The United States is already a global leader in traffic-related fatalities, with a thirty-percent jump in the last decade. That’s in contrast to every other developed country, which saw a decline.
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The electric Ford Lightning, for example, is a whopping 6,500 pounds. The Hummer EV is even heavier, clocking in at 9,000 pounds. Its battery alone weighs more than a Honda Civic. Experts have pointed out the significant safety ramifications of this transition for a while, but it’s still not clear that we’ve prepared the regulatory and policy landscape for such a transition.
Even if you don’t want a giant, extremely heavy EV, the tendency to purchase such vehicles creates an arm race for everyone interested in protecting their family on the road. That in turn causes a shift away from smaller EVs in a bid to feed the elemental materials needed for ever larger EV batteries.
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“Norway, a pioneer in EV use, is considering a weight-based tax to steer buyers away from the fattest EVs (the Norwegian government recently eliminated EV purchase incentives). France already has one on SUVs. Buyers of new diesel and gasoline vehicles must pay a tax of €10 ($14.58) a kilo (2.2 pounds) above 1.8 tons. The weight threshold is to be reduced. EVs are exempt, but as those vehicles become heavier and more popular, it seems they will get swept into the weight-based tax net.”
A smattering of localities have tried to prepare for the threat. DC, for example, has imposed a creative vehicle registration fee schedule that has heavy EV truck and SUV owners paying higher registration fees than lighter EV sedans. But it’s an outlier.
Interesting what I don’t see in this article. There’s a lot of different drivers for costs of car infrastructure maintenance. But one of the most important drivers is weight. It causes more stress on the road surface and decreases that lifespan.
I agree with the article, just weird that they left out the most compelling argument for a weight tax on ALL vehicles.
Something important to consider with regards to weight and road damage, damage is proportional to weight to the fourth power. A little extra weight means a lot more wear. This is also why we should be shipping most things by train, as trucks are absolutely annihilating the roads.
Yeah, and it comes up a lot when people say EVs aren’t paying their fair share and should have increased registration costs. The biggest hit on road maintenance is big trucks, and it’s not even close. We are all subsidizing this industry.
Yep. No one wants ro talk about a real weight tax, because if they charged trucks their proportional share, shipping costs would go through the roof.
But what if we moved them onto a separate road, made of metal?
Thay would be crazy, they would all be running at different intervals. You would need some system to link all the cars together, with a singular engine. An Onomotive or something like that, we can figure out the name later.
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A bicycle can’t move without someone sitting on it pedaling, so I think it’s fair to include the weight of the rider.
They should also raise the gas tax so it’s cheaper to own an EV.
Make evs expensive, sure, but make gas more expensive.
Can we instead remove oil subsidies?
Same thing in the end.
… but why not both?
Because it’s easier to sell ending oil subsidies rather than raising gas taxes. Ending corporate subsidies has broad support among Americans.
I was meaning it as the meme “porque no los dos” but yeah I get it.
That’s definitely true. It’s also a concern for a lot of infrastructure like parking garages and bridges.
I suspect it’s left out because the site focuses on tech, but I’ve seen a few articles looking at that this year. I think some states already do licenses based on weight, though arguably it’s not enough.
Apparently, there’s some loopholes that manufacturer’s are using to justify increasing weights (eg. this ), and a similar taxbreak from some recent legislation for cars over 6k lbs.
You bring the tax in for EVs first, and conservatives will either not care or even cheer for it. A new tax on woke cars!
Then after the next election you quietly extend it to all vehicles.
A bunch of those conservative states use large pickups as grocery-getters. If the weight tax hits them you’d better believe the whine will start quickly.
But not large electric pickups
Heck no. Screeching turbos and foghorn exhaust tips. Gotta make sure you everyone turns to look at your 36” lift and giant knobby tires.
The Dutch have had weight based roax tax for a long while: link in Dutch It just does not apply to EVs.
Ngl, started reading the headline and thought this was going to be a tax on heavy people to combat the threat posed by obesity…
Same I was like “this isn’t the weight tax I was expecting” 😂
Neat. Now do the extremely heavy, large, not-EVs.
i love this type of policy. oh you’re rich? 😂👍 go ahead risk as many lives as you want
This is a good policy, there will be some people that be like “oh you’re rich, drive whatever” but the reality is this affects the automaker’s calculus so those heavy cars will be rebranded as luxury and smaller consumer cars will get more production. This is better for road maintenance, safety, etc.
