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Get ready for a new tax if you live in Washington...

4K views 47 replies 35 participants last post by  jlf.ski.bike.sail 
#1 ·
#5 ·
You have a lot more faith in the government then I do. I live in Washington and this government spends money on crap like it is water. I have to agree with LDB on this one. I thought Democrats were the champions of finding a solution for Global Warming? I'm confused?
 
#12 ·
Kind of funny $500 is entry level to us bike snobs on our $1500 and often higher priced bikes, some here owning many. Wall Mart bikes are entry level, are they every priced more than $150? Sure many bike shops have $400 bikes, but these are much nicer "entry level" than what a laboring class family can afford to buy their kids.
 
#7 ·
Tax Schmax. Weed and Dr. assisted suicide legal. If you are a Tea Bagger in WA you're in the wrong state. Move to a confederate state with all the other selfish goobers who think they can live without a government. Or join a militia or a survivalist cult.

Pass the bong, Billy Bob.

Lip Cheek Hairstyle Skin Chin


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
#9 ·
what a bunch of dumbasses in Olympia. Tax the weed, stupid! Tax hard liquor or even beer. Taxing a bike costing $500 is dumb. WTF? A bike is an anti-cancer, anti-obesity,
pro health machine. Like taxing kids going to school wanting to learn to be decent hard working Americans. They are so out of touch gray hairs. (I have white hair now so I can say that)


PS---Olympia, why don't you add an additional tax on exercise equipment, bike helmets, bike lights, reflective vests,
all vegetables, and athletic shoes while you're at it. Pisses me off.
 
#11 ·
Did anyone else pick up on this?

"...a new annual car registration fee pegged at 0.7 percent of the vehicle's value..."

If I lived in WA, I'd be more annoyed at that instead of the $25 on a new bike. How often do you purchase a whole new bike? Every few years? I'm assuming no individual parts would be covered under the tax since it's not a whole bicycle.

0.7 percent on a new $25,000 car is $175! I pay $36. Again I'm assuming as your vehicle's worth declines, so would the amount you pay. So buy a $2500 clunker and you'll only have pay $17 a year to register it.

Just seems like an incentive to keep your car longer and build a bike from mail order parts. That will jump start the local economy alight.
 
#13 ·
from the article:
"House Democrats unveiled a transportation revenue package Wednesday that would raise $9.8 billion over the next decade"

And the tax on bikes adds up to 0.01% of that. What's the point?

They need to cut government pensions and make them all pay into their own 401K like the rest of us in the private sector. [/politics and sorry, I know it's not allowed]
 
#14 ·
Here we go..

Let's do some meth I mean math! :thumbsup:

2011 bicycle sales: 15,700,000

18% of which came from shops where the average price per bike was $680.

15,700,000 * .18 = 2,826,000 bikes

Those are the numbers for the entire US. Let's say for giggles Washington state represents 1/50th of $680 bicycle sales in the US. That's 56,520 bikes.

56,520 * 25 = $1,413,000 in tax revenue for Washington state. Probably not even enough to pay the politicians to argue about it in the House and Senate let alone the administrative costs once it takes effect. Now let's consider another bill being discussed in WA Congress. Washington gas tax increase proposal faces bumpy road | KPLU News for Seattle and the Northwest

2 cent increase on gasoline every year for 5 years. The total tax would be 47.5 cents once fully implemented for a 10 cent increase overall.

2011 WA state gasoline consumption = 63.4 million barrels * 42 = 2,662,800,000 gallons
2011 Total WA state gasoline expenditures = $9,860,400,000
2011 Average Price per gallon = $9,860,400,000 / 2,662,800,000 gallons = $3.70

2,662,800,000 gallons * .10 = $266,280,000 in additional tax revenue once the 10 cent increase is fully implemented.
Total new revenue with 10 cent gas tax increase and $25 >$500 bike sales tax = $267,693,000
$1,413,000 / $267,693,000 = .5% of all new revenue per year comes from bicycle sales over $500.

If Milton from Office Space was working for the WA state government he could write a program to redirect that much money or more to an off-shore bank account and no one would ever notice.

Data sources: EIA.gov and NBDA.com
 
#16 ·
So do the taxes from a mountain bike sale go to help out mountain biking? haha

If I thought they would use the money from the tax in an efficient manner I wouldn't mind paying $25. But I don't really have faith that it will be used that way.
 
#17 ·
The tax on bikes doesn't go to anything bike related. It's all to highways. It's also been acknowledged by the bill sponsor that it is largely a symbolic tax for the anti-bike crowd. Hmmm and now we know why the government is lambasted for it's spending policies.
 
#21 ·
I hate to discuss politics here but sadly we have to....
Just keep in mind our tax structure is the most regressive in the nation, in other words the tax burden falls hardest on the poor. This is the problem that's almost never discussed, do some Googling for details. Until this is fixed our problems will continue. Chances of a major fix (income tax and no sales tax) are slim to none.
 
#26 ·
So the bicycle that I buy to ride only off-road will be taxed to support roads?

I can see how people freak out about the cost of bike lanes, but I still believe that the bike lanes really exist to benefit the motorists.

Now if the tax was used for the purchase of new land or to expand trail opportunities, that might be something different. It's still hard to swallow that considering so many trails (if not, all) are built and maintained through volunteer hours.
 
#27 ·
So as a person that works at a bike shop, and has for 15 years, I would think law makers would just make a broad tax for all bicycle sales. But they wont. And the main reason is that if you include ALL bicycle sales for the state, the vast majority is cheap department store bikes. And the govenment doesnt want to piss off the big department stores. So raise the minimum price and independent bike shops will have to tack on the tax and have to eat the tax more often than not to make the bread and butter sales of 600 dollar bikes.
 
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