As more drivers turn to zero-emissions vehicles, which don't have to pay anything at the pump, California's gas tax could soon be a thing of the past. But it would be replaced by something else.
Well, one source I found with a cursory search indicates that California spent about $15.1 billion, with a B, on its police in 2023. So I can think of a good place to start.
Anyway, I was following on to the above poster’s observation that electricity is already heavily taxed in CA. Just, none of that cash is allocated towards transportation (or at least in any significant manner insofar as I’m aware) I imagine because historically transportation and power consumption have not been intrinsically linked as they would become if electric vehicles become ubiquitous.
California already has the highest electricity rates in the country by a significant margin, and now they’re also doing stuff like this, which makes you wonder just what the hell they expect to be doing with all that surcharge money if it’s not modernizing their power distribution and soon-to-be electrically driven transportation infrastructure. In fact, incentivizing a switch to electric infrastructure including vehicles was supposed to be one of the stated intentions of that scheme, although it’s dubious if things will actually shake out that way in reality.
One thing’s for sure, the more they can structure their scheme so that it works via even collective contribution rather than making it appear to specifically punish individual drivers/owners, the much less pushback they’re going to get on it.
Well, one source I found with a cursory search indicates that California spent about $15.1 billion, with a B, on its police in 2023. So I can think of a good place to start.
Anyway, I was following on to the above poster’s observation that electricity is already heavily taxed in CA. Just, none of that cash is allocated towards transportation (or at least in any significant manner insofar as I’m aware) I imagine because historically transportation and power consumption have not been intrinsically linked as they would become if electric vehicles become ubiquitous.
California already has the highest electricity rates in the country by a significant margin, and now they’re also doing stuff like this, which makes you wonder just what the hell they expect to be doing with all that surcharge money if it’s not modernizing their power distribution and soon-to-be electrically driven transportation infrastructure. In fact, incentivizing a switch to electric infrastructure including vehicles was supposed to be one of the stated intentions of that scheme, although it’s dubious if things will actually shake out that way in reality.
One thing’s for sure, the more they can structure their scheme so that it works via even collective contribution rather than making it appear to specifically punish individual drivers/owners, the much less pushback they’re going to get on it.