though that the states have to get money not based on gasoline. It would make transition to electric and ethonol easier because energy providers wouldn't have to pay the tax up front... the main thing the bio-diesel crowd gets in trouble for. No matter what you drove, you'd all pay the same tax per mile.. does seem fair. Also the $3 gas really did curb consumer driving to the tune of 20%. As the state rebates truck drivers part of their gas tax, that means a larger chunk comes from consumers which means more than 20% of this years gas tax money went way and isn't there to pay for roads right now.
Chris, even for interstates, the federal funds are assistive, nowhere exhaustive.
So under the proposed plan, if you have a car that gets excellent mileage, you shouldn't use the GPS plan and should instead pay the flat gas tax, since you'll be getting more miles per gallon. If you have a poor mileage car, you should use the GPS plan to avoid being over taxed by the flat rate plan. This assumes you already have a GPS or would buy one regardless of savings from the tax, as the $100 cost of the GPS would almost inevitably be greater than the difference between the two plans.
Except ONE of the reasons to go electric (minor yet but not irrelevant) is I DO NOT WANT TO PAY THEM the tax.
Over my dead body will I put a GPS tracker in my car. Take the "tax" revenue lost out of the money you save in the GREEN programs since I am now creating LESS pollution.
1.2 cents a fraking mile !!! I drive 40+ thousand miles a year !! thats over $400 a freaking year. SCREW THAT.
THEY DO NOT HAVE A RIGHT TO TAXES WHEN ARE PEOPLE GOING TO REALIZE THIS AND PUT A STOP TO THIS KIND OF NONSENSE !!!!!
@Chris
No right to tax? At all? I think you've misunderstood something! With NO taxes, who's gonna pay for the roads you drive on??? And everything else? Taxes do A LOT of good. Income tax to pay the Federal Reserve on the other hand is something completely different.
However I do agree that this is completely idiotic and probably somthing dreamt up by Gas-companies to negate any possible savings on alternative fuels. That everyone could be constantly tracked even without RFIDs is just an extra incentive for the Government... Very true though!
which would be about a billion times more practical than making everyone get a GPS unit installed in their car.
I think the problem with your idea is that it actually makes sense. It depends upon actual logic instead of high technology to solve the problem.
This asswipes politicians are always thinking of ways on how to take more and more out of our miserable salaries, while giving themselves unchallenged raises all the time with full medical coverage "fo' life."
Anyway, if they really want to go with this, the best, and cheapest way to do it is ... wait I need a job. If they want to find out, they should offer me a 6 figures salary first.
Perhaps you should have worked harder during school? A gas tax/road tax w/e you call it is a great idea. It will help fund Mass Transit and push hydrogen technology development. Hybrids and Electrics are just stop gaps, we need hydrogen! Also the money can be used to fund Mag-Lev trains and bullet trains which the rest of the world has! And america was supposed to be no. 1 right?
Fatima, although in theory everything looks good. But, we all know that government is great at coming up with ways to pull more and more money out of pockets via taxation. But, they never do anything of what they promised in order to get such measured passed. The reason we have problems is because govt's do nothing but tax us more, while giving us less back for our money. No thank you.
They need to find ways to do more with what they're already extorting from us. We're not Europe. If they like being taxed through their noses, that's their problem.
Mass transit has enough problems in Oregon already. The problem is finding the space to actually have a train. Currently the MAX is limited to 1 car because it takes such hard turns it can't have more then one car. Also there have been HUGE safety problems with the MAX and it has been left up to concerned citizens to ride the train at night to help people feel comfortable. Course these problems require thought and the decisions are difficult. It is far easier to come up with an annoying tax system related to driving, ask former Gov. Gray Davis how that worked out for him.
The key factor for a gas tax should be to reduce congestion and convince people to take mass transit. So with the money from gas tax u can build up the mass transit so people can actually use it. Off course you can't tax the people who are in rural areas and the poor so the tax structure would have to be carefully implemented
What a great idea, imagine this conversation:
Taxpayer: "I got mailed a fine, because my state provided GPS wasn't working"
Bureaucrat: "You'll have to pay the fine, and recurring fines, until you get the unit fixed"
Taxpayer: "But how I am supposed to know the GPS isn't working?"
Bureaucrat:"You'll have to pay the fine, and recurring fines, until you get the unit fixed"
So idiotic an idea, they don't even do it in Massachusetts! Good job Gov!
@subgenius: I'm not sure what you are talking about, Max trains are at least 2 (big) cars long. They are rarely ever full, so adding more cars isn't something they would want to do if they could.
@Rob: How exactly do you propose to pay for the road systems if not through taxes on people that drive on the roads? Bridge repairs? Road expansions? Onramps and offramps? All of those million dollar road projects that go towards our simply amazingly effective road system were designed by the "asswipe politicians" who like to do nothing more than take your paycheck or whatever it is you were going on about.
Dean, I understand that roads repair and construction is financed, at least is the claim, from gas tax. My problem is that more often than not, politicians are always looking for more "creative" ways to tax us. Seldom are they ever looking for ways to do more with what we're already giving them. Just do your math and you'd realized that we're taxed on every single thing in our lives. There's a tax for everything. And, to add insult to injury, they're always coming up with more ways to tax us even more while giving themselves raises that never go through public approval. That's my problem.
@Fatima -
Maybe YOU should have worked harder in school - hydrogen is so light, it floats away into space after hanging around in the atmosphere. Using hydrogen as our primary energy source could feasibly exhaust not only our supply of hydrogen, but water too. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, it's just not the end all be all of solutions (it seems to me)
FATIMA that is Terrorist talk, don't ever question USA and Apple!
This is a great step in the right direction. It will require legislation like this to transition the US to electric vehicles.
Please enlighten us on how exactly this will speed the transition to electric vehicles? Lets say on Jan 1, this tax goes into affect. On Jan 2 magically all cars in oregon morph into electrics. Do you honestly believe on Jan 3 the tax would be revoked? Are you really that naive? This is only great if you are down with orwellian government.
What a wonderful step in the right direction.
Instead of signing a piece of paper tomorrow that says "raise the gas tax 2 cents", Oregon can make everyone install GPS systems (over the next few years) in every single car that is registered there, at a cost of hundreds of dollars.
Then Oregon can train the Inspection Guys to read those GPS systems and note the mileage, then you can pay your gas tax all at once, instead of over time, which people might be able to afford. Oh, don't forget to pay your licensing and registration fees at the same time, too.
Then when those GPS systems fail, you can take it to a state-run facility to get it fixed or get a new one, even though your car is just fine, you can take a day off work, wait in line at what is likely to be some branch of the DMV, etc....
But yeah, it's a great first step.
How about, make an electric vehicle that costs the same as a gas-powered one, has decent range, and doesn't look like a Prius?
How? It will actually benefit people who use more gas and penalize people who don't use gas.
Also, you could just register your car in a different state.
Let's put this in simple terms...
Gas vehicles use gas. The goverment taxes gas. The government likes vehicles that use gas because they get money from them. The government likes auto companies to make gas cars so they can get more money.
This new tax is a way for the government to fairly tax electric cars. They will now get money from electric cars, just like they get money from gas cars now. The goverment likes to get money, so they will like auto companies making electric cars. Thus, we will eventually drive electric cars.
It is definitely not a quick fix. Good things take time.
Well, the thing is--electric cars are more expensive to buy. So if you're going to get taxed for driving an electric car just as you are for driving a gas car, that's one less incentive to make the switch. If the government is serious about wanting to protect the environment, this is not a step in the right direction. Why should people who drive more be taxed more? If they're driving gas vehicles, it makes sense--it discourages them from polluting. But if they're driving electric cars? It just seems like you're trying to apply an old taxation where it no longer makes sense.
@spencer
yes but the government already taxes electricity and will tax any other viable fuel source that comes along. they dont need such a complex system as expensive gpses to do it.
this is a TERRIBLE potential piece of legislation. the whole idea is invasive and will only serve to fill the pockets of government officials in general. There are other answers to this transition problem and the answer is not to tax the consumer more. That is absurd.
I agree with the statement about the gps use. That does seem a little to extravagant. There may be a better way. I am just happy to see the government take one more step to adopting vehicles powered by something other that gasoline.
I know a guy who had a Kulongoskipi once... They went in and cleaned out his kulon.
Personally I think this is a rather expensive task... And all you would have to do to avoid the tax is disable the GPS.
Nah, since it would be hidden and embedded, it's probably just easier to jam the GPS signal.
just a bit Orwellian....
Agreed.
Sounds just like this:
http://www.roaduserstudy.org/faq.aspx
what would his sexuality have to do with this? or are you just being a homophobe?
Can't you just us your odometer instead of GPS to track miles?
So what they're doing is punishing drivers of economical cars and rewarding drivers of gas guzzling SUVs? What a crock.
By taking the number of gallons purchased out of the equation, they're creating a system where everybody pays the same amount per mile regardless of gas usage. If their goal is to replace the old gas tax with an equal amount of income from the mileage tax, that means gas guzzlers are going to be paying less than they were and hybrid drivers are going to be paying more than they were.
Thanks for nothing, Oregon.
Ding Ding Ding Ding.....we have a winner!!!!!!
talk about short sighted legislation
That is the point dumbass. The problem is that our road system is based on gas taxes. If the masses continually use more efficient vehicles, the government gets less and less money to maintain roads.
This tax is to eliminate that discrepancy and to allow all users to pay for how much they use the road.
The problem? Well, you can just register your car in a different state.
Except, dumbass, that the lower consumption vehicles are also much lighter and cause significantly less damage to road surfaces.
Now the out of state, double-trailer truckdrivers just passing through from CA to WA all day long will be paying NOTHING for the damage they do to the roads. That's the point.
What are people with Vespas and motorcycles supposed to do? It's kind of hard to tack a government-required GPS unit onto the handlebars.
Either this plan has not been thought out or there are ulterior motives.
what can i say, another dumbass politician with shit for brains. this is must be really appealing in such a great economy too. that and spying on people isnt nice, you freakin meathead...ski! how about firing this idiot and using his 7 figure salary to fund the road repairs.
Al,
I'm glad that there a still a few sane people on earth. (Richard adds Al to the sane list)
+1
What's next? Government issued pedomiters to charge people by the step?
A FLASHDANCE tax!! THAT'S actually a great idea!
you sir are what is wrong in this world. you are the reason some of my best friends still fear coming out to anyone but their closest friends.
So this way they can track you no matter what you do?? yeahhhh right i will pass
"yeahhhh right i will pass"
Well son, that there is ANOTHER tax for the using the passing lane and adding to the wear-n-tear on that lane too...
The gas tax is already a joke. They act like all gas used goes into moving vehicles. They didnt account for all the chain saws, gas mowers, generators..etc but they collected on it all
Now this GPS thing is already flawed. You would be taxed when driving on private, commercial and logging roads which the state dept of trans doesnt manage, own or repair.
So Oregon doesn't do the dyed fuel thing for non-road use? That sucks.
Okay then, what's your proposal to fixing the road infrastructure (which this gas tax goes to)? And don't say privatization, because then you just lose accountability instantly when companies take over roads.
I wonder if there's a way to calculate distance traveled without pinpointing location - say using less sats and a fixed reference. Not sure.
@richard proud queer here, telling you to go to hell.
Wouldn't it be easier just to tax tires, since they wear down as you use them... presumably on roads?
Prius---Hummer --pay the same gas tax--makes sence to me---not
Actually, yes. See, then the driver of the Hummer, which uses more gas per mile and also does more road damage per mile will be paying more, and the prius, which uses less and costs less in road repair would pay less. That's the idea behind the matching principle of taxation.
What seems more logical:
An advanced GPS tracking system a fuel/odometer combo tax?
This GPS based system sounds so ridiculous that I wonder why they would even propose such an idea. That is, unless this was just to get the system implemented. "A tax system for heavy driving usage" is probably one of the few concepts where people might actually consider having such a "big brother" system installed.
Final Note: Doesn't this seem like it's penalizing rural drivers over city drivers? My father has a 1.5 hour commute per day, I have a two hour commute per day. He drives 50 miles round trip, I drive 16.
I see WAY too many flaws with this system.
This from the state where it's illegal to pump your own gas.
Did you hear, There gona start charging us for the amount of music we listen to next.
Politicians need to have a toilet permanently attached to their mouths so it can catch all the shit that constantly comes out.
@thatguy
And we have a WINNER!
TAX Collector: "Ah sir, are you sure this is your cars GPS Unit? No your son's bike?"
as someone who drives less than 1,200 miles per year, i love this idea.
also, are you insurance companies listening?
Ever heard of progressive?
Better idea is to have an odometer-like gauge for the pure electric cars that tracks some sort of electrical abstract and have a state-licensed inspector read it and base the tax on that (maybe at inspection), then pay when you renew the registration. It's not instant but its much more reliable. Hybrids would have to pay a little extra something based on mileage differences at registration, and regular gas cars just keep paying the gas tax. You wouldn't need to raise the gas tax either as you are already compensating for the lesser gas consumption from the hybrid registration mileage, and the electrics' meter.
This model would have to be modified/tweaked as more electrics and hybrids get on the road and less gas-only vehicles are around, so it can't/won't stay this way for long. But this would be more fair.
Also, electrics and hybrids aren't all that light... they're still around the same weight as their non-hybrid siblings. Look at the Civic or Camry and compare the hybrid options with their non-hybrid models. Or any other model car for that. 200lbs lighter does not make a car 'light'.
Hmmm.... Perhaps instead of raising taxes on fuel and driving to fund road repairs, ODOT and the State Legeslature should stop wasting funds on overpriced and unfairly bid new construction projects in parts of the state that see little use, and instead use it to fix the roads and bridges that already exist and see heavy use...
yeah right... like that would happen in ANY state...
It's feasible. But, amongst other issues, interstate commerce and travel issues would need to be worked out.
If I drive to Oregon then, while I'd be using its roads, I would be paying nothing to the state government for the wear-and-tear my car is causing their roads. If I am an interstate trucker, that becomes an even larger amount of wear-and-tear because the 18-wheeler is going to do more damage to the roads than the Saturn is.
If, on the other hand, I'm an Oregonian who drives to other states on a regular basis then it's especially hard on me because I am being taxed for miles I drove outside of Oregon and, most likely, was taxed for at the gas pump in those other states.
As was said earlier: It's a bit Orwellian and it puts an undue burden on Oregonians themselves. Seeing as how Oregon has a large tourism industry it seems to me that a gas tax is the only thing that makes sense - the GPS idea doesn't hold water.
There is a reason this never took off over in the UK. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GPSHacking/
So are they gonna start taxing my chainsaw now that they won't tax the gas itself? This is a dumb idea, as gas is used in more than vehicles...
glad I don't live in oregon
What a crock! There are other alternatives to making up for the reduction in gas comsumption such as, increase in pay tolls, etc. I know that the government can already track every movement I am making, but this is just taking it too far.
Hmm..I agree Alex, that is a nice crock you have there.
A democrat looking to tax people to death.......shocking!!!
There are times I'm proud to be from Oregon (no sales tax, beautiful scenery), and times when I'm not ("man" gives birth). This would definitely fall in the latter category. Such an idiotic idea, it's scary to think that someone not only came up with that, but then elected to present it to the public. I hope it fails in grand fashion.
I was listening to KIRO interview one of the drafters of this piece of legislation explain the usage of this device. The device will only have the ability to know if it is in Oregon's boundaries or out of the boundary. When "in", the odometer racks up the taxable mileage on the car for transmission back to a central location when the car fuels up. When "out", the odometer works like it always does, but the mileage doesn't get tallied up as taxable.
The tax gets paid when you go to a gas station via radio signals.
The idea is to put it in all new cars that are sold to OR residents, and they are trying to come up with ways to keep the device from being disabled (physically and legislatively). There are no plans to retrofit existing cars with this.
If you want to hear it, I think it was on today's Dave Ross show here in Seattle at www.mynorthwest.com .
Hmm. So if you live on the border of another state.. Gas up outside of state lines?
But you might have to pump your own, ew!
As a Portland resident who wouldn't get banged too hard by this idea, I have to say it really punishes the rural working poor. What dickhead idea....
Usually the way these ideas work is:
1. Tech company dreams up idea to hawk their wares
2. Contributes to political funds
3. Writes up said proposed legislation
4. Proposed legislation stipulates that government will not have to pay for the system, in turn for lucrative no-bid or fixed-bid contract
5. Bloated cost, often realized after the fact is passed onto the tax payer.
As stated before, why come up with a tax that will equally tax a Prius and a Hummer. What an idiot...
What we need here is a racist comment tax. You moron.
I don't know about everyone else here, but the more information I give to my government, the absolutely better and more secure I feel. Look, all you doubters and critics, at the government's impressive record of keeping private data, well, private, and perhaps more so, how they really never overstep or abuse privacy boundaries that they create. Come on, I bet you haven't ever heard of our efficient government losing anything - pens and office supplies, computers, 27 million computer records - or being found guilty of keeping records of product purchases even though they had a regulation against doing so? Geeze!
Should this ever spread to where I live I will drive a car old enough to not have the device, or I will break the device. Won't abide it, period.
What you wanna bet the GPS maker and installer will be his son, brother, Even if the gov. paid for it I bet they'd just be paying him. Crook.
Some states already tax you on your music. Hell they did it in AL and I didn't even know about it.
I will say NC has some shitay roads near Asheville, I can't even take my jeep down parts of I26 for fear of it rattling apart (part my fault, part theirs)
There's one problem with this (Well, one MORE, i should say, besides what's already been pointed out).
Gas tax is a tax per gallon.
Fuel efficient vehicles can drive farther on one gallon than non-fuel efficient vehicles.
Hence, fuel-efficient vehicles pay less per mile in gas tax.
So, besides the privacy concerns, and the likelyhood that they'll send you speeding tickets, and know when and where you've been, and be able to datamine your driving habits, favorite hangouts, etc, now they want to tax Everyone equally for using the roads, instead of taxing the fuel-guzzlers heavier than others.
Sounds like a great plan to promote high-efficiency and electric vehicles. Tax'em more.
The next step is to tax exhaling because all of you dogs are spewing carbon into the atmosphere every time you breathe. Shame on you.
Goofball gov.
What an idea. only tax oregon drivers, not the people visiting and buying fuel and driving through, etc.
As others said, this is full of huge holes and hasn't even gotten off the ground yet. Forest roads, private roads, out of state drivers, low income folks having the deal with expensive electronics, etc.
THe only thing this can be is a push to track people movement.
http://craphound.com/littlebrother/
check out Doctorow's book. Privacy is the last freedom.
carefull guys the limp wrist treehugers and enviro thugs are out in full effect on this thread.
It's like sin taxes, the more you squeeze the less tax there is cause we're all either buying bootleg or cheating in some other fashion. With fuel I sort'a pay attention to mileage and don't really think about the taxes on it. Now make me keenly aware of my weekly mileage and how much it's going to cost me and I'll really start planning those trips. The result few miles driven by me, average Joe, as I get everything done in one or two well planned trips and EVEN LESS TAXES COLLECTED you MORONS!!
Why would anyone ever believe that taxes collected are used for there intended purpose?
We are closer and closer to having states succeed from the union....and we must let them.
If Oregon wants to implement this that's fine for them.
Indeed. This is all about control. Taxes are made up. And can be attached to anything, and be much simpler to determine and collect. This is all about tracking individuals, and don't let them persuade you otherwise.
Already there are states requiring electronic passes for some sections of highways. They are making it increasingly difficult to commute without them. Of course, in order to deduct from your funds they need to know when and where you were. Additionally, even if you opt-out of the electronic pass (which is still possible, but may not be for long), a photo of your license plate is still taken, even if you pay.
Then you've got the traffic cams, which are part of a system that blindly tickets you, without considering the situation. In fact, some people like to play tricks on others by falsifying their plate number with that of a friend's (or enemy's more likely) simply by pasting the false number on theirs and watch the other get a ticket.
Now those traffic cams are being considered for use to track individuals, and in fact, are used as such in some parts of the world. And let's not forget the GPS/emergency systems in automobiles (like OnStar) which companies have been ordered to hand over information about when the person using it is considered a suspect.
So yeah, this is all about more and more control. And if we are wise, we will realize that letting powerful groups in our society (the government, etc.) gain more power over the rest without any added responsibility or power taken from them is a very bad idea. I'll pass, thank you.