Rather be taxed on how much gas or the number of miles you drive...

[DreamfulSpirit]

I want to hear opinions on this. I live in North Carolina, and the gov't here is considering taxing you on how many miles you drive, possibly as an alternative to taxing on the amount of gallons of gas you buy.

http://autos.aol.com/article/news/_a/north-carolina-considers-charging-tax-on/20081215104309990001?ncid=AOLCOMMautodynlsec0004

I'll try and post some better articles.

[epchick]

Is a quarter-cent like $.25 (as in a quarter) or is it like $.0025?

[DreamfulSpirit]

Is a quarter-cent like $.25 (as in a quarter) or is it like $.0025?

I remember the news explaining it...but I can't remember how its supposed to go. I think its the .0025 cents per mile. So if you were to drive 10,000 miles in a year, you'd have to pay $25.

[Kevin]

How do they tax non-residents?

[DreamfulSpirit]

It would just be residents apparently...but the way they'd get non-residents is they're also going to turn some highways into toll roads.

[AKA_Monet]

It sounds like NC did not upgrade their roads at a time when they could afford it. If you all have "recall capability" the civil engineers and planners in charge need to be removed from office because somebody ought to have informed the public of this impending transportation issues. NC is no way near as large as other states and what gets me is why is it $1 billion. And what are folks getting if they pay this tax. Now, nothing is wrong with tolling up "regular highways", etc. I do have issues with "tolling" on interstates because I thought the interstates are federal areas allegedly used by the military, as needed. The feds need to put of the funds.

There are other ways to collect some taxes.

[DreamfulSpirit]

as listed in the article:

to reduce congestion, increase safety and boost the economy

and for road and highway improvement I would imagine too lol

[preciousjeni]

as listed in the article:
to reduce congestion, increase safety and boost the economy

Yeah right. At least when they decided to add a lane to the Tappan Zee Bridge between Rockland County and Westchester County, NY they didn't try to claim that it would reduce congestion. They actually admitted that it would increase the number of cars on the road!! LOL!

[AlphaFrog]

It sounds like NC did not upgrade their roads at a time when they could afford it.

That's an understatement. I-485 is only a few years old, not even finished at the top of the loop, and is already extremely out-of-date. It takes 30 min to go 2 miles from I-77 to the mall on 485 from 4pm-7pm. They needed to make it about 5 lanes, and it's 3-ish (drops off to 2 before you make it to the mall).