Wyo. punishes electric car owners with new taxes

BY HUGH SELWAY

The definition of “arbitrary and capricious” is doing something according to one’s will or fancy. Therefore, it conveys a tendency toward the abuse of the possession of power.

The Wyoming Legislature introduced HB0166 in 2019, raising the fees assessed on electric vehicles from $50 to $200. 

Wyoming, already one of the most expensive states in which to own a vehicle, decided that the 171 electric vehicles in the state should pay quadruple the fee already attached to

Wyoming lawmakers use taxes to punish electric car owners.

 registering those cars. State Rep. Landon Brown of Laramie County justified that by saying, according to the Associated Press, that this would “offset state fuel taxes not being paid by owners of hybrid and electric vehicles.” 

While I understand the need to collect revenue to maintain state roads, this $200 fee puts Wyoming at the top of yet another list of “most expensive states.” That seems antithetical to the state’s generally skeptical, libertarian view on taxation and is at odds with the Republican Party’s state platform on taxation.

The $200 fee would generate $34,000 in revenue. This, of course, would pay for almost two years of flowers in planters for Cheyenne. While hardly even a blip on the bottom line for the state, given that Wyoming took in approximately $170 million from fuel taxes in 2018, it is a four-times increase in costs to the owners of these vehicles.

Originally, the bill included hybrid vehicles, which shows the outright fantastical imagination and failed reasoning of some of our fine elected representatives.

During the legislative session, Brown defended this quadrupling of taxes by telling voters, “I brought this bill forward due to the fact that electric and hybrid vehicles weigh more than their counterparts in gasoline engines.” 

That tells us he didn’t bother to actually collect any real data, instead relying only on what he imagines to be true. He said this in defense of the hybrid fees, which were thankfully later removed by the Senate. Tell this to a Wyomingite who owns a Ford C-Max (curb weight 3,600 pounds with 40 miles per gallon combined average fuel economy). Clearly this, when compared to a RAM 2500 4x4 Hemi (curb weight 7,100 pounds, 19 mpg), is an absolute pig of a car – in Brown’s imagination land. In reality world, they run about the same, pound for pound, excluding the RAM’s class-leading 19,000-pound towing capacity.

For a straight-up electric vehicle, the one which would see this extra tax, it is easy to show the extreme cost disparity. 

Using a Nissan Leaf, comparing it to a similar-sized Honda Fit, the chasm becomes plainly obvious. That Honda sees a combined average of 34 mpg. Given that the average miles an American drives is 14,425 per year, a one can easily see that this Honda will burn through about 425 gallons of gas, paying $101.82 in fuel taxes per year. 

Tell us again why that Nissan Leaf is supposed to pay $200. That 7,100-pound Ram only pays $182 per year. 

This fee is not about bringing electric vehicle taxes to parity. Rather, it clearly is punitive.

Regardless, at the end of the day, the Legislature is asking individuals to further subsidize the trucking industry and has decided that any movement to live a more efficient lifestyle should be penalized. 

The history from past decades of state government’s habit of ignoring opportunities to diversify the state economy and build better infrastructure and amenities to attract newer businesses and industries, instead choosing to gloat about the ever-shrinking boom years, has cost us dearly. 

Now it is just government lashing out at small populations while it slowly drowns in its own hubris. So get in line, citizen, and open that checkbook.

Hugh Selway is a resident of Cheyenne.