Why are bikes so expensive…

[Vorpal]

This thread from a couple of years ago has a link to a study that shoows every EU citizen pays about £600 per year towards the costs of motoring.
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=71313

[[XAP]Bob]

Actually is more spent on roads and other traffic related expenditure than is received in direct motoring taxes. According to this £58 billion was raised from motorists in taxes directly related to car use in 2010-11 and £7.7 billion spent on roads , both new build and maintenance. That leaves 51.3 billion for other vehicle related stuff - just what is that vast sum spent on?

The external costs of motoring - google with externalities as part of the search term and find things like this:
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov. ... nsport.pdf

There is another £40 billion without even looking at the health cost of inactivity...Strokes cost the NHS £7billion/year, Diabetes costs ~£10billion/year

[MartinC]

I said total taxation paid by car drivers - this includes income tax, VAT , council tax etc. I would suggest the total tax paid by car drivers is much higher than that paid by non drivers and subsidises the latter.........................

What a strange and precious argument. In your view then drivers aren't obliged to take their share of all state spending but all their tax is predicated on roads and non drivers pick up the tab for the rest.

Every time I've seen figures the direct spending on roads exceeds the income from Fuel Tax and VED by a country mile (and the difference would be astronomic if you included the indirect costs). I didn't realise motorists weren't obliged to pay for anything else.

[Postboxer]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

[[XAP]Bob]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

So are alcoholics subsidising the rest of us?

Tax isn't predicated - revenue and spending are separate decisions (although their sums ought to balance over $time_period)

The fact that I pay tax when I buy beer doesn't fund breweries, and neither should it.

For some reason motorists believe that they are "paying for the roads", when in fact we all pay for the roads - that's kind of the point of taxation.
They then try to claim ownership and additional privilege, based on this assumption, and despite the fact that the cost of motoring is net negative to society (i.e. the damage done is paid for out of income tax and other "non motoring" taxes).

The figures deliberately do not offset motoring-connected taxes unless they are specifically ringfenced for car use, for example a motorway toll where the money is set aside for highway maintenance. The authors argue that other motoring levies form part of the general tax pot and are no more reserved for the impact of cars than alcohol duties are reserved for healthcare or policing drink-fuelled disorder.

Even if motoring taxes were taken into account there remains a significant shortfall in the UK. Fuel duty and its associated VAT along with vehicle excise duty contribute around £38bn a year to the Treasury's coffers, £10bn less than the estimated cost.

So - general taxation is subsidising the motorist to the tune of £10 billion/year
31 million cars getting handouts of more than £300 each from general taxation (*after* getting back all the tax they pay)

[Mark1978]

Quite so; which is why requiring railways to make a 'profit' but treating the roads entirely differently is never going to work.

Governments have recognised that roads are good for the economic development of the country, and railways are the same. Dare I say that cycling infrastructure falls under that category too.

[[XAP]Bob]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

The average cyclist earns even more...

So we should get excellent cycle paths...

Progressive taxation is an excellent model for paying for the general needs of a country - it supports those who can't afford to pay very much in the same manner as it supports those who can afford to (avoid) pay a great deal.

[OnYourRight]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

But even if that were true, what has it got to do with the topic under discussion? It’s a perfect non sequitur.

Driving has significant uncosted externalities that have long been ignored. Cars are as popular as they are because they’re much cheaper than they would be if their full costs were borne directly by their owners.

The situation reminds me of air travel. Did you know that aviation fuel is not charged excise duty? It’s not taxed! This bizarre anomaly exists for some historic reasons and for some pragmatic reasons (e.g. if the UK or the EU taxed jet fuel but other countries didn’t, airliners would fill up outside their jurisdiction and burn even more fuel hauling massive quantities of cheap fuel around Europe).

Needless to say, the massive growth in low-cost airline travel depends heavily on jet fuel being untaxed while land-based competitors are taxed. So even though flying is many times less fuel-efficient than travelling by land (train, coach, etc.), and even though fuel is a huge cost of flying, in many cases it’s cheaper to fly across the country than to hop on a train.

[pete75]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

But even if that were true, what has it got to do with the topic under discussion? It’s a perfect non sequitur.

The topic under discussion is why are bikes so expensive so all discussion of whether or not drivers are subsidised is a non sequitur and it was wasn't me who first raised it.

[pete75]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

So are alcoholics subsidising the rest of us?

Tax isn't predicated - revenue and spending are separate decisions (although their sums ought to balance over $time_period)

The fact that I pay tax when I buy beer doesn't fund breweries, and neither should it.

For some reason motorists believe that they are "paying for the roads", when in fact we all pay for the roads - that's kind of the point of taxation.
They then try to claim ownership and additional privilege, based on this assumption, and despite the fact that the cost of motoring is net negative to society (i.e. the damage done is paid for out of income tax and other "non motoring" taxes).

The figures deliberately do not offset motoring-connected taxes unless they are specifically ringfenced for car use, for example a motorway toll where the money is set aside for highway maintenance. The authors argue that other motoring levies form part of the general tax pot and are no more reserved for the impact of cars than alcohol duties are reserved for healthcare or policing drink-fuelled disorder.

Even if motoring taxes were taken into account there remains a significant shortfall in the UK. Fuel duty and its associated VAT along with vehicle excise duty contribute around £38bn a year to the Treasury's coffers, £10bn less than the estimated cost.

So - general taxation is subsidising the motorist to the tune of £10 billion/year
31 million cars getting handouts of more than £300 each from general taxation (*after* getting back all the tax they pay)

The total amount contributed to treasury from taxes associated with motoring is £58 billion ie 10 billion more than your estimated cost of 48 billion os no subsidy for motorists. You are just quoting the figure raised from fuel taxes and ved but you should also include VAT on car sales, company car tax and insurance premium tax. The figures for 2011 -12 are these in billions. I'd guess the total paid is higher taking into account VAT on car parts, accessories and servicing.

Total Taxes £58.0
Fuel duty £26.9
VAT on Fuel £9.9
Vehicle Excise Duty £6.0
VAT on Car Sales £8.5
Company Car Tax £3.7
Insurance Premium Tax £2.9

[[XAP]Bob]

I don't think that is what he is arguing. Assuming the average car driver earns more than the average non-driver, then they are paying proportionally more income tax, VAT and so on.

So are alcoholics subsidising the rest of us?

Tax isn't predicated - revenue and spending are separate decisions (although their sums ought to balance over $time_period)

The fact that I pay tax when I buy beer doesn't fund breweries, and neither should it.

For some reason motorists believe that they are "paying for the roads", when in fact we all pay for the roads - that's kind of the point of taxation.
They then try to claim ownership and additional privilege, based on this assumption, and despite the fact that the cost of motoring is net negative to society (i.e. the damage done is paid for out of income tax and other "non motoring" taxes).

The figures deliberately do not offset motoring-connected taxes unless they are specifically ringfenced for car use, for example a motorway toll where the money is set aside for highway maintenance. The authors argue that other motoring levies form part of the general tax pot and are no more reserved for the impact of cars than alcohol duties are reserved for healthcare or policing drink-fuelled disorder.

Even if motoring taxes were taken into account there remains a significant shortfall in the UK. Fuel duty and its associated VAT along with vehicle excise duty contribute around £38bn a year to the Treasury's coffers, £10bn less than the estimated cost.

So - general taxation is subsidising the motorist to the tune of £10 billion/year
31 million cars getting handouts of more than £300 each from general taxation (*after* getting back all the tax they pay)

The total amount contributed to treasury from taxes associated with motoring is £58 billion ie 10 billion more than your estimated cost of 48 billion os no subsidy for motorists. You are just quoting the figure raised from fuel taxes and ved but you should also include VAT on car sales, company car tax and insurance premium tax. The figures for 2011 -12 are these in billions. I'd guess the total paid is higher taking into account VAT on car parts, accessories and servicing.

Total Taxes £58.0
Fuel duty £26.9
VAT on Fuel £9.9
Vehicle Excise Duty £6.0
VAT on Car Sales £8.5
Company Car Tax £3.7
Insurance Premium Tax £2.9

I was quoting figures from 5 years ago - since that's the only stat set I have access to.

Company car tax is merely income tax paid on "non financial" remuneration, but frankly I'm going to be kind and just point you back to the original article - they looked at motoring related income in the relevant year. I'm sure that if I used 2004 numbers for part of the discussion I could skew the result in either direction as well...

Private motoring is heavily subsidised - this is the reason it appears to be so cheap.

Anyone arguing that it doesn't appear cheap needs to come up with some other reason that >75% households have a car (and I imagine that some noticeable proportion of that 25% are city folk who simply don't need one).

[MartinC]

...............................
Total Taxes £58.0
Fuel duty £26.9
VAT on Fuel £9.9
Vehicle Excise Duty £6.0
VAT on Car Sales £8.5
Company Car Tax £3.7
Insurance Premium Tax £2.9

This is the special pleading that's being challenged. The only taxes specific to motoring are Fuel Duty and VED. All the rest are general taxation e.g all benefits in kind are taxable which is why there's company car tax etc. If you really want to include all the indirect receipts then you need to include all the indirect costs - like pollution, congestion, health, etc. etc. The indirect costs/benefits are hard to quantify and contentious so to be consistent you need to compare the direct costs to the country and the driver. The direct costs for all of us are road building and maintenance, policing and the direct health costs (dealing short and long term with the 200,000 people killed or injured every year).

[al_yrpal]

Nether the less its all very interesting. Keep it up!
Al (op)

[[XAP]Bob]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/thinking ... price.html

Externalities of £100 billion?
I've not looked up their basis yet

[mjr]

Anyone arguing that it doesn't appear cheap needs to come up with some other reason that >75% households have a car (and I imagine that some noticeable proportion of that 25% are city folk who simply don't need one).

Network effects: it's difficult to switch from a private car to mass transport or car-share or whatever if few others near you do because the service level will be poor. What price do you put on convenience?

On reflection, that's a fun twist on space4cycling too: there's a few words about latent demand in the Design Manual for Roads and Bridges and providing for it, but I don't think there's any good method for assessing it, is there? Similar problem: if few cycle in an area, the service level from government for cycling there is usually poor.

I think it's also worth remembering that 75% households having access to a car (the usual wording I've seen) does not mean that the car is available for 75% of household journeys and so on. Sure, there are some households where every driving-licensed occupant has a car, but not all.

My informed belief is that private motoring is in receipt of public subsidy, but it's only an informed belief (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayesian_probability) because there are some difficult decisions about where you draw the line between direct and indirect costs, such as what about government-provided parking? http://freakonomics.com/2013/03/13/park ... o-podcast/