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Wacky California Considers by-the-Mile Driving Tax
Nov. 16, 2004
If you drive a car in California, you could soon find yourself being
taxed for it.
That's because the state's Department of Motor Vehicles chief wants to
tax drivers for every mile they drive.
Newly appointed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to head up the DMV,
Democrat Joan Borucki has long advocated a tax-by-the-mile scheme.
Schwarzenegger hasn't signed off on the plan, but he appointed Borucki.
What does that say?
According to the L.A. Times, her scheme would require each car be fitted
with a mileage tracking device that beamed a signal to a GPS satellite.
A driver's tax would then be calculated based on total miles driven.
The plan would supplant the state's current means of deriving revenue
from drivers - the 18-cent-a-gallon gasoline tax.
But the scheme is illustrative of the failure of the liberal-socialist
welfare state mentality.
For years, liberal California environmentalists have been pressuring
their Democratic allies in state government to tighten automotive
emissions and gas mileage standards.
Hence, for years California residents have been penalized for wanting to
drive any vehicle larger than a beer can with a motor.
Now that residents have finally responded to all this pressure and
penalization by buying high-mileage, cleaner-burning vehicles, the
welfare socialists in state government are afraid the current gasoline
tax won't be sufficient to maintain the state's roadways.
They can't get the money from other budgetary line items because it's
all earmarked for entitlements, such as paying for education, medical
care and welfare benefits for the state's vast illegal alien population.
So, the end result is all of those Californians who were pressured into
buying and driving tin cans will have done so for naught, as a driving
tax generates revenue on miles driven, not gallons of fuel bought.
That means, as one opponent of the plan told the Times, it won't make
any difference if a driver is operating a Toyota Prius hybrid or a
Hummer.
There are also privacy concerns, say opponents of this scheme. A global
tracking system device on your automobile will allow government snoops
to monitor you wherever you drive - which may be the underlying goal of
this entire plan anyway.
The liberal answer to this constitutional privacy concern is to ask, "If
you're not doing anything wrong, what are you worried about?"
Never mind the fact that in America, without provocation, the government
has no need or right to track you in the first place.
On another note, the air in California's major cities is smoggy and
dirty, with no relief in sight, no pun intended. What's next - a tax on
every breath of air?
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