Tag Archives: #Taxes

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President Biden wants to tax working-class people to subsidize new electric cars for their bosses Sadly, this headline isn't an April Fool's Day joke.

2020 Chevy Dolt Bolt.

President Biden, along with all of the other 2020 Democratic presidential contenders, promised to require that all new cars after a certain model year — 2035 for Mr Biden, 2030 for some of the others — would be ‘zero emission,’ which primarily means plug-in electric vehicles, all to fight global warming climate change.

Well, Mr Biden was elected, and he wants to try to put his promise into action, but even the liberal New York Times notes the problems:

Biden’s Push for Electric Cars: $174 Billion, 10 Years and a Bit of Luck

The president is hoping to make electric vehicles more affordable to turn a niche product into one with mass appeal.

By Niraj Chokshi | March 31, 2021

President Biden is a muscle-car guy — one of his most prized possessions is a 1967 Corvette that he got from his father. But he’s trying to make this an electric vehicle world.

So, his fossil-fueled Corvette is OK for he, but not for thee! Got it!

The $2 trillion infrastructure plan that he unveiled on Wednesday is aimed at tackling climate change in part by spending up to $174 billion to encourage Americans to switch to cars and trucks that run on electricity, not gasoline or diesel. That is a large investment but it might not be enough to push most Americans toward E.V.s.

Despite rapid growth in recent years, electric vehicles remain a niche product, making up just 2 percent of the new car market and 1 percent of all cars, sport-utility vehicles, vans and pickup trucks on the road. They have been slow to take off in large part because they can cost up to $10,000 more than similar conventional cars and trucks. Charging E.V.s is also more difficult and slower than simply refilling the tank at far more prevalent gas stations.

This is what prompted me to write on this article. Not only does the Times note that plug-in electrics are ‘niche products,’ but this is the first one I’ve seen from the liberal side of the credentialed media which has noted the problems with recharging the vehicles. The article noted that charging them was “slower” than filling your fuel tank with gasoline, though it was a journalistic failure to note how much slower. As we noted here, they can take the better part of an hour to charge at a high-capacity public station:

Charging an electric car at a charging station can take as little as 30 minutes or up to a day depending on a number of factors. The car’s battery size, your battery’s current state of charge, the max charging rate of your vehicle and the charger you’re using, and even the weather — all play a role in how quickly you’ll be able to fill up. A typical electric car like a Nissan Leaf (62-kWh battery) would take about 11.5 hours to charge from empty to full at home on a 240-volt Level 2 charger or could get to about an 80% charge in just 45 minutes if using a public Level 3 DC fast charger.

Then there was this:

Tesla Owners Wait in Long Lines to Recharge over Holidays

Institute for Energy Research | January 6, 2020

With over 400,000 Tesla vehicles on U.S. roads, Tesla’s Supercharger stations were overcrowded over the holidays and many Tesla owners faced an hours-long wait to recharge their electric vehicles. At one location in Kettleman City, California, a line of 50 or so Tesla vehicles awaiting a Supercharger stall stretched to about a quarter mile over Thanksgiving weekend. The station is located about halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Its 40 stalls were insufficient to accommodate the demand, and the simultaneous recharging of the vehicles lowered the rate of recharging, frustrating customers even more. It takes about 52 minutes to charge a Model 3 to 80 percent at a 120 kilowatt Tesla Supercharger.

How many times have you gone to the gas station, and had to wait behind a vehicle or two to get your turn to fuel up. When it takes around five to ten minutes to pump gasoline into a vehicle, it’s annoying enough, but what if there was just one vehicle ahead of you . . . and it took the driver 52 minutes to recharge his car?

Mr. Biden hopes to address many of those challenges through federal largess. He aims to lower the cost of electric vehicles by offering individuals, businesses and governments tax credits, rebates and other incentives. To address the chicken-and-egg problem of getting people to try a new technology before it is widely accepted, he hopes to build half a million chargers by 2030 so people will feel confident that they won’t be stranded when they run out of juice. And he is offering help to automakers to get them to build electric vehicles and batteries in the United States.

It will take “federal largess,” because, as The Wall Street Journal noted, consumers aren’t buying them because most consumers don’t want them. The plug in electrics are simply not as convenient as gasoline powered automobiles.

And American consumers want larger vehicles; that’s why trucks and SUVs dominate the American market. Plug in electric vehicles like the Chevy Dolt Bolt are smaller, because manufacturers need to reduce size and weight to increase range.

The federal government and some states already offer tax credits and other incentives for the purchase of electric cars. But the main such federal incentive — a $7,500 tax credit for the purchase of new electric cars — begins to phase out for cars once an automaker has sold 200,000 E.V.s. Buyers of Tesla and G.M. electric cars, for example, no longer qualify for that tax credit but buyers of Ford and Volkswagen electric cars do.

Mr. Biden described his incentives for electric car purchases as rebates available at the “point of sale,” presumably meaning at dealerships or while ordering cars online. But the administration has not released details about how big those rebates will be and which vehicles they would apply to.

Let’s be honest here: new car buyers are wealthier than most Americans. In 2019, the last year before the pandemic hit, there were 40.8 million used cars sold, versus 17 million new vehicles, because used vehicles are much less expensive. President Biden’s plan calls for, in effect, taxing lower-income earners more to give a financial benefit to higher-income people, taxing working-class people to help pay for their bosses’ cars. What an absolutely great idea!

There’s considerably more at the Times original, but it’s pretty much what I have been saying all along: a whole lot of people do not have garages or secure, dedicated overnight parking spots in which they can have their own vehicle charging stations. Naturally, the Times looks at it from the perspective of a wealthier urban area, but when I look around the poorer area in eastern Kentucky where I live, I see older, not-as-well-kept-up homes, many of which have inadequate, 100 amp electric service — and not a few probably still have old fuse boxes instead — and I see people who have little prospect of buying a new car, having to depend on used vehicles.

Siemens US2 Versicharge electric car charger

President Biden’s ideas suffer from the same thing as the rest of the climate change activists: they are the wealthier elites who have no flaming idea how poorer people have to live their lives, how poorer people have to struggle. When around 40% of Americans would struggle with an unexpected $400 expense, how can we expect them to spend $599 for a Siemens 30 amp, 240 volt car charger? If they don’t have the tools, knowledge and skill to install a NEMA L 14-30P receptacle on a 40 or 50 amp circuit themselves, how are they going to come up with the money to pay a real electrician to install that for them?

I’ve said it before: the Democrats, who have for generations purported themselves to be the party of working people, have no idea what a working-class life is like. The Patricians driving the climate change agenda aren’t the people who have to worry about having enough money to buy the kids new blue jeans because what they have are worn out, don’t have to buy cheap Kroger brand products at the grocery store because the name brands cost more, and don’t have to worry if the electric bill gets too high due to colder weather in the winter. It’s just so easy for the elites to say that something won’t cost the plebeians all that much when they don’t themselves have to worry if the price of milk has risen.

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Big Brother will be watching you!

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg ran his mouth the other day about going from a gasoline tax to a mileage tax:

Vehicle mileage tax could be on the table in infrastructure talks, Buttigieg says

By Thomas Franck | Friday, March 26 2021 | 10:29 AM EDT | Updated 4:57 PM EDT

  • Pete Buttigieg, the Transportation secretary, said a vehicle mileage tax could be on the table in infrastructure talks.

  • He contended that President Joe Biden’s forthcoming plans to rebuild the nation’s roads, bridges and waterways would lead to a net gain for the U.S. taxpayer.

  • “I’m hearing a lot of appetite to make sure that there are sustainable funding streams,” Buttigieg said. A mileage tax “shows a lot of promise.”

A vehicle mileage tax could be on the table in talks about how to finance the White House’s expected multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure proposal, according to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

Buttigieg, who spoke with CNBC’s Kayla Tausche on Friday, also contended that President Joe Biden’s forthcoming plans to rebuild the nation’s roads, bridges and waterways would lead to a net gain for the U.S. taxpayer and not a net outlay.

“When you think about infrastructure, it’s a classic example of the kind of investment that has a return on that investment,” he said. “That’s one of many reasons why we think this is so important. This is a jobs vision as much as it is an infrastructure vision, a climate vision and more.”

He also weighed in on several potential revenue-generating options to fund the project. He spoke fondly of a mileage levy, which would tax travelers based on the distance of the journey instead of on how much gasoline they consume.

“A so-called vehicle-miles-traveled tax or mileage tax, whatever you want to call it, could be a way to do it,” he said.

Democrats have slowly pivoted away from a gasoline tax in favor of a mileage tax amid a simultaneous, climate friendly effort to encourage consumers to drive electric cars.

This really isn’t all that new: it was in either Oregon or Washington that such was proposed a few years ago, because higher gas mileage cars and electric vehicles were depressing gasoline tax revenues.

But a mileage tax has an obvious drawback: how do you determine mileage, unless the government mandates GPS units on every vehicle, and tracks your travel?

This is what a mileage tax would mean!

Of course, what it would also mean would be backyard mechanics who find ways to disconnect the GPS, so you can leave the damned thing at home for half or more of your trips. Big Brother will insist on GPS units without which your vehicle can’t be started, but it won’t take hackers long to find ways around that. Big Brother would need to find ever more intrusive ways to track your travels, such as satellites which scan vehicles and determine which ones have the GPS disconnected, to send the Geheime Staatspolizei to stop and arrest you.

It could be something simpler, such as having to track your odometer, and file that with your income taxes, but I’ve seen plenty of vehicles in which the odometer did not work. And, in older vehicles, it’s ridiculously easy to disconnect the damned thing.

But, however it works, one thing is certain: for it to work, the government has to be able to watch you, to track your every movement, because mileage taxes can’t work unless they track your mileage!

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The nanny state prepares to strike again

As William Teach pointed out, it’s rather humorous that the Pyrite State is so worried about sugary drinks, yet legalized marijuana usage. From the Los Angeles Times:

Is gulping soda as bad as smoking? California seems to think so

By The Times Editorial Board | March 4, 2019 | 3:10 AM PST

In California, soda is the new tobacco — at least from a public policy point of view.

Adopting some of the same methods that have been employed to reduce smoking, California legislators have put together an ambitious package of bills aimed at curbing consumption of sodas, energy drinks and other beverages that have added sugar.

The proposals, which are sponsored by the California Medical Assn. and California Dental Assn., include levying a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages, mandating warning labels on their bottles and restricting how they are promoted and displayed in stores, as well as limiting the serving size of fountain drinks. The proceeds from the tax (the amount is yet to be determined) would fund programs to prevent obesity, diabetes and other health problems associated with the overconsumption of sugar.

It’s an intriguing approach that has already sparked a backlash from the soda industry and a public discussion about what role the government should play in grocery store purchases. Now the onus is on public health officials to make a clear and compelling case about the dangers — and to explain why sugary drinks deserve as harsh a regulatory response as cigarettes.

There’s much more at the original.

Full disclosure: I love Mountain Dew, and I had been consuming mass quantities of it since I was a teenager in the 1960s. It was nothing for me to drink four bottles or cans of Dew in a day, and on a particularly hot summer day, the count could go higher. When we lived in Pennsylvania, I even had my own, separate Dew refrigerator in the basement, because Mrs Pico continually complained that I had the regular ‘fridge set too cold, and was freezing the produce and eggs.

On July 1, 2017, when we moved back to the Bluegrass State, I gave up soda, cold turkey. I really haven’t missed it.

But, I digress. There is little question that soda isn’t particularly good for you; the Times’ editorial board was simply making the case that it hadn’t been proven bad enough for you for California to attempt to regulate and tax into disuse. I find it interesting that a state which has legalized the recreational use and sale of pot, has passed an assisted suicide law, tried to (but shelved) ban homosexual conversion therapy, and makes millions off of advertisements and product placements for the consumption of alcohol, is so very worried that you might drink a Pepsi.

But one of the proposed measures that could show results is definitely worth exploring: taxes on drinks with added sugar. Last week, a three-year study of the tax on sugar-sweetened beverages imposed by Berkeley in 2014 — the first in the nation — found that people in low-income neighborhoods bought fewer sugary drinks after the tax was imposed, while consumption trends remained the same in neighboring cities that didn’t have such a tax. The study also found that the people who drank fewer sugary beverages consumed more water during the same period.

This finding mitigates the argument that such a regressive levy would hit low-income people the hardest. Poorer people, many of them black and Latino, would still suffer, economically and physically, if they continued to drink copious amounts of sugar-sweetened drinks. But black and Latino Californians have higher rates of obesity than other populations, so if the higher cost encouraged them to switch to healthier (and untaxed) water, it would be a double benefit to them.

Translation: yes, it would have a disparate impact on minorities, but it’s for their own good, so that doesn’t matter!

The obvious question has to be asked: why is it any of the government’s business to “encourage” people to change their choices and habits? The city of Philadelphia imposed a special tax on sugary drinks, and part of the effect was to cut revenue to retailers near the city limits when their customers could, and did, easily drive to stores in neighboring Bucks and Montgomery counties to buy Mountain Dew without paying the ridiculous tax. It seems that customers were willing to spend a little more in gasoline to buy what they chose.

Of course, alcohol consumption is worse, far worse, than that of sugary drinks, and nobody in the Pyrite State is (seriously) trying to ban or reduce that. The editors of the Los Angeles Times even advocated changing state law to allow businesses which serve alcohol to continue serving until 4:00 AM rather than the 2:00 last call specified by state law:

California is still hewing to a 1935 law dictating that alcohol sales stop from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m., and that blanket prohibition no longer makes sense for cities with thriving music and nightlife scenes that compete for investment and tourism with the likes of New York City, Las Vegas and other late-night cities.

Heaven forfend! We wouldn’t want the “thriving music and nightlife scenes” to be stifled by not having people drinking during the very wee hours of the morning, would we? At best, I found some California sites which want to help people who drink too much alcohol to moderate their intake, but it seems that nobody wants to curtail it back to zero. The National Institute for Health said:

An estimated 88,0008 people (approximately 62,000 men and 26,000 women) die from alcohol-related causes annually, making alcohol the third leading preventable cause of death in the United States. The first is tobacco, and the second is poor diet and physical inactivity.

Yet California’s legislature doesn’t seem to care much about that!

The truth is that sugary drinks aren’t good for you, tobacco isn’t good for you, alcohol isn’t good for you, and, let’s be honest here, casual sex isn’t good for you, but you sure won’t find the home state of Hollywood trying to discourage the hook up culture!

Governments should just stay out of people’s personal decisions about what to put in their mouths. Yeah, a lot of things people do put in their mouths aren’t good for them, but those are decisions, intelligent or otherwise, which ought to belong to individuals, not politicians.