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None of those things are real then tony fi or have a cost?
Monbiot has some discussion of it here. I have read a more expanded referenced version of this but cannot find it now. I'm not going to waste more time on this because you will dismiss it no matter what as its not what yo9u want to hear nor does it mesh with the pro car propaganda pumped out
https://www.monbiot.com/2000/08/03/drivers-are-undertaxed/
I just tried to ballpark quantify the per-car the lost revenues from EVs replacing ICEs.
I reckon a petrol car doing 45mpg for 12,000 miles a year paying £1.45 a litre will be paying 1,051 in duties and taxes.
(1,264 litres used - duty = 1,264*0.5295 = £722 duty. The VAT proportion of total fuel bill of 1,264 is £329)
To match that with an EV would need an overall tax rate of £1,051 / 12,000miles = 8.5 pence per mile.
Some tax is already taken via VAT for electricityg. Lets assume 3.7 miles/hw.hr and an average cost per kw.hr of 15p (kind of an average between cheap home charging and some motorway charging). Total cost would have been £486, which would have brought in £81 of VAT. This makes the "missing" tax/duty revenue close enough to a round £1,000.
So it looks like about 8p per mile ish is needed to recoup fuel duty & VAT incomes.
Or to add a duty / increase the rate of VAT on electricity used for charging vehicles. Problem there is how to control it. You could make the vehicle report kW.hrs added over the year and charge duty on the kw.hrs used instead of on the miles driven? The tech is clearly there (my i4 can show me graphs of both these things via the cars app). That would be a duty of £1,0000 / 3,300kw.hr = 30p per kw.hr
Or... a flat charge of an additional £1,000 a year on top of an equivalent existing ICE VED rates. That's a bit unfair I think as whilst the charge could vary for different vehicle classes it doesn't account for mileage so someone who does 1k a year pootling the shops pays the same as someone doing 25K miles a year.
So - ignoring political realities and "selling it to the people" etc, if I was in charge of this and could not just move the tax burden elsewhere (non-doms / millionaires anyone?) I would just scrap yearly VED and impose either an 8p/mile driving duty or a 30p/kw.hr duty. Or a balance between VED and this to make it less painful to swallow. Average out at £500/yr VED and halve the duty maybe.
There is also a rather interesting article from Oxera at the link below which includes some quantification of overall tax takes from VED and Fuel Duty (£25BN vs £7.4BN in 2022/23) and looks at some future alternatives.
He is the UK govewrnment estimates of the costs of road collisions deaths etc
total annual cost 15 billion if I have read it right in 2012 - less accidents now but obviously the costs will be greater per accident
Hmmm – I might be wrong but I don’t think that EV motor or gearbox bearings are typically designed as a maintainable part – they’re fit for life. Easily achievable by specifying the right parts and designing properly. Compared to industrial machines they will have a very easy life.
Lolwut?
Let's compare shall we, a pump running constantly with no load changes vs a motor running up and down and getting the life knocked out of it by rough roads, sudden load changes, axial loads and several things that could be out of balance due to wear and tear.
That's my point, car bearings have a terrible life and are designed to be as difficult to replace as possible. To replace mine you need a press to get them out the shell and a £300 tool to press them in without wrecking them, by contrast I've replaced industrial motor bearings with bearing pullers, heat and a drift. Why? What's wrong with a grease port and a squirt every service?
Seriously - car engine / gearbox duty cycles and life times are pretty light vs industrial applications. I’m talking engine / gearbox bearings here, not suspensionn / cv joints - they’re both different and also no different between ICE and EV.
Let’s looks at the lifespan of a car engine / motor gearbox. 150,000 miles life expectancy over circa 15 years ish. At an average of 40mph that’s 3,750 hours of run time. Most of which is at moderate load as car duty cycles have an extremely low load / something like 0.5% of their life at max power / torque as the peak capability is only there for transient performance / occasional overtakes.
Now let’s see what 3,750 hours life span gives on a 24/7 application which is quite common for industrial motors, pump: etc all of which use bearings.
3750/24/7 = 22 weeks. So a car gearbox would be dead in less than 6 months. And that’s not accounting for the higher industrial duty cycles such as the ISO prime PG rating where the average is 70% of the peak power or continuous where its 100%, only stopping for servicing.
Typical industrial product would have a 10+ year lifespan often more. Equivalent to millions of miles and several decades on a car. Look also at commercial trucks - they do several hundred thousand miles. So those applications have grease ports etc as they are needed.
So yes, in comparison to those applications the automotive duty cycle and life expectant e is pretty tame and grease ports etc ere not needed within its own expected lifetime - usually oil lubrication either pressure fed or splash is sufficient. I guess you’ve noticed that everyday cars don’t have “service / grease the bearings” on their service schedules - it’s a repair rather than PM action. also most cars die from the body shell rusting and general age related failures, not bearing wear out.
Re shock loading etc - again they have quite an easy life as they’re generally mounted to the body shell via rubber mounts, and the body shell is connected to the wheels via rubber mounts and the suspensio then finally the wheels are connected to the ground via pneumatic rubber tyres. So compared to industrial equipment they are positively cosseted.
By the way - your description of replacing car bearings makes it sound like you’re talking wheel bearings / CV joints. They are no different between an ICE and an EV so no change in approach is needed other than ensure they’re rated for the torque and weight.
You peddle this again and again like you’ve worked the numbers. I’m challenging you to provide actual numbers (rather than TJ facts) here otherwise we should dismiss you as a stopped clock.
You do know they’re often right, right?
In this case, twice a day, every day. Almost 100% correct.
They’re in many cities round here. I’ve been involved (on the car side) in two of the current clubs in Goteborg. Cars are cleaned and maintained regularly, most have dedicated club spots, with chargers if they are EV. Flagging a dirty or dangerous car takes 30-60 seconds and in most cases they’ll assign you another car within a 3-5 minute walk (or even the next parking space). Or a refund and compensation.
Sounds good I'll let him know. Is there a direct flight from Edinburgh airport ?
total annual cost 15 billion if I have read it right in 2012 – less accidents now but obviously the costs will be greater per accident
So less than half the amount raised in taxes on cars? Seems like a reasonable amount, and even if it wasn't other methods of transport are not 100% safe
Yes – so that is just one of the costs of cars – add in roads and all the other stuff and car drivers are hugely subsidized from general taxation
You say that often but never seem to have any figures to back it up. Total road spending is around 11bn, the injuries thing is maybe 15bn, road policing is small change so there's 8bn left spare till you get to the 34bn in fuel/ved, and that's before the other billion or so in toll roads and low emissions zones, and a further billion in parking profit. To be "hugely subsidized" I'd expect an extra 20bn or so in government spend that's not accounted for.
Yes – so that is just one of the costs of cars – add in roads and all the other stuff and car drivers are hugely subsidized from general taxation
You’ve only provided some accident costs from 2013 nothing else and still insist on peddling your nonsense propaganda as you haven’t a clue on the actual costs.
Tick tock please stop.
Tony doesn’t need to provide data - it’s TJ who is the one pushing this argument.
It's Tony that's being asked.
I would also argue that trying is seperate out the total “costs of motoring” is a fools errand. Society has road transport so closely intertwined into how we function that the costs are arguably showing up most everywhere, but equally so are the benefits. E.g. take road transport away and you would not have food on the supermarket shelves, indeed there would not be a supermarket as trucks would have been used to build it. Does that mean that a proportion of the tax take from
Supermarket sales can legitimately be used to fund roads and cars? That applies to every other economic and social activity that depends on cars and road transport.
I think that the current answer is yes - tax revenue is mostly pooled and used where appropriate.
That’s not to say that TJ doesn’t have a point but to continue down the rabbit hole he’s taking is on would require a wholesale re-evaluations and reworking of the entire economy to look at how it could work with an alternative to road transport. Whilst that is a noble quest it’s a bit out of scope from this thread.
TBH every time there's new research on the true cost of motoring, there's also a new set of figures... And they all disagree.
The only consistent thing from the academically inclined research is that there isn't a single government anywhere that actually makes motorists pay enough to cover the costs.
From what I can remember the most generous study I've seen regarding the UK gives about a 20% shortfall on 15 or so billion tax/VED/duty take, that was all direct spend on roads and infrastructure. Worst case is about 150%. But that included lots of intangible costs as well as the indirect spend.
I was going to post what @whatgoesup said. It's absurd to try and point the finger at "drivers" costing us a certain amount. Most of those drivers are driving places to do other things, many of which are quite important. Transport is vital for economic activity.
In the future we will need to minimise the need for transport, undoubtedly we will need to be far more efficient than we are now.
If you really wanted to purge out zero value jobs that would rip out a lot of the UK economy....
I’m not going to waste more time on this because you will dismiss it no matter what as its not what yo9u want to hear nor does it mesh with the pro car propaganda pumped out
From what I can remember the most generous study I’ve seen regarding the UK gives about a 20% shortfall on 15 or so billion tax/VED/duty take, that was all direct spend on roads and infrastructure. Worst case is about 150%. But that included lots of intangible costs as well as the indirect spend.
The total tax on motorists is 46bn -
7.5bn ved
24.8bn fuel duty
12bn vat
1bn parking
1bn low emissions/toll roads
15 bn of road spend wouldn't touch the sides
was going to post what @whatgoesup said. It’s absurd to try and point the finger at “drivers” costing us a certain amount. Most of those drivers are driving places to do other things, many of which are quite important. Transport is vital for economic activity.
If you want to include that as a positive then it also follows that there are a bunch more negatives to include - the costs of all the congestion ie the hours spent in traffic, the costs of the diseases of inactivity becauise folk no longer feel sdafe to walk or cycle etc etc
5lab - 15 billion of road spend, 15 billion of costs from all the death and disabilities then all the other costs
Well this has got quite silly. If TJ has his way the 15 minute city conspiracists might actualy have a point.
A lot of the cost of driving could be reduced with a bit of effort and investment, particularly the accident statistics, just enforce our current laws on emissions, road worthiness and driving rules.
VED is going to difficult to replace, or rather fuel duty will, it's the perfect tax at the moment, very hard to avoid and penalises people doing large numbers of miles, driving inefficiently and driving in congested areas. I cant see any pay per mile system being very well policed. Maybe a large VED might a be a good thing, make those that really don't need a vehicle think twice, a headline yearly cost is harder to swallow than paying it each time you fill up.
"If you want to include that as a positive then it also follows that there are a bunch more negatives to include"
That is exactly my point. All the positives and negatives have to be considered together. When you try and do that it fairly quickly becomes an exercise to model almost all of current society as whole - transport is so integrated that it can't be disconnected from just about anything.
TJ - can I please ask that you drop this much wider discussion, so that the thread can focus on the question of replacing duties and taxes from ICEs with EVs which I think was its intent.
If you would like a discussion of overall societal taxation and how society can move away from cars as a whole then please start a thread on it. It would be a very valuable, interesting discussion and would help to avoid this one being pulled further down the rabbit hole.
If you want to include that as a positive then it also follows that there are a bunch more negatives to include – the costs of all the congestion ie the hours spent in traffic, the costs of the diseases of inactivity becauise folk no longer feel sdafe to walk or cycle etc etc
Absolutely. Just don't over-simplify it. It's an extremely complicated situation, I reckon it's nearly impossible to un-pick the effects that road spend has on the economy.
I’d disagree with the “many”.
A vast number of people in traffic every day could just as easily stay home, they either do something that is completely zero value, or could do it from home.
Yes, that's a point for debate. I'm anti-road and pro-PT in general, I just don't think you can do simple costings when you don't really know the benefit.
TJ – can I please ask that you drop this much wider discussion,
I would rather he move it to the EV thread 🙂
penalises people doing large numbers of miles, driving inefficiently and driving in congested areas.
Hmm I disagree a little. I think that whilst most of the traffic in urban areas is producing bad congestion and emitting a lot per mile, the number of miles done is quite low. You get through FAR more fuel commuting 80 miles each way on a motorway than you do 4 miles each way in a city.
"TJ – can I please ask that you drop this much wider discussion,
I would rather he move it to the EV thread 🙂"
Oh god no - please don't!!!! It's about economics and society as a whole, not EVs.
Topics like like tend to completely detail whatever thread they're attached to.
This is a topic needs its own thread.
@tjagain - can you please start a thread on this ? Something like "Benefits and problems of road transport - how could we could do better" or similar ?
Seriously – car engine / gearbox duty cycles and life times are pretty light vs industrial applications. I’m talking engine / gearbox bearings here, not suspensionn / cv joints – they’re both different and also no different between ICE and EV.
Let’s looks at the lifespan of a car engine / motor gearbox. 150,000 miles life expectancy over circa 15 years ish. At an average of 40mph that’s 3,750 hours of run time. Most of which is at moderate load as car duty cycles have an extremely low load / something like 0.5% of their life at max power / torque as the peak capability is only there for transient performance / occasional overtakes.
Now let’s see what 3,750 hours life span gives on a 24/7 application which is quite common for industrial motors, pump: etc all of which use bearings.
3750/24/7 = 22 weeks. So a car gearbox would be dead in less than 6 months. And that’s not accounting for the higher industrial duty cycles such as the ISO prime PG rating where the average is 70% of the peak power or continuous where its 100%, only stopping for servicing.
Typical industrial product would have a 10+ year lifespan often more. Equivalent to millions of miles and several decades on a car. Look also at commercial trucks – they do several hundred thousand miles. So those applications have grease ports etc as they are needed.
So yes, in comparison to those applications the automotive duty cycle and life expectant e is pretty tame and grease ports etc ere not needed within its own expected lifetime – usually oil lubrication either pressure fed or splash is sufficient. I guess you’ve noticed that everyday cars don’t have “service / grease the bearings” on their service schedules – it’s a repair rather than PM action. also most cars die from the body shell rusting and general age related failures, not bearing wear out.
Re shock loading etc – again they have quite an easy life as they’re generally mounted to the body shell via rubber mounts, and the body shell is connected to the wheels via rubber mounts and the suspensio then finally the wheels are connected to the ground via pneumatic rubber tyres. So compared to industrial equipment they are positively cosseted.
Not so sure about all that. In an EV peak torque will happen at almost every acceleration. Most EV motors are coupled directly (almost) to wheels, so less cossetted than an RWD car for sure. Most EV motors will have a max rotation speed significantly in excess of a ICE or even most industrial motors at over 12000RPM and even at moderate speed will be rotating far faster than an ICE and over a much wider range of temperatures.
The bearing in out i3 started to go at 80k miles, so not a long life.
@whatgoesup I'm not going to break that down as I'm on my phone so bear with me.
Yes, my point about shitty proprietary tools is in relation to wheel bearings. I expect @mert is better placed to inform me better but it seems like either a cynical way to rinse folk and keep things in network or badly executed reliability engineering.
FWIW I'd probably have paid for the tool and press a couple of times over if I'd replaced my own hub bearings. They're not that reliable.
You haven't considered my point about constant speed either. What is on/off/regen/off/on torque loading doing to any drivetrain bearing? People are ****ing useless and mechanical sympathy is a rare trait. Add in dynamic loading in all directions and the only equivalent I can think of with similar instability and hostile environment is a ship and they chew through ball bearings.
My point about motors is that in an industrial setting they are stable and will have good alignment (hopefully). On a car? C 'mon...
5lab – 15 billion of road spend, 15 billion of costs from all the death and disabilities then all the other costs
what are all the other costs? you're claiming that motorists are heavily subsidised, so far the maths has them costing £30bn and providing £45bn. For them to be heavily subsidised we're missing maybe £25bn of spend
Read the posts above. It details but does not quantify other costs - some of them.
Guys - the motor bearings are really NOT an issue.
They will be in perfectly adequate alignment as the position is controlled by the motor and gearbox casings which fix in place the bearings and the motor shaft plus output shaft connections. Any misalignment would be via the drive shafts which have CV joints at either end - designed specially to deal with misalignment
Changing loading doesn’t do too luck to the bearings as it’s primarily torsional / the bearings don’t see torsional stress (which is kinda the whole point of a bearing), they would only see any reaction loadings which are quite easy to calculate and design for. EVs don’t see instant peak torque every time they set off - no one drives like that (you’d destroy your tyres and make your family sick within no time) but even if they did the bearings should be designed with those loadings as an input to the design process.
Rotational speed is easy to deal with too - bearings are easily designed for way in recess if EV rotational speeds which are something like 10-15k max.
Re multi directional loadings - the driverrain of a car is specifically designed to avoid this (including ICE). You use the CV joint design to take this away, have a sufficiently highly rated bearing at the output shaft location to cope with higher and variable tangential loadings (axial generally absorbed by having a splined shaft design) and from that point onearsa as you travel into the differential (they still have those), gearbox and motor everything is controlled by the casing which can be designed to be as stiff as it’s needed.
They are also easily protected against dirt or water ingress via seals. Not a new design needed as existing car output shaft seal designs still work - just carryover.
Seriously - bearings are NOT a limiting factor. Of course manufacturing defects and poor designs happen. If specified and designed properly they are easily capable to last the life of a vehicle with no maintenance.
Note - this doesn’t apply to CV joints and wheel bearings which do see all manner of unpleasant loads, but they are simply carryover from ICE cars so are no better or worse.
Also - this has no relation to the bearings on mountain bikes which die regularly due to dirt and water ingress as it’s not practical to seal them robustly enough - the seals would be significantly deeper, and higher friction so with bikes we just accept that they are replaceable.
Re wheel bearings - on my VW they were bolt-on hub units with the bearings already in - fantastic and easy to change. On the Merc they were two sets of roller bearings with separate races; the outers had to be pressed in and out of the hub; you need a dial indicator to set the right play and the rear seal which has the ABS sensor ring pressed into it had to be pushed in flush, but not too far as they were made to be able to be pressed in about 1mm too far FFS. It was a right faff. You can however also buy the whole unit ready installed but, y'know, it was more expensive...
A lot of weird thread policing going on here. If a topic that is a core element of the thread subject doesn't interest you - don't talk about it...
1bn parking
lol there's no world in which paying for parking is a "tax"
10-15k max
Try 22-25k max. Most run to ~20k, give or take. Biggest issue is rotor balance and clipping the stator at higher speeds. Which also can mangle the bearings.
Comparing industrial and automotive bearings is a pointless exercise.
The whole deck of design requirements is totally different. Industrial is serviceability, steady loads, maximum MTBF, weight, cost and size are a way down the list. Cost, size and weight are a big deal in auto, loads fluctuate wildly, MTBF is done by testing (i can plug an industrial bearing spec and loads into a calculator and get a moderately good estimation of B10 or B5 life, it's been around long enough that i used to do that on a Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet!), serviceability is tempered against cost of ownership, being able to swap a bearing quickly in a factory plant making a million quid a week is key. Automotive (much though i dislike the concept) it's cheaper to swap the assembly and make the bearing system simpler. 2-3 hours to swap the whole assembly, rather than 5 to dismantle, change the bearing, reassemble.
I've done both. Chemical plant equipment, pumps and mixers mainly and on the automotive side, transmission, head and bottom end, some super/turbo charger stuff and (obviously) xEV motors.
You could make an automotive bearing as durable and easy to replace as an industrial one, but the car would probably weigh 500 kilos more and cost twice as much. The performance would be dire as well. Industrial bearings are designed for steady state use, they even have start up and stop cycles programmed into most of them, to warm up, get the grease or oil moving before the loads hit. Try that with an average (or below average) driver, they'll trash the bearings in weeks.
Loads of other shit going on too. I'm glad i don't do bearing stuff anymore. It's bloody horrible.
@mert are car assemblies designed with repairability in mind as well as ease of initial assembly? Or just the latter? Does this really vary by manufacturer as it appears to us DIYers?
I agree with Mert / I think you’re saying what I was trying to say, but more eloquently. - yes, automotive is designed down to a price, weight, service life, no maintenance and size.
They are designed for the expected life of the vehicle and can be designed small enough, light enough and cheap enough whilst still not requiring maintenance for the life of the car.
One of those design requirements is no service, so they’re designed to not require any. If a failure happens (not expected wear out) then it’s a replacement job which usually means disassembling the gearbox and motor casing.
Hence why there are no grease ports and they’re not serviceable (which was the point where tangents off on to bearings in the first place.)
Industrial is a whole different ball game - loads and service life typically on a different order of magnitude, so the bearing can’t often realistically be designed for life of the product hence is designed to be easy to service and replace if neccesary.
Not all industrial bearings require careful start up type behaviour - but again that’s application specific and you would design the bearings to the required speec (for example we make industrial generators - the same basic set can do either a standby duty cycle whilst requires going from switched off to 4,000 ish BHP in a handful of seconds and also continous cycles where 60,000 hours life is expected before bearing overhaul.
“ are car assemblies designed with repairability in mind as well as ease of initial assembly? Or just the latter? Does this really vary by manufacturer as it appears to us DIYers?”
A bit of both. It depends on the system. For example an engine or an EV motor for that matter is intended to be fit for life so if it’s a pig to get out then the manufacturer will prioritise ease and speed of assembly, cost and packaging over easy servicing.
Changing brake pads and discs - designed for easy access.
Over the years are cars have become more reliable and do tend to die from old age body rot and things like cam shafts and con rod bearings do last the life of the car it’s tending more and more towards ease of assembly. Take liquid gasket rather than proper ones for sumps and rocker coverw for example.
Yes, it varies by manufacturer although most are trending towards cheap to assemble in order to stay competitive.
@mert are car assemblies designed with repairability in mind as well as ease of initial assembly?
It depends. Is the manufacturer interested in End Of Life extension i.e. do they want to keep their cars on the road for as long as possible. And how much extra cost/weight will they allow to enable this. (thinner, lighter, cheaper housings are crap for pressing new bearings in, but the assemblies can be cheaper, a trade off, and the machines the supplier will use are designed for the job, but adding split bearing housings costs a fortune).
Do we want customers fiddling with those bits? (Some DIYers really shouldn't be allowed to pick up a set of spanners, and oxy torch or a sledge hammer.)
Then we have the legislation, some markets have bits we aren't allowed to let customers fiddle with, and some have bits we legally have to let them fiddle with (EU Diagnostics stuff for example and some right to repair legislation).
So, yeah, it varies massively, both by manufacturer and component area.
there’s no world in which paying for parking is a “tax”
its income to the government (local) which can be used to pay for things, so offsets any costs from that local goverment (looking after roads) that they may incur. It reduces any "subsidy" that may exist (but doesn't)
Interesting.
Is the manufacturer interested in End Of Life extension i.e. do they want to keep their cars on the road for as long as possible
I do wonder if longevity is important to certain brands. I see a lot of older Mercedes driving around, perhaps these are important as advetising; but it's probably quite an expensive thing for a manufacturer to cultivate and must be hard to quantify a return on that investment. Looking at how things are made on the Merc Vs the Nissan we had I get the feeling the Germans do things because they think that's the way things should be done, not for a calculated economic reason.
I do wonder if longevity is important to certain brands. I see a lot of older Mercedes driving around, perhaps these are important as advetising; but it’s probably quite an expensive thing for a manufacturer to cultivate and must be hard to quantify a return on that investment. Looking at how things are made on the Merc Vs the Nissan we had I get the feeling the Germans do things because they think that’s the way things should be done, not for a calculated economic reason.
I think its far simpler than that - expensive cars take longer to reach the point at which they're no longer economical to repair. This is easy to spot if you look at certain cars - there's far more (as a percentage of new) 80s ferraris and lamboghinis (which had truely terrible build quality) on the road than there are w126 merc S classes (which were built like battleships). the mercs were simply run into the ground at 15 years old, whereas someone stuck the ferrari in a shed and paid for any repairs to keep it tip-top
You're right, but Merc aren't repairing a lot of these old cars so why do they care if it's easy to replace stuff?
Brand image, residuals, JDPower type stuff.
If stuff is "extra" durable, it doesn't fail early, and if it's easy/possible to repair customers tend not to complain so loudly, so reliability surveys improve by more than the actual reliability does. Second hand value improves, lease cost drops sales improve. See lots of really old cars on the road, you're more likely to buy a second hand one, as it'll last...
One large german manufacturer did this in the 90's/00's, let lots of stuff that usually wouldn't have been covered by warranty slide. So their actual reliability was somewhere middle of the road, but customer complaints were far lower than would be expected. Cost them a lot of cash (but they had a lot of cash at the time), they still have a reputation for excellent reliability. Even though the numbers show that they aren't anything special (maybe top 3rd of the market? Haven't looked for a while.)
Tony: what do you think are the actual costs, then? I’m challenging you to provide actual numbers.
I haven’t a clue which is why I asked. TJ thinks he does though but is being shy to provide them bless.
I provided figures for one aspect, listed others, put up an article with a list of costs to be considered,
I have been asked to give up on this debate, you car lovers are not actually interested in debate nor do you want to hear any rebuttal of your car centric propaganda you like to believe so I shut up
Nowt I say will get you to open your closed minds
The true cost of motoring if borne by the motorist would be 2 or 3 times what you pay now
You talk about having a debate and then make the claim above. I’ve asked you how you came to this conclusion as frankly it seems an astonishing claim. You can’t so it’s probably best you step away from debates where your limited knowledge disrupts conversation and debate. Peace Out.
Tony: what do you think are the actual costs, then?
I haven’t a clue
frankly it seems an astonishing claim. You can’t so it’s probably best you step away from debates where your limited knowledge disrupts conversation
Come on, Tony, which is it? You have no clue about what the true cost of motoring is or you know enough that you're astonished by other views? People with limited knowledge (like TJ) shouldn't be allowed to discuss this topic but people that don't have a clue (like you) should? 😃
I’m not the one making claims on the number though. TJ says he does know the numbers.
I’m sure others can form an opinion (and some have voiced) without your unwavering support of TJ’s every pronouncement.
Council tax revenue is around £48bn of which around 8% is for the roads, so ~£4bn.
Fuel duty was ~£26bn last year,
VED brings in around £7bn.
So £37bn in revenue from Duty, VED and CT in 2023.
The government and local authorities spent around £11.5bn on the roads in 2023,
they also spent an additional £2bn on infrastructure to support electrification,
so £13.5bn spent.
They've also said an additional £8bn will be spent on fixing the roads, but still.
Now there will be additional costs for policing, etc that are specific to the roads and there will be costs for things like gritting, that might not be covered in this, but to me, it seems that cars and drivers are actually paying to support other things, not the other way around.
daffy - 15 billion for deaths and injuries on the roads - detailed above with links
Plus cost of
Road policing
Costs of deaths illhealth and disability from roads pollution
Damage to buildings
Diseases of inactivity.
Lost value of the land used for parking
etc etc
Read the Monbiot article linked to above
You cannot count council trax revenue as that does not only come from car drivers
so 33 billion directly raised by motoring taxes, 11 billion spent on roads, 15 billion cost of direct deaths leaving 7 billion to cover allthe other costs.
I have been asked to give up on this debate, you car lovers are not actually interested in debate nor do you want to hear any rebuttal of your car centric propaganda you like to believe so I shut up
Have you owned a car in the past? Maybe before you retired...? I have a car but I wouldn't class myself as a car lover, I just deem it a necessity in my life currently. I don't live in a city, I travel to/from work and sometimes to other locations (e.g. data centres and customer sites). Sure, there are alternatives but none are as practical and reliable as having my own car and sometimes they're just not a viable option.
Have you owned a car in the past?
No - well a few weeks when 17
A few more takes on costs
As well as the loss of life, serious injury and distress these casualty figures also have an economic value. The cost to the British economy is estimated to be in the region of £36 billion a year. The table below shows the average value of prevention by casualty/ collision type.
So greater than the taxes raised on motoring just for the economic losses from all the deaths and disability caused from road accidents. that 36 billion does NOT include the 15 billion direct costs of the deaths and disability ( tho there seems to be some overlap ie loss of wages may be in both)
If deaths and injuries cost the economy £15 Bn per year then the 99.99% (my estimate) of folk who aren't killed or injured each year on the roads must be contributing £150,000 Bn to the economy annually.
the 15 billion is the direct costs not the total economic loss. total economic loss is 36 billion - governments own stats
Ah. Update my motoring benefit to £360,000 Bn then.
you car lovers are not actually interested in debate nor do you want to hear any rebuttal of your car centric propaganda you like to believe
That's really needlessly inflammatory. Just because we might be questioning your figures, doesn't mean we are car lovers who want to see the whole country tarmaced. Don't be so polarised - this is a major problem with internet society, don't be part of that particular problem!
Nowt I say will get you to open your closed minds
Again, we don't have closed minds, we just might not agree with you on this topic. I don't think that's an unreasonable stance!
I rode a horse once when I was 17.
the 15 billion is the direct costs not the total economic loss. total economic loss is 36 billion – governments own stats
if the loss was that big (and its only mentioned in one document, not backed up by other figures, so I suspect that one document, unlike all the other government stats that align is incorrect) a very large chunk of it is is met by motor insurance (if I crash into you causing you economic loss, this is met by my insurance), which is paid for by.. me.
in fact we forgot the vat on car insurance as another form of income. The motor insurance industry is worth £20bn a year, of which VAT is 12% - so another £2.4bn in income to the government there.
I refer the right honorable member to the answer I gave before 🙂
daffy – 15 billion for deaths and injuries on the roads – detailed above with links
Plus cost of
Road policing
Costs of deaths illhealth and disability from roads pollution
Damage to buildings
Diseases of inactivity.
Lost value of the land used for parking
etc etc
Read the Monbiot article linked to above
You cannot count council trax revenue as that does not only come from car drivers
so 33 billion directly raised by motoring taxes, 11 billion spent on roads, 15 billion cost of direct deaths leaving 7 billion to cover allthe other costs.
I'm sorry but almost all of that is bad science and provides no comparison to benefits. Property damage was included in your £15bn costs as was policing, etc, so you can't double account.
The human costs associated with it are plainly rubbish as they can't be compared to people who were injured whilst walking to work (breaking an ankle) or cycling to work (breaking a collar bone) which would also lead to a loss of productivity.
The Monbiot thing isn't available, but the article is almost 25 years old...
as for land and Ill health, the former provides revenue, the latter, EVs will remove that pollution from urban areas, vastly improving air quality, and the infrastructure for this improvement is already covered in the money spent.
I'm a cyclist - I'll have ridding 180km to work and back this week by the time I get home tonight. I still pay car tax, council tax, VED and duty, but only do around 2000 miles a year. People like me are subsidising the rest of the network, but on balance taxes and duties from vehicles, pay for the use of vehicles and provide a MASSIVE MASSIVE impulse into the economy.
Hypothetical - Ban cars, right now. What would be the financial consequence of it? Would we be better off as a country or worse?
Environmentally or societally, there's no argument that cars (in their current guise) are bad, but financially, which is the angle you're approaching this from, you can't argue it. Well, YOU can, but you can't win, no matter how much you massage the figures and add the ancillaries.
so there it is. the closed mind with the absolute refusal to accept the governments own figures that are robust and valid.
You can argue that the subsidy from general taxation is good value and worth spending. You cannot argue it does not exist as the governments own robust figures clearly show that the costs to the country of motoring vastly exceed the taxation raised on motoring
Property damage was included in your £15bn costs as was policing, etc, so you can’t double account.
Property damage directly caused was - I am talking about the indirect property damage. Same with policing - the cost of policing the accidents was - not the general cost of roads policing
the closed mind with the absolute refusal to accept the governments own figures that are robust and valid.
Robust and valid in your opinion. Since when do you have so much faith in government figures?
I don't call it subsidising motorists, I call it investing in the economy - just like other forms of transport like rail and air. Now - I don't think road is a good investment, as I've said - but that's what it is. Calling it a subsidy for motorists suggests they are indulging frivolous private transport for pleasure - ignoring that the economy runs on roads too - goods and people moving for business purposes. My mind is not closed, in fact it's a lot more open than yours since I am considering all the options and looking at it from other angles - even from points of view that I don't share. Your mind is closed to any other point of view here an you are pushing the same line you have been for what, 20 years?
I’m a cyclist – I’ll have ridding 180km to work and back this week by the time I get home tonight. I still pay car tax, council tax, VED and duty, but only do around 2000 miles a year.
Just to be clear, this is someone you are accusing of being a car lover.
What subsidy? The vast proportion of your additional 15bn costs are human costs and loss of economic productivity. Neither of these are an actual cost. They're an assumed cost based on some old research and assumed values. You want to accept the result and thus take it as gospel, but refuse to accept that there's significant contributions to the economy that you're wilfully ignoring as it suits your agenda and lifestyle.
Total DIRECT revenue from vehicles is £37bn+ (closer to £45bn once sales, insurance and other things are accounted for) and yes, you can count Council Tax as the roads would still need to be maintained even if personal vehicles were banned and more than 45% of current households have a car and more than 80% of households have owned a car over their lifetime and so have used the roads with a car. Even with your creative accounting and even assuming NO economic benefit from car use, your figures are still below the direct revenue and far below the total indirect revenue.
In equating economic loss, you've got to balance it against economic benefit. You aren't.
In equating human loss, you should also account for human benefit such as families kept in contact, care home visits, etc. You aren't.
You're arguments are based on STATS19 reports which are designed to show why we should invest in better technology, more policing, better standards - It's a business case FOR roads policing.
Car insurers pay out £10bn in claims a year, so of the £15bn in accident "costs" only 5 are met by the general population, and most of that is losses to motorists (as they're the ones most involved in accidents) not tax revenue.
Road policing is £100m a year. Almost nothing.
Even if everyone cycled and walked we'd still need roads. And far more mass transit which would also take some of that road money, possibly much more. So it's complicated.
Please don’t forget to include the net benefits of road transportation as well as the costs.
The whole of society is based around it - take it away and pretty much everything closes. No hospitals, food, medicine, internet etc.
Pretty much all of these benefits are taxed on some way - so the road transport system is treated as part of the overall cost of having a functioning country and is taxed and funded as such.
Trying to seperate out the tax input from cars and comparing against the overall costs to society is a fools errand.