The "problem" with that tax is that if it's applied fairly, it gets very big very fast. The damage to the road goes up with weight, but not linearly. Not a square factor, either. Not even cube. It's to the fourth power.

Start applying that to long haul trucks and the whole industry will be bankrupt in a month. The implication being that we are all subsidizing that industry with taxes on roads. Including that one trucker with a "who is John Galt?" sticker on the back.

That said, this is also a very good argument for improving cargo trains to the point where most long haul trucking goes away.

There was a discussion a couple of years ago around gasoline taxes and how they are supposed to pay for roadway maintenance.

I just want to point out, even if they're supposed to, gas taxes do not pay for roadway maintenance, not by a long shot

Some states do exactly that, or did back in the day. 30-years ago in Oklahoma, an old 2-ton dump truck with an antique plate was $20, a new Corvette $600. I think Texas flipped that and charged by weight vs. value.

ah yes, another anti-environment tax. More barriers to fossil-fuel free adoption. As you would expect, Mississippi already has this tax. Don't be like Mississippi.

And the heavy vehicles get classified as light cargo so are largely exempt from those taxes. They're promoting and building heavy "cargo" vehicles specifically because they get exemptions for fuel efficiency and taxes (depending on location).

In the country I reside, everyone pays for the roads through income tax. Vehicle owners pay emissions tax. I think this is fair since everyone relies on the roads even if they never travel down a road themselves.

An alternative idea that I mentioned on a thread yesterday about vehicles with high bumpers, adjust the license class system to be more strict regarding vehicles. You already have to have extra training in a different license to run transport vehicles or semi trucks you should have to do the same with large vehicles, I'm not saying ban every pickup truck out there because I fully agree that trucks are a hard requirement especially in snow covered States like mine but there is a difference between having a pickup truck and having a monster truck at least in my opinion heavier or taller than low end transport vehicles