Ken Nelson

Worried that electric cars won’t buy gas, and thus won’t pay road taxes, Oregon is looking at taxing drivers by how many miles they drive:

The governor wants the task force “to partner with auto manufacturers to refine technology that would enable Oregonians to pay for the transportation system based on how many miles they drive.”

but don’t worry… rural folks, the Governor cares:

The online outline adds: “The governor is committed to ensuring that rural Oregon is not adversely affected and that privacy concerns are addressed

and revolutionaries don’t worry, the police won’t notice you are all driving to the same place:

“The concept requires no transmission of vehicle travel locations, either in real time or of travel history,” the report said. “Accordingly, no travel location points are stored within the vehicle or transmitted elsewhere. Thus there can be no ‘tracking’ of vehicle movements.”

Uh… except that the devices will be subpoenaed. This is how DNA started and now they have a humungous DNA database.

I don’t like this idea.  Everybody drives. Everybody benefits from highways. Everybody should pay for them – equally.   Heavy trucks and other things that damage highways should pay more, but there are already adequate systems for capturing that usage.

It should also be obvious that although they talk of “trading” this for the gas tax – they won’t. The fuel tax might be lowered to sell this but it will be back as big as ever.

Don’t believe them. They want your money. They want your time.  Don’t be stupid and fall for their sweet talk.