gas prices (kinda OT)

"Malt_Hound" > wrote in message
...
> Peter Bozz wrote:
>>
>>
>> What I don't get is this:
>>
>> Every time people talk about SUVs or oversized trucks, the standard
>> example is the "soccer moms" using them: moms driving their kids to
>> soccer practice, and how nuts that is (which it is).
>>
>> The question is: with the proliferation of soccer moms and their SUVs and
>> all the soccer practice going on in the US, how come US soccer sucks?
>
> Easy... the kids form other countries have to walk (or run) miles t get
> to their soccer pitches, and that's half of their conditioning.
>
> -Fred W

OMG, how can they survive without air conditioning, and a Starbucks
Frapucchino after practice?

> "Peter Bozz" > wrote in message
> ...
>
>>Jeff Strickland wrote:
>>
>>>At a $1.50 per liter, that works out to nearly $6.00 per gallon. Most of
>>>that is road tax though, and we pay our road taxes differently than you
>
> do.
>
>>>Our -- USA -- gas is about $2.50 per gallon in California.
>>>
>>
>>Well, in addition to paying $1.00 for a liter of diesel (ie $3.80 a
>>gallon), I pay $100 a month in road tax. (Diesel costs less at the pump,
>>but private vehicles are taxed more.)
>>
>>What's the road tax in California?
>>
>
>
> It comes from several sources, income taxes and property tax that make it to
> the General Fund are the primary sources. Then, we have sales tax that when
> generated from gasoline sales gets sent to the road department. We have
> sales tax on lots of stuff, generally non-food items, but not always.
> Anyway, the sales tax is different in different counties -- I suppose a
> township would be an equivelent level of government -- but it hovers right
> around 8% statewide. When the sales tax is derived from fuel sales, then
> those tax dollars go to transportation projects.
>

It doesn't seem then that you have a flat rate "road tax" as they do
here (next to all the other sundry taxes, such as property, sales,
income, etc....) By this I mean, you pay road tax for every vehicle you
own, every month, regardless of whether you actually drive it. You can
keep your beautiful convertible garaged for nine months a year and only
drive it three, but you still pay twelve months of road tax.

The only way to avoid paying the tax for a car that you never drive, is
to hand back your registration. But then you won't be able to drive it
that one time a year when the weather is fine.

This is, of course, preposterous, but it helps keep the number of cars
down -- I, for one, do not keep a second vehicle (say a beautiful 1988
Saab 900 for recreational driving on weekends), exactly because of the
flat rate road tax.

Dori A Schmetterling wrote:
> It may not suck that much longer.
>
> 1) I heard it's the most widely-played sport at school level.
> 2) The Hispanics are mad about it.
>
> It's just that the US pro world has to be persuaded that football (the real
> one) is the Beautiful Game....

Maybe if "soccer" introduced chearleaders?



>
> DAS
>
> For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
> ---
>
> "Peter Bozz" > wrote in message
> ...
> [...]
>
>
>>The question is: with the proliferation of soccer moms and their SUVs and
>>all the soccer practice going on in the US, how come US soccer sucks?
>
>
>

"Peter Bozz" > wrote in message
...
> > "Peter Bozz" > wrote in message
> > ...
> >
> >>Jeff Strickland wrote:
> >>
> >>>At a $1.50 per liter, that works out to nearly $6.00 per gallon. Most
of
> >>>that is road tax though, and we pay our road taxes differently than you
> >
> > do.
> >
> >>>Our -- USA -- gas is about $2.50 per gallon in California.
> >>>
> >>
> >>Well, in addition to paying $1.00 for a liter of diesel (ie $3.80 a
> >>gallon), I pay $100 a month in road tax. (Diesel costs less at the pump,
> >>but private vehicles are taxed more.)
> >>
> >>What's the road tax in California?
> >>
> >
> >
> > It comes from several sources, income taxes and property tax that make
it to
> > the General Fund are the primary sources. Then, we have sales tax that
when
> > generated from gasoline sales gets sent to the road department. We have
> > sales tax on lots of stuff, generally non-food items, but not always.
> > Anyway, the sales tax is different in different counties -- I suppose a
> > township would be an equivelent level of government -- but it hovers
right
> > around 8% statewide. When the sales tax is derived from fuel sales, then
> > those tax dollars go to transportation projects.
> >
>
> It doesn't seem then that you have a flat rate "road tax" as they do
> here (next to all the other sundry taxes, such as property, sales,
> income, etc....) By this I mean, you pay road tax for every vehicle you
> own, every month, regardless of whether you actually drive it. You can
> keep your beautiful convertible garaged for nine months a year and only
> drive it three, but you still pay twelve months of road tax.
>
> The only way to avoid paying the tax for a car that you never drive, is
> to hand back your registration. But then you won't be able to drive it
> that one time a year when the weather is fine.
>
> This is, of course, preposterous, but it helps keep the number of cars
> down -- I, for one, do not keep a second vehicle (say a beautiful 1988
> Saab 900 for recreational driving on weekends), exactly because of the
> flat rate road tax.
>


Well, not exactly. We don't pay a road tax, specifically -- with the
exception of the sales tax of 8 cents on the dollar of fuel purchases. All
of the other road funding comes from the state general fund and from federal
income tax dollars that manage to drift back down the funding pipeline. It
doesn't matter that one owns 1 car or 5, he pays the same in taxes. The
obvious exception would be that the guy that owns 5 cars has a higher
income - arguably - and therefore pays more income tax. But assuming equal
income, everybody pays the same tax except that high mileage drivers will
buy more gas and therefore the sales tax they pay will be a greater dollar
amount. If a car gets filled with gas, then is parked for 9 months or gets
used everyday, it pays the same in taxes for that particular fill up.

In any event, we pay considerably less fuel tax than Europeans pay, this is
why we have Suburbans and Hummers trolling the highways, and you guys find a
way to make due with Geo Metros and other micro minis that Americans do not
seem to tolerate very well. The argument has long been that if we paid the
same fuel taxes that you pay, we would change the way we drive.

I drive a 3 Series as a daily driver, my wife gets by nicely with a Mazda
minivan, my daughter has a Toyota truck, and we keep a Jeep in the side yard
for weekend driving. As you can see, I keep several cars around and don't
worry much about paying road taxes.

Hey, that's an idea!

Trouble is, they may introduce advertising and cheer-leading breaks every 10
minutes...

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
---

"Peter Bozz" > wrote in message
...
[...]
>
> Maybe if "soccer" introduced chearleaders?
>
[...]

In western Europe at least we all pay a tax that allows us to put the car on
the road. The annual sum and way of calculating it varies substantially
across the countries. In Britain we display a tax disc on the windscreen
as evidence that we have paid.

In Britain this tax and those on fuel were raised initially to pay for
roads, but the link was broken decades ago and, of course, revenues far
exceed the expensiture on roads.

Peter Bozz's comment about paying for a car off the road for a long period
do not necessarily apply across the board as in the UK we can deregister a
car if it is kept on private ground. And did I not hear about seasonal
registration in Germany?

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
---

"Jeff Strickland" > wrote in message
...
[...]

> Well, not exactly. We don't pay a road tax, specifically --
[...]

U¿ytkownik "Dori A Schmetterling" > napisa³ w wiadomo¶ci
...
> In western Europe at least we all pay a tax that allows us to put the car
> on the road.

in Poland we all hae it in fuel price. normally 1 Liter of fuel in
production costs about 15Ecents, on gas station- 1 Euro.
So 85 Ecents are taxes

> we can deregister a car if it is kept on private ground. And did I not
> hear about seasonal registration in Germany?

it's not possible in poland actually you do not pay road tax but you have
to pay car insurance no matter if you use your car or not.
only old cars (more then 40 years) can have insurance not for whole year but
just for part of it for exemple 1 month.
I've also VW T2 westfalia camper (30 years old) which I use only for
holidays but I have to pay insurance for whole year((

Anax

Dori A Schmetterling wrote:
> In western Europe at least we all pay a tax that allows us to put the car on
> the road. The annual sum and way of calculating it varies substantially
> across the countries. In Britain we display a tax disc on the windscreen
> as evidence that we have paid.
>
> In Britain this tax and those on fuel were raised initially to pay for
> roads, but the link was broken decades ago and, of course, revenues far
> exceed the expensiture on roads.
>
> Peter Bozz's comment about paying for a car off the road for a long period
> do not necessarily apply across the board as in the UK we can deregister a
> car if it is kept on private ground. And did I not hear about seasonal
> registration in Germany?

In the Netherlands, you *can* deregister a car if you don't keep it on
the public road. But then you literally have to hand in your license
plates -- Taxman is pretty tough that way. (We don't have tax discs or
other visual markings indicating we've actually paid the due taxes.) So
it's kind of a hassle. I haven't heard of seasonal registration here.
Only cars older than 25 years are exempt from the road tax. So you can
keep a 1979 convertible (or older) for "free".

>
> DAS
>
> For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
> ---
>
> "Jeff Strickland" > wrote in message
> ...
> [...]
>
>
>>Well, not exactly. We don't pay a road tax, specifically --
>
> [...]
>
>

>>It doesn't seem then that you have a flat rate "road tax" as they do
>>here (next to all the other sundry taxes, such as property, sales,

[snip]

>
> In any event, we pay considerably less fuel tax than Europeans pay, this is
> why we have Suburbans and Hummers trolling the highways, and you guys find a
> way to make due with Geo Metros and other micro minis that Americans do not
> seem to tolerate very well. The argument has long been that if we paid the
> same fuel taxes that you pay, we would change the way we drive.

Logic dictates that, yes, you will. Chances are you'd be less likely to
buy a Suburban than a Japanese minivan. That will keep the gasoline
demand down a bit. But hey, it's your money. If you want to keep giving
bundles of it to the Middle East, Venezuela and other place that the
average American (and European) can't even find on the map, that's your
prerogative. I hear the Burj Al Arab Hotel is a very expensive piece of
architecture.

>
> I drive a 3 Series as a daily driver, my wife gets by nicely with a Mazda
> minivan, my daughter has a Toyota truck, and we keep a Jeep in the side yard
> for weekend driving. As you can see, I keep several cars around and don't
> worry much about paying road taxes.
>
>

If you kept these cars in Holland, they would set you back at least
$300+ a month (rough guestimation: the road tax on a diesel powered Land
Cruiser alone is about $150 a month).

And that's before you even drove a single mile with any of them.

Subsuming the current road tax ("vehicle excise duty" in its present guise)
into the fuel duties keeps getting raised as a discussion point in the UK.
There are people who advocate this.

We pay more than EUR 1 per litre excluding the road tax.

However, wages in Poland are lower, so the price there is probably higher,
pro rata, i.e. the effect on the pocket is greater.

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
---

"Anax WRC" > wrote in message
...
[...]
> in Poland we all hae it in fuel price. normally 1 Liter of fuel in
> production costs about 15Ecents, on gas station- 1 Euro.
> So 85 Ecents are taxes
>
[...]