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Comment by jbverschoor | Hacker News Reader

In NL, a RAM can be bought as a company car, effectively dodging road tax. (50 euro vs 200 euro per month). For comparison, you pay 100 euro per month for a tiny car if it runs on diesel (these were 'green' and exempt from road tax 10 years ago). Or between 30 and 70 per month for gasoline cars.

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There's 200 euros road tax PER MONTH in NL? OMG and TIL.

We have the best or second best roads in the world (which is very noticeable when you drive into neighboring countries). Additionally we have extremely low congestion even at rush hour.

Road tax depends heavily on the vehicle. I think we pay ~€1000 a year, ~€83 a month, for our Hyundai ix35.

US "road tax" is in the gasoline tax. (Plus a nominal fee for electric cars in some places) Does NL have gas tax? What's that used for?

NL has both.

* Electric Cars are exempt from both IIRC.

* Diesel is mostly front loaded in the yearly road tax. With a very low tax on fuel. So if you drive a lot it is worth getting a Diesel for this reason alone.

* Petrol has a lighter yearly tax. There is a formula someplace and it has to do with engine size, weight, age and some other things assuming I understood correctly. The yearly tax is cheaper on average than the diesel. Then there is a large tax on petrol. About €0.17 a liter or €0.642 a gallon.

Sometimes over 200.. And then we pay super high excise (lowered until the end of the year) and tax over fuel. Basically we pay about half on taxes over fuel. To finance that, you pay with money your earned and payed 50% income tax. So basically the gov takes 75ct out of your euro, and we still can't manage treasury

Also worth mentioning that many of them are running on LPG to keep the costs down

Every landscaper seems to have at least one of them.

And this is a problem because why? It's pretty perfect for the role of "something a little lesser than a small dump truck but that still does the same jobs".

I didn't say it was a problem. Please don't strawman.

More expensive than a small dump truck, bigger and less useful... Therefore the status symbol is the point.

Do company cars not use roads?

A "company car", usually means a van. Something with no passengers except the front row, and it needs to have certain dimensions. The RAM is therefore classified as one of those. And because vans are meant for business, you pay less.

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