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Comment by neilv | Hacker News Reader

> Using three separate identification strategies we show that, controlling for own-vehicle weight, being hit by a vehicle that is 1000 pounds heavier generates a 40–50% increase in fatality risk. [...] We consider two policies for internalizing this external cost, a weight-varying mileage tax and a gas tax, and find that they are similar for most vehicles. The findings suggest that European gas taxes may be much closer to optimal levels than the US gas tax.

In an environment of wealth inequality, this seems like another way that the wealthy can benefit: easily afford to drive heavier vehicles that increase their personal safety while increasing the lethal threats against the poor.

How about instead: if larger vehicles are more dangerous for the population overall, then they should be banned for everyone, not only effectively off-limits to the poor.

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What if there was an additional tax on your income for driving a heavy vehicle?

In my country (Australia), we have an additional income tax if you don't have health insurance (point is to get more people to pay for private health insurance so the government's universal health care isn't as loaded). As a result, everyone earning over $xxx,xxx buys health insurance because it's literally cheaper than not getting it.

Imagine if the best income tax avoidance scheme was "don't own a big car"...

Isn't it relatively easy to bypass? The legal owner and the person that actually uses the car might be different people. E.g. a family might swap cars to lower their taxes.

That's why it's better to tax the energy itself directly. Instead of inventing a lot of complicated tax schemes and deductions and incentives, just increase the tax on gasoline/diesel. It steers people to fuel efficient cars, which steers the manufacturers to provide those cars.

The comment that started this thread though was about rich people being able to just pay the tax which is relatively smaller to them. Hence the idea to couple it to income.

Good point. Tie it to the registration cost.

You are right. And the simplest solution to this is to increase the cost of fuel /energy (typically by increasing taxes on it). This automatically directs us in the right direction. More fuel efficient cars. Or public transport and bicycles instead of cars.

Same with electricity. It also has to cost more. Right now electric cars are not very good for the environment either. They are bigger than necessary and consume too much electricity.

Unfortunately governments have never managed or dared to increase it. And unfortunately it often creates a lot of tension among the population.

The population likes to complain that it is the banks which are to blame (because the invest or lend to oil companies) or that the oil companies are to blame. But it is the people using the cars (unnecessarily big cars) which are to blame. And the politicians which do not enforce a higher cost on burning energy, by not increasing taxes on energy usage.

Due to the war in Ukraine we finally see some movement on this and it will become more important with energy efficiency and finally we see even governments send out flyers and inform of methods to save on energy. Why did they not do that before? There has been those COP meetings with presidents for over 20 years, but they have not been capable of doing the most basic things because they are afraid of affecting growth.

Unfortunately they don't understand that a fuel efficient car can transport as much as a non-fuel efficient car.

We had one of these, a carbon tax and cap-and-trade scheme, and it got dismantled after a few years :( forever unsure why "taxing externalities" isn't popular

If electricity is produced cleanly I don't think it should be more expensive though.

Is it only me or is there anyone else who believes that the price of gas or electricity should be set by supply/demand on the market and shouldn't be a political tool?

If there's a tax connected with it, this should be 100% used to just remove negative externalities (removing emissions, storage of nuclear waste...) and nothing else.

You and the parent aren't disagreeing. The problem is defining "negative externalities" which is inherently political.

> Right now electric cars are not very good for the environment either.

Relative to internal combustion engines, electric cars are better, even when you consider total lifecycle cost.

Yes, electric cars could be smaller. This is feasible technically with some range tradeoffs. The demand side is less clear.

While I generally agree with your sentiment, I think the health insurance example is not a good one. There are several factors that are wrong with it, for one people with insurance have advantages over people without, so you are creating a system where your access to healthcare depends on how much you earn. Secondly, it essentially creates an artifical market for insurances with pretty much guaranteed customers, the insurances don't even need to offer that much over the state system because it's cheaper anyway. If you want have the universal health care not be as loaded, simply raise income/wealth/other taxes and use that funding to prop up health care. That's a much fairer solution.

If you have insurance-based healthcare then you need some mechanism to prevent a death spiral.

I'm not sure I understand. The Australian system is weird that it isn't a insurance based system (like e.g. Germany), but they give tax insentives to high earners to get insurance. However those insurances don't pay for the basic stuff paid by the medicare system, but for extra things, for example you get faster treatment for elective surgery.

Doesn't it result in a similar scenario? Rich people can still opt to drive heavier cars and even fewer poorer people still cannot afford them.

I get that adding taxes is less fascist than straight bans, but it also raises inequality.

Instead of insurance deductibles, how about a third party accident claim payout strikeout limit? It could be quite high, say a million dollars or two, but this would still open the driver to unlimited liability for litigation in the event of reckless negligence litigation claims.

I would also set a mandatory minimum compensation level to unrepresented accident victims in a similar range, possibly paid in escrow for medical expenses and family care.

My thinking is partially in response to earlier comments about the wealthy just not being bothered by the cost of their own relative safety while driving the heaviest vehicles. That really ought to be tested imo.

Poor people drive pickup trucks too

And would be eventually priced out by something like this.

They'd drive them a lot less with European levels of gasoline tax.

Lots of poor people actually need those vehicles. They would just suffer from having to pay the taxes.

Do they really need a pickup truck? There are so many alternatives to carry around loads which are much lighter. What do you think construction workers and farmers use in Europe?

My farmer neighbour had one beatdown VW polo that he used for the field or the woods. Full motor swap for 500 €, a good car.

Mostly vans I believe. With roofrack or trailer if something longer is transported. Or just get it delivered by actual truck.

In Japan they mostly use Kei trucks, which weigh around 700 kg (1600 lbs).

I can count on one hand the time I have seen someone driving a pickup truck with something actually in the back of the truck -- and it doesn't even make sense to put anything in the back of the truck unless you bring a stepladder with you as well in case you need to retrieve it.

I work construction. at least half of the people on the same jobs as me drive their personal trucks 80km to work, park them until the end of the day, and drive home. Not a single tool in them.

The other half drive sedans.

Yeah my girlfriend works construction and drives a Honda Civic. It fits all her tools just fine. On the job she drives a company truck. Still 75% of her coworkers drive their own personal trucks to work. It is more of a cultural thing.

In my neck of the woods the foreman/boss often drive a nice pickup, but he never has anything on the flatbed. The guys actually building drive a Hiace or Sprinter or something like that (company vehicle).

You probably see a ton of trade vehicles with tools in them, you just don't associate them as personal vehicles. Or your project is only subbing out to commercial trade companies.

No, it's because I work in civil construction. "Tools" are brought to site on flatbed trailers or in panel vans. Foremen drive company branded pickups, they move smaller tools around site. Most crew drive their personal vehicles to site as described above, and the only gear they have is a safety vest, boots, and their lunch.

Not to mention that the IRS requires a vehicle to be at least 6000 pounds in order to deprecate for business purposes. Buying anything under 6000 pounds for business means paying more taxes.

Note that a 6000lb minimum rules out the f150, the best selling vehicle in North America. Tax considerations can't be too top of mind.

Not according to a google search for "6000 pounds vehicle list".

Doesn’t look like any of the 2021 F-150s are over 6000 pounds curb weight (1). It’s not particularly close, so I would expect most of the newer model would be under 6000 pounds too (I didn’t easily find the newer brochure)

(1) https://media.ford.com/content/dam/fordmedia/North%20America...

Curb weight is an irrelevant number, interesting only to calculate payload (which many ignore, albeit at their peril). The number of interest for regulators is Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR), as that's the manufacturer's specification of the heaviest the vehicle can be in as-sold configuration and still drive down the road safely.

Thanks for the clarification. The lowest GVWR among the f150s is about 6010 lbs which makes the IRS' apparently minimum weight make more sense.

> Curb weight is an irrelevant number, interesting only to calculate payload (which many ignore, albeit at their peril).

Not just their peril, also any road users or others nearby. If you've ever seen an overloaded pickup, they tend to drift around their lane as all the extra weight in the back reduces the steering authority on the front. Double so if it's pulling a badly loaded trailer that puts a lot of weight on the hitch

Lots of poor people work construction in Europe too, and they do fine without gigantic pickup trucks.

Sadly, pickups are becoming more and more common from what I've seen over the last couple years in London.

+1. Hardly ever have seen a pickup in germany. Most trade companies will use vans.

There's a tweet I read that says something along the lines, "as long as any change, despite how beneficial for most poor people will hurt some poor people, it is the progressive position such change is bad. From that the progressive position is keep everything the same."

The irony is of course that poor people disproportionately suffer from car fatalities, so "change" is already being wrought on them by the increasing size of cars and increasingly more expensive and difficult car culture. They just lack the voice (or awareness really) that middle class people who want to protect their position and privilege do, and the latter do not hesitate to use the poor as props whom they otherwise have contempt for the moment they need relief in other areas.

This is overly dismissive of a legitimate concern. Laborers, tradesmen, and people who can only afford a single vehicle that must meet all their needs predominately try to get trucks and SUVs.

Just because you can bike to work does not mean everyone else has the same luxury.

You can have vans with a front like regular cars, too. Where I live exactly zero carpenters have pickup trucks or SUVs.

There is never a need for SUVs in suburban settings.

Pickup trucks atleast has some theoretical utility.

Yeah let's ban everything that's vaguely dangerous.

The problem is there are some legitimate uses for a heavy vehicle.

99% of trips can be done in a 400kg LEV or even a 30kg single occupant vehicle, but some tasks legitimately require a 3 tonne truck.

Maybe add additional license classes with stricter requirements (like needing a per-trip permit for use in some areas) or move any new vehicle to existing heavy vehicle licenses?

> 99% of trips can be done in a 400kg LEV or even a 30kg single occupant vehicle, but some tasks legitimately require a 3 tonne truck.

If that's the case, it might be more economical to do the majority of work with a smaller vehicle, and rent the larger vehicle when necessary.

I more meant that the need effectively allows bad faith actors who want but do not need a large vehicle to leverage that legitimate need hold people who do not need or want a large vehicle hostage by filling the streets with them and constantly yelling about how small vehicles are dangerous.

The way out is difficult.

1% of 365 days is less than four days a year. So you say me you buy and drive an expensive, heavy and polluting vehicle that consumes a lot year long because you barely need it four days in the whole year.

Vs renting a generously sized truck when you really need it ?

It’s not worth it, either for you and for everyone else.

Buddy, my primary transport is a bicycle. If I need to go further I use a train. If I need to take stuff I usually use an industrial tricycle with a 250W motor. I only use an ICE vehicle if it's unsafe to go somewhere because LEVs are illegal and there are unavoidable which roads are built to kill me if I don't get in a protective metal box.

My point was the 1% of trips are used to make doing things the sane way unsafe and ban sensible vehicles from the road. Getting us out of this tarpit where you must join the murder brigade or be killed is the hard bit when you can't just ban them outright and any effective regulation would be an even worse mess of regulatory capture.

Ah yeah we definitly live in times where humanity can afford people who rationalize their behaviour like you.

I haven't had a car in 10 years now and guess what I do with the 1% of tasks I cannot do with the bicycle or public transport? I rent a transporter. Like any responsible inhabitant of a dying planet would.

Do you understand that what you do with a vehicle you can rent once or twice a year, some people do five days a week?

Do you understand that people wouldn't complain about people using their cars for their intended purpose?

Please read the comment I have reacted to which admits that "99% of the trips could be done in a smaller vehicle".

I challenge you to stand next to a crossing for 20 minutes during rush hour and count the number of SUVs with more than one person in it (or any visible load that warrants such a car). As someone who lived next to a big crossing I can tell you that you might have a hard time finding anybody that is not alone in their completely empty car. Big cars are mostly for the feelings of those sitting inside them, and very occasionally for transport.

Btw. I think every car has it's purpose. I mean trucks deliver nearly everything I eat and they are even bigger. But they aren ot driving around empty. But if every normal commuter would drive an empty 16 ton truck to work every day I would ask them if they are mad. And rightfully so.

Nitpick: the planet will be fine. The life currently inhabiting the planet will die or evolve (if trends continue). It's not the first time such a catastrophic event has occurred, and it won't be the last.

What behavior? I don't drive a car.

I worked in the trades for a little and primarily focused on tile and odd carpentry/framing jobs when someone called out.

Nearly all of my material got delivered in one day, but the job would continue for weeks afterwards. I would drive my Prius and catch flak from some guys until they realized I could do everything they could do in their light duty trucks and get 3-5x the MPG. I can carry a handful of sheet goods, bunch of studs, hardware, etc. If something needed more than that having it delivered made more sense as my time is more expensive than the delivery driver’s time. In the rare occasion I was slow we would rent a Home Depot flatbed truck for a couple of hours.

I think most people overestimate how often they need large trucks for work and could get away with something much much smaller.

Then hire a 3 tonne truck for those 1% of trips when they happen. People acting like "oh because I need it for 1% of trips I guess I should just drive it for all trips".

Yeah but it's not as big of a problem. Sure, no one driving SUVs is a slightly better outcome than only rich people driving them but the main gain is in preventing majority from driving them.

Straight up ban is just very unlikely to happen for political reasons while making it more and more expensive and inconvenient might work.

You are correct. The same mistake is made with emissions, like London's LEZ/ULEZ.

The enforcement is a fixed fee and the criteria allows large new vehicles even if their emissions per passenger are much worse than many disallowed small older vehicles. The rich get to not care.

Yup, things like 8L Lambos are ULEZ compliant! Giant Rolls SUVs, also compliant.

What a fucking joke.

How about we stop attributing everything to an attack on the poor by the rich?

The paper actually does not show that larger vehicles are more dangerous for the population overall.

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