Sign Up for the State’s VMT Pilot Program – Please!

Sometimes, you have to take one for the team. In this case, it involves signing up for the California Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) tax pilot program.

Why should you join such an effort, why go through the form-filled rigmarole and take part in a program that you – as a normal person – do not at all want to see succeed?

Actually, that’s exactly why. When these pilot programs have been performed around the country (and once here in California) in the past they have consistently come back with amazing results.

They’re popular!  They’re fair!  They’re wonderful!  They’re easy!  And, while it may be through taxation and surveillance, you’re doing your part to save the planet.

A quick recap: a VMT tax would “replace” the taxes currently paid at the pump with a per-mile fee.  The system would necessitate some form of tracking (transponder, maybe the “digital license plate” the state has been pushing, etc.) of a driver’s car usage.  And depending upon what form the tax takes, the system would not just count miles but where and where they were driven – higher tax rates during rush hour and/or in downtowns, additional fees for having a commute that is deemed too long, daring to drive downtown, etc.

The idea is adored by government bureaucrats and loathed by the general public.

But there’s a very specific reason why pilot programs like the one the state is signing people up for right now always show the idea of taxing people for every mile they drive is somehow more popular than free ice cream: it’s because the only people that sign up for them are already in favor of the idea.

The pilot programs  appeal to a very specific group of people: they already lean green, they are people who do not necessarily find the idea of the government monitoring them every time they get in their car, they’re pretty much technocratic busy-bodies to begin with, and – of course – there is that wonderful feeling of profitable self-righteousness that comes with participation.

“See everyone – I care!  Why don’t you?”

Therefore, the programs are essentially self-selecting because very few regular people join, hence the consistently overwhelmingly positive results.

Both Oregon and Utah report their volunteer (a very important word that typically in government world gets replaced with mandatory after a few years)  programs are very popular. When California did one eight years ago, it reported that  90% of people would do it again, 85% were satisfied, 78% said they believed their data to be secure, and 73% said it was a fairer system than paying gas taxes at the pump.

So what can be done to ensure that this year’s program could actually even vaguely reflect reality?  Having real people sign up.

A broader, far more diverse (the good kind of diverse, you know, the thought and idea kind) group could return a result that would not be instantly touted as showing overwhelming support for an idea that actual polling shows the public actually hates.

Sure, CalTrans would have to throw away the press releases they’ve already drafted for next year announcing the success of the program (they just leave the numbers blank for now,) but a real study with real results could at least temporarily tap the brakes on the concept at the state level at least.  Admittedly, a national pilot program was in the Biden infrastructure bill and LA is expected to roll out its own not at all very volunteer pilot program in the next year   so no matter what the VMT will keep poking its head up here and there for some time.

But isn’t intentionally queering – skewing, modifying, whatever –  the data collected unfair?  In this case, absolutely not because, again, of the self-selection problem.

Adding normal people will essentially queer the data towards, well, normalcy –  if enough people sign up.

And how do you sign up?  Well, here’s the website   and here’s the flier explaining what’s involved.  

What do you need to do?  Well, sign up by the end of the month, so in the next week or so.  Then in July you find out if you’re in and then in August the fun begins.  From August through next January, you track how many miles you drive and then you pay the VMT tax every month (it seems the state is looking at something like 3 cents-a-mile for the pilot, but do not expect that number to hold if an actual VMT is rolled out.)

Now, you still have to pay tax at the pump but you get that back at the end, most likely through a registration fee deduction (EV drivers may get an equivalent reward, too.)

And you fill out a few surveys and that’s about it – Oh, and you get $400 in gift cards for taking part ($100 near the beginning and the other $300 if you finish the program properly.)

So, if you don’t want a permanent mandatory VMT tax that involves a government bureaucracy that could only be some kind of combination of the IRS and DMV following you everywhere you go, do consider joining the program.  Our future is in your hands.

But I wouldn’t tell them the Globe sent you.

Thomas Buckley is the former mayor of Lake Elsinore, Cal. a Senior Fellow at the California Policy Center, and a former newspaper reporter.  He is currently the operator of a small communications and planning consultancy and can be reached directly at planbuckley@gmail.com. You can read more of his work at his Substack page.