in fact, it is a progressive tax since reinvestments into public transit are phenomenal for the vast majority of low and middle Americans (and ALL the rest too, but especially those who can't afford a car in NYC)
In Manhattan only 22% of households own a car, and the number is probably a fraction of that in the congestion relief zone.
The guy who gets shafted here is the middle to upper middle class with a job that requires driving into NYC.
I'm sure any repairman would rather be doing 2x repair jobs in the time it'd take to do one + sitting in traffic for an extra thirty minutes. Most don't get paid to drive between jobs.
Or is land just far cheaper in Manhattan?
For the working contractors that need to drive their van around no matter what, the reduction in transit times seems like a big benefit.
There could be, and are, (truly) progressive normal taxes that could be invested into public transit. And now there's a reduced pressure to use tax money for public transit, so it can be used for a nice tax break.
City planning seems to be a particularly inflexible issue on this forum, possibly because the majority of this board are upper-middle income, urban, childless, 20-30s males.
Most in the thread seem to miss the fact that flat congestion pricing (even with the 50% reduction for those making <50K), is regressive, like a carbon tax. It's made progressive by allocating the revenues to transit upgrades, which would outsizely benefit lower income communities. But as you say, the redistributions aren't liquid, so progressive feels like a slight stretch.
Here in Canada, the carbon tax is regressive (carbon consumption is not graded as steeply as income is). However, the canada carbon rebate redistributes all revenues flatly, and makes this scheme truly progressive. Though some debate can be had about liquidity diffs of tax-at-use and rebate at end-of-year.
It is okay to admit a scheme is not progressive, and still support it!
I've made that very argument here in favour of higher tolls, but I'd like to see if it's actually happening.
A tax doesn't have to hit just the poorest people to effect the poor. This probably hits middle-upper middle the hardest, and anyone taking a hired car (like a cab) as well* (There's a chance that sort of fee is elsewhere, like the medallion registration).
The correct place to levy the fee is on demand sources that draw people into the area at given times. Reduced fees should be offered to business that schedule shifts earlier or later to avoid the congestion windows.
The change here is also reporting when those hours are worked, possibly to local govs instead of just state/national, and then a zoned tax based on the start and stop times relative to 'congestion windows'. Similarly with 'open hours' for businesses.
That seems more simple and more direct than taxing individual people, taxing the drive of the demand instead.