Since September my wife has had about ten CTs, three MRIs, two major surgeries (the last one 7 hours long), one emergency surgery, weeks of chemotherapy and radiation treatments and about 8 weeks hospitalised including some time in the ICU.
Total cost: $0
Unless you count the cost of parking when I visit her in hospital, in which case I’ve spent about $170 USD
This is in New Zealand with a publicly funded health system.
One of the benefits of excise tax is it rewards lower polluting vehicles with fewer fees.
However they end up doing it (emissions tax, tiered RUC?), I hope this incentive remains. But considering that'd essentially be a 'ute tax' on running costs I can't see this government doing it.
EVs absolutely need to pay RUC and contribute to roading in NZ, but the way they've implemented it is half baked and stupid (as expected).
For each 100km driven, a Toyota Prius pays $2.58 into the National Transport Fund via petrol excise tax (at 3.4 litres per 100km), and a Nissan Leaf will be paying $7.60 via Road User Charges.
Do we want to decarbonise the vehicle fleet or not? Because charging clean vehicles almost 3x what their fossil powered peers pay seems a strange way to go about it.
Either the Prius should be paying more, or the Leaf less to make this equitable.
Russia (and Putin) are so weak the USA forced them to invade their neighbour?
Cope.