Tesla

Some companies get tax breaks, which some people equate with taking government money. The logical extension of that thinking is to conclude that any tax rate below 100% is corporate welfare.

What's sad is that small businesses, the ones that create domestic jobs, pay the biggest tax rates (like, 40% when big corps pay a tenth of that) and get little or no "help" from government.

The recipes for curing income inequality mostly seem to kill domestic jobs and make income inequality worse.

But will they lose money forever? I suspect so. Without government subsidies on the price of their cars, they would crater even sooner.

Sure. California's regulated utilities are whiplashed by state politics, and consumers pay the bill.

--

John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
lunatic fringe electronics 

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com 
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

Here (AZ) cars are taxed as "property" -- so, your plates reflect the current value of your vehicle (allegedly). Registration fee (yearly) is ~$2.80 per hundred dollars valuation (actually, I think they assess at 60% of valuation?). So, a $20K assessment costs $560/year for plates (plus some fixed fees).

Electric vehicles pay $4 per $100 assessed value. So, that $20K assessment on an electric vehicle costs $800/year for plates.

Some localities are also trying to move away from a "gas tax" to a "road/mileage tax".

Oddly enough photovoltaic produces power when electric demand is at its peak...

Do you have names? I'll talk to those people.

This doesn't even make sense.

--

Rick

here it is registering a car the first time is 105% of the first ~$12000, 180% of the rest

and then biannual "green tax" between ~$50 and ~$2000 depending on rated fuel mileage

here electric cars pay no tax, but if people start buying them in numbers that will change

gas tax is hard to enforce if you can drive somewhere else and avoid it but mileage tax almost requires big-brother systems

-Lasse

But you only wear T-shirts, so you don't understand fashion statements. ;)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs 
Principal Consultant 
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC 
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics 

160 North State Road #203 
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510 

hobbs at electrooptical dot net 
http://electrooptical.net

I've seen such things. It would take me a while to chase down a reference, though (and, not even sure which COUNTRY it was located in!)

For an individual home, the costs involved don't make sense (windows). We looked at replacing all the windows, here (modest home) and, barring installation costs, we were well over $20K. Folks with *lots* of glass would easily be double that.

[Note that it does nothing to curtain losses through the flimsy ceiling/roof!]

And, all that does is help reduce our cooling costs (we don't have much of a heating load given how mild the winters are).

The smarter move would be to put most of the living spaces below grade -- earth bermed, etc. But, that requires architecture designed with that in mind -- not the sort of thing you can retrofit, effectively. (Our electric needs -- KWHr -- *double* in the months when we need supplemental cooling)

The pisser is that the rules keep changing. Yet, you are expected to make significant investments/commitments based on one *particular* set of rules -- with no idea as to how those rules will change tomorrow.

E.g., we are urged to conserve water (desert). Put things in place like on-site grey water reclamation and the utility claims there's not enough water running through the *sewers* to keep them running effectively -- so rates go up. When you use pricing pressure as a motive to conserve MORE, then there's not enough income to cover their

*costs* -- so still more increases.

We're looking at installing one or two large cisterns (below grade); something on the order of 2,000-4,000G. This is a significant expense and a significant "disturbance" (digging up the yard to install, plumb). When/if we've done that, how will the rules be changed to render that decision retroactively "useless"?

(E.g., we currently have charges on our natural gas bill because "it wasn't cold enough" this winter past -- i.e., we didn't use enough gas so we have to make a forced DONATION to the utility to keep them in business)

I suspect that when the toilet-to-tap issue raises its head, local muni officials may find The Public opting for a moratorium on development, instead! ()

Did I misread that? I.e., a $10K car would cost $10,500 to *register*?? Do you all ride *bicycles*?? :-/

Fuel efficiency plays no direct role, here. Just "valuation". (aside from the distinction I made wrt electric vehicles).

You pay for fuel efficiency (lack thereof) in other ways: taxes on fuel, etc.

Note that this varies from state to state. Some places just charge a fixed fee. Others treat the vehicle as "property" (like a home)

Of course! See my comment to George, elsewhere.

Gotta generate $X for the coffers so if you can't get it ONE way, you have to get it ANOTHER!

Tires are taxed, here, as a means of supporting the cost of roads. In theory, someone driving more would pay more in those taxes.

But, they are tiny when compared to fuel taxes (that electric vehicles avoid)

you read it right, I think there's a few deductions for safety equipment like airbags, etc. but not much. And you'll have to add 25% VAT.

lots of people have bikes, but other than that I think the cars people buy are just smaller and they stay on the road longer and unless you live far out you only really need one car

-Lasse

Christ! So, what does a typical vehicle *cost*? And, the registration thereon?

I'd be a bit annoyed if I had to shell out tens of $K for a vehicle

*plus* a comparable amount for the right to drive/own it. Then, a significant piece of change twice a year to continue to do so!

Here, older vehicles will cost ~$50/year to register.

you really only see the final price including everything

lots of "micro cars" like VW Up at around $13000-$14000, something like a Mazda6 starts at $45000

here it is based on weight/mileage depending on age, but easily 10 times that

and the mandatory liability insurance is also easily 10x

-Lasse

You'd heat when it made sense to you to heat! A friend in Chicago heats his throughout the winter months. Does he look at the clock to decide what time of day to turn the heater on? Does he know what sort of thermal lag the water mass represents? I.e., if he wants to take a dip after work, when does he have to ensure the heater is "enabled"?

I suspect it's just *on* and the control loop "decides" when to call for "energy" (electric/gas)

We don't *have* a pool! That's ~25,000G of water that just goes into the atmosphere each year (after passing through your wallet).

Instead, we "waste" our domestic (and harvested) water growing fruit; things that we can consume and that have a "fair trade value" with which we can justify the "water expense". At $1/pound, it's relatively easy to get a tree to pay for itself. For the Blood Orange, we probably turn a "virtual profit"!

OTOH, for those folks who *do* have pools and decide they want the water temperature up above 100F, it's silly to use anything other than solar power for the job.

The point was, the utility never grumbled that these folks were getting the *advantage* of having the electric/gas supply system as a FALLBACK -- ON DEMAND -- to address their water heating needs when solar couldn't cut it. Ditto for solar domestic hot water. Or, passive solar heating! They never thought to assess them a special "heated pool fee".

OTOH, when they see these folks as *competitors* and potential NONcustomers, they need to rationalize the need for these fees.

They aren't even given a *choice*! The utility decides how much power you can generate on site. It's only when you can tell them, "I don't want to use your Grid for storage; I don't want to rely on you to handle my power needs in the absence of sufficient on-site capacity; AND, I don't want to *sell* my electricity to you" that you can cut them out of the calculus.

Musk's batteries are the only practical way to do that.

So, you're saying the costs of all of these current generation technologies are "acceptable". But, the costs of any *new*/alternative approaches are NOT? How do you factor in the number of miners who die from Black Lung disease? Or, toxic spills in water supplies? Or, lives lost protecting energy supplies in wars? *Those* are all acceptable? Already factored into the equation?

[What portion of the defense budget do we attribute to protecting energy supplies?]

I thought you were concerned for all those poor folks in third world countries trying to attain the same standard of living as us? Wouldn't you want to reduce the pricing pressure on these "old" energy sources so THEY could gain the full benefit of them? And, at *reduced* costs (as there would be less consumers vying for them)?

So, do the figures (below) represent that "final cost" (inclusive of "first time registration)?

Ouch! A quick check of stock at a local dealer suggests MSRP on that vehicle is ~$22K. So, I guess the answer to my above question is "Yes"!

Makes me wonder what the hell a "micro car" could be if it's MSRP is ~$7K!

So, this is in addition to the "50-2000 green fee"?

Liability insurance is probably $700+/year, here. Insure yourself, insure against the other party NOT having insurance AND insure against the other party not having SUFFICIENT insurance! :-/

E.g., I took my vehicle off the road as it was costing me $1/mile to operate (insurance, fuel, maintenance) when I was driving ~1200mi/year. Now, it would probably be double or triple that rate! :<

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I paid 0.0023 per mile, but cap at 500 miles per day. So, i try to do all my driving in one day. For example, round trip from San Francisco to Phoen ix is around 1200 miles. Two drivers can do it in one day. Need to add co uple of 20 gallon tanks so i can fill-up on unadulterated (ethanol free) ga soline in Phoenix, which is difficult to find in the Bay Area.

I would expect a lot of features to find their way to after market add ons... like engines, brakes, seats...

Why would liability insurance be so much more? Is the max payout a lot more? Here I have seen states with a mandated cap as low as $100k per person and $300k per accident.

Here there are many states with annual fees on cars. They often call it a "personal property" tax. It was many years after I had to pay the tax that I found out "personal property" doesn't have to do with you owning it vs. a business. "Personal property" is everything tangible that is not "real estate", "real" property vs. "personal" property.

The annual car tax here is usually in the 1-5% range.

--

Rick

Nonsense! Chicago to Tucson (~1800) took me 36 hours -- probably could shave

10 hours off that if I hadn't stopped to sleep! Or, if I was driving a *car* instead of a panel truck! :>

For an average usage of ~6K mi/year and 25MPG (entirely city driving) with current fuel costs at $2.50/G, we pay ~$1600 in a year (fuel, insurance, maintenance). Our problem is we don't drive many miles so have high per-mile costs.

OTOH, only paying $1600 for transportation costs is probably a *deal* compared to most folks!

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yes, that is the final cost

!

VW up, Toyota Aygo, Renault Twingo, Opel Karl, Chevrolet Spark, Hyundai i10

quite amazing that it is possible to build a car for that kind of money

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no that is the "green fee", for cars from before ~1997 it is based on weigh t

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here if you don't have insurance the police will come take the license plat es

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and add to that depreciation, I looked up the statistics here and one an av erage car it is ~50% after 4 years and 80000km

-Lasse

Why nonsense then? Actually, driving distance of around 1500 miles and I don't need to sleep if i find an alternate driver.

they got that covered, anything added for the first 3 months you have to pay registration on, and if a car "loses its identity" i.e. you upgrade so many parts it really becomes different car you have to re-register it

if you are 40 and never had an accident you can probably get it for $500 if you are 18 and just got you license the sky is the limit

the law says the insurance must cover; ~$7500000 for person injury and loss of provider, ~$1500000 property damage

-Lasse

Yes, it's high, which is the reason the average danish car is old compared to the rest of the world

But, some of the reason for that tax, and the astronomical income tax (up to 67% of last earned krone, the danish currency), is that we have a lot of benefits, if you ask me to many:

Free education to any level Free hospital care Minimum fee paid out to an individual if they are unemployed (1000 USD per month) Minimum feed paid out to an individual which has retired

But, the downside to this is that a lot of people takes advantage of this to live off the state and does not contribute in any way

Cheers

Klaus