New Jersey Approves Additional EV Road Use Taxes
As more electric vehicles hit the roads, states are grappling with the change in tax revenues they’re seeing as a result. EV buyers don’t pay gas taxes, slashing millions out of state highway budgets and making it hard to afford planned improvements. New Jersey is taking action on the issue with a controversial measure to charge EV owners an annual road tax, which will increase over the next four years to $290 in 2028.
The fee starts at $250 in July and will increase by $10 until 2028, when it reaches $290. EV buyers in the state will also have to pay four years of registration fees upfront, making it significantly more expensive to purchase a new electric model.
New Jersey isn’t the only state that has tossed around ideas for extra taxes on electric buyers, but the move could put a dent in the already bumpy road EVs face. Price remains a significant hurdle for buyers, and automakers have struggled to deliver on promises of more affordable models.
Any upward movement in cost will likely deter more people from buying electric, though it’s worth noting that New Jersey also offers a healthy $4,000 tax incentive that largely makes the tax a moot point. But, as InsideEVs pointed out, the state’s funds to support that incentive often run out before the end of the year, leaving many buyers high and dry.
[Image: Natalia Bratslavsky via Shutterstock]
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Chris grew up in, under, and around cars, but took the long way around to becoming an automotive writer. After a career in technology consulting and a trip through business school, Chris began writing about the automotive industry as a way to reconnect with his passion and get behind the wheel of a new car every week. He focuses on taking complex industry stories and making them digestible by any reader. Just don’t expect him to stay away from high-mileage Porsches.
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You're close. EV owners would report their milage and pay tax electronically on a quarterly basis (like some Federal income tax players do). Milage incurred in non taxing states would be deducted and logged separately. When the vehicle is sold,, traded, donated, salvaged or otherwise disposed of, the owner would file a final milage report a remit any tax due but at thus time, this would be done at an official liscening station, auto dealer or by odometer photo to discourage fraud. Oregon and possibly other states install GPS meters that involve possible issues with cost and privacy. I would hope that our lawmakers are smarter and more creative than I am and will come up with a solution better than the unfair and punitive one currently under consideration.
>New Jersey
>More taxes
What a shock.
Seriously though, this is slowly boiling the frog for mileage taxes.
The Dystopia: BEVs pay more.
Amerikans: Grrr not fair! Taxes, such as life, must be fair! You're [INSERT LIES HERE]!
The Dystopia: Ok, now all of you driving proles will pay per mile.
Amerikans: Well at least now its fair since everyone is being BOHICA'd now [but we don't realize this is all bullsh!t to start, taxes are already sky high, and society is literally failing].
I was going to leave a comment saying how stunned I am at what the American people tolerate when it comes to government taxing us to death. Every aspect of our lives is taxed from birth to death. We just sit back and do nothing. Then I read some of these comments and it seems to me a lot of you out there are fine with the government stealing your money in every possible way it can. Unbelievable.
It's not just EV's but all cars. States decided to fund roadwork out of gas tax and even in the last 10 years overall MPGS have gone up and many are now working from home. Gotta get them dollars somehow.