🚀 go-pugleaf

Bruce Harper <bharper@vt.edu> wrote:
> 
> In article <36CCF2D8.F02@richmond.infi.net>, "Scott M. Kozel"
> <kozelsm@richmond.infi.net> wrote:
> 
> > Another perspective, the Virginia personal property tax ("car
> > tax") on motor vehicles provides over $300 million per year to the city
> > or county of registration.  This is a road user levy that goes to
> > municipal general funds.
> 
> Sorry, no, the personal property tax is not a "road user levy" unless
> you really stretch things.  It is a tax on large, non-real estate
> items, of which cars happen to be.  In Montgomery County, it also
> includes mobile homes and airplanes.  If I owned a 1998 Mercedes on
> January 1, 1999, even if it were parked in a garage and never set
> a tire on the street, I would still pay personal property tax on
> that vehicle.  The revenue from that tax (at least in Montgomery
> County) has nothing to do with streets and roads in the county.

The Virginia personal property tax on vehicles is most definitely a
"road user levy".

The vast majority of states do not have this tax.  It is an annual
impost on motor vehicle owners in Virginia, a direct tax on motor
vehicle ownership.

> The revenue from that tax (at least in Montgomery County) has 
> nothing to do with streets and roads in the county.

That was one of my main points; it is a subsidy paid by motorists to
non-motoring uses.

-- 
Scott M. Kozel     Highway and Transportation History Websites
Virginia/Maryland/Washington D.C. http://www.richmond.infi.net/~kozelsm
Philadelphia and Delaware Valley
http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/Campus/5961/pennways.html