The issue of the self-selecting population who elected to participate and then rated the program favorably is a huge issue here. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a car and take public transit or bike everywhere and am in favor of a mileage tax, but most people I talk to are not, even among the many progressive citizens of PDX. The public reception to the plan in the rest of the state (the Red part) is even worse. I think this is still a non-starter.

“Privacy is protected. The state only gets odometer information, not information about vehicle location.” – If this is the case, why is someone who drives 100 miles in the city being taxed the same amount as someone driving 100 miles in the country, possibly even on private roads or off-road? It makes no sense.

You have to motivate this as being BETTER than the current system for some physical reason. It WILL cost money to implement over the current gas tax or a higher gas tax. What are we getting for our money?

1. People with less efficient (read larger) vehicles tend to have more political clout, and they are the ones who benefit with mileage over gas taxes.

2. The average driver fears that his car is less efficient than the average car because he hears so much about efficient cars.

3. Novelty. New kind of tax better than old one.

4. Drivers think they’ll be able to figure out a way to outsmart it.

There’s a massive disjunction between expert and lay opinion of mileage taxes (briefly, experts think they’re a worthwhile policy option, the public thinks they’re scary), which is part of the reason I’ve been writing about them recently.