California closed the Montana license plate loophole

> “The bill would hold any officer, manager, partner, beneficial owner, or member of a shell company personally liable for any unpaid taxes, and any interest and penalties on those taxes, the nonpayment of which may constitute a crime, due on the purchase of a vehicle, vessel, or aircraft.” Is dumb. You want comprehensive enforcement with reasonable penalities. You don't want draconian laws randomly enforced.

• grvdrm · 16 hours ago

  You are speaking deeply to me about leaf blower bans in my town. They are useless.

  • collabs · 16 hours ago

    If it is a blanket leaf blower ban, that is indeed asinine. However, I will gladly support a ban on two stroke engines for leaf blowers the same way I support requiring drivers to wear seatbelts.

    • deathanatos · 15 hours ago

      > If it is a blanket leaf blower ban, that is indeed asinine. Uh … okay, it isn't immediately obvious to me why that would be. My landlords insist on (literally) weekly leaf blowing, regardless of season, and so every Thursday the air outside the apartment is quite literally unbreathable, as it is slaked with dust and exhaust, and literally unbreathable inside if I were to open a window (i.e., living here, I have to remember to always close the windows prior to Thursday). Not to mention the sound. Banning the gas ones fixes a portion of the problem, I suppose. I don't think I'd care as much if the cadence was something reasonable, like monthly. One bad apple spoils the bunch.

    • grvdrm · 13 hours ago

      The electric machines are way less intrusive. Ok with them.

  • jacobolus · 15 hours ago

    Gas leaf blowers are a menace to society that should not be allowed in any urban or suburban area. (If you want to use one on your farm or whatever, go for it.)

    • blagie · 14 hours ago

      Gas leaf blowers shouldn't be banned. What's needed is banning of the outputs: - Pollution - Noise Regardless of the source. If someone comes up with a magic silent gas leaf blower which doesn't pollute, that's okay.

      • jacobolus · 13 hours ago

        There are some unavoidable sources of noise, so I'm not sure a blanket noise restriction is going to work. If someone is doing home renovation and the contractor needs to run a saw for a while, it's just going to be loud. Sometimes someone needs to jackhammer up a slab of concrete, or chip up tree pruning debris. Etc. But gas leaf blowers are easily replaced by a much less neighbor-hostile alternative.

        • blagie · 7 hours ago

          Turns out noise control regulation has a solution for this: "We have a permit." It costs around $200 at City Hall to pick up a permit.

        • WalterBright · 7 hours ago

          A month ago, I heard a lot of very loud jackhammer noises at 2AM. I got up and went out to investigate. A crew was jackhammering up the street. The foreman saw me and came by to apologize. The water main had broken and water was flooding the street. If they let it wait until morning, a lot of erosion damage would have been. I told him I appreciate the crew coming out and fixing it right away.

    • grvdrm · 13 hours ago

      Notice that I didn’t say “I love leaf blowers” The ban is useless because the only way to enforce it is to catch it in the act (in my town). Basically impossible. So it is a ban that could be enforced (other ways) but instead is just a suggestion - and not one that most people follow because there are almost no repercussions.

• trelane · 16 hours ago

  > You want comprehensive enforcement with reasonable penalities. > You don't want draconian laws randomly enforced. This depends entirely on what the goal of the law is.

• bluGill · 16 hours ago

  I don't think it will hold up in federal courts. This seems to apply to cars that the company officer who lives and drives in Montana as well. If this only applies to cars used more than 50% in CA is would hold up. Of course truck drivers who mostly don't drive in CA but that is home may find an out with that plan. Details are important and very hard to get right.

  • jmilloy · 16 hours ago

    > If anyone running the business is a California resident (by the updated definition outlined above), then the whole business is a California resident, and any assets (including Lamborghinis and Bugattis) held in the state are subject to California taxation. I'm relying on the paraphrasing in article rather than the text of the law itself, but this says that it only applies to assets held in the state.

  • mikeryan · 15 hours ago

    The core of the law, ie who is expected to register their car in CA and what state sales taxes need to be paid has already been in place for years and likely already challenged. This is just a modifier to address a particular loophole. As long as nothing about this crosses state lines (ie they’re not trying to regulate out of state businesses or property) there’s not a lot to go on. Several states have taken similar steps to close this loophole. Famously the YouTuber whistlindiesel got arrested in Tennessee for this and the case is still pending https://www.thedrive.com/news/is-the-government-making-an-ex...

    • bluGill · 15 hours ago

      Details matter and the article may have them wrong, but my reading is this accidentally covers out of state cars as well. I'm not going to look up the law to see who is right though.

      • mikeryan · 14 hours ago

        The cars are registered in MT but they’re under CA jurisdiction if they are primarily driven here. That’s the literal loophole. CA is not trying to force people to pay CA registration and sales tax on cars kept and used primarily out of state.

        • bluGill · 13 hours ago

          That is the intent of course. However it is really easy to write a law that missing important details and so despite the intent cover all cars regardless of where they are used.

  • hparadiz · 15 hours ago

    This tries to apply a tax to people who have never set foot in California. I have no idea how this holds up.

    • ted_dunning · 10 hours ago

      It actually doesn't do that. Did you even read what was written?

• linksnapzz · 16 hours ago

  What, the government of CA is lobbing hastily-crafted, poorly considered legislation in the general direction of a problem that they think they have? (surprised pikachu face)

• sandworm101 · 16 hours ago

  >>You want comprehensive enforcement with reasonable penalities. >>You don't want draconian laws randomly enforced. Paying tax on a vehicle driven in a state is not unreasonable. And holding the executives of a shell/numbered/privately-held/tax-dodging organization liable for taxes owed is not draconian.

Next headline: More wealthy people leaving California. These shenanigans with vehicle taxes happen whenever a neighboring state has a significantly better deal. People register vehicles in friends or families names who live in that state, or form a legal entity there which can own the vehicles. Of course then the high-tax state writes more and more convoluted definitions of "residency" for the vehicle to make it subject to taxation, which are either hard to discover/enforce as a practical matter or someone finds a new loophole and the avoidance games continue.

• Noaidi · 16 hours ago

  > More wealthy people leaving California. Good! I do not understand why people think this is a bad thing. I would rather be surrounded by poor, kind people than these rich sociopaths.

  • recursive · 16 hours ago

    Good news. There are a lot more poor people in CA than rich.

  • linksnapzz · 16 hours ago

    ...and yet, the number of people willing to emigrate to live next to the "rich sociopaths" of sportscar-owning California is far greater than the # trying to emigrate to live amongst the poor, kind people of, say, Cuba. Funny, that.

  • GaryBluto · 7 hours ago

    Believe it or not, whether you're a sociopath or not is not dictated by economic status.

• testfrequency · 15 hours ago

  HN crowd used to hate the rich. Now comments like this, defending losers with lambos, are seen as admirable.

  • randallsquared · 15 hours ago

    What are you talking about? HN was a site for people aspiring to BE the rich, in the sense that it was operated by and revolves around a startup accelerator.

  • pessimizer · 14 hours ago

    > HN crowd used to hate the rich. I don't know where you heard this, but it is not true. HN is filled with people with many opinions about the rich, and also many rich people, and has always been. Startup News, created by a founder of the venture capital incubator Y Combinator, did not ever uniformly hate the rich. It is sponsored by the extremely rich, and only exists because they wished it into existence and maintain it.

    • krapp · 14 hours ago

      (raises hand) I hate the rich!

  • GaryBluto · 7 hours ago

    >defending losers with lambos By what definition is someone with things you don't have a "loser"?

• kube-system · 15 hours ago

  No wealthy person is going to save money by relocating from California to avoid a $30-40k tax bill on an exotic car. Wealthy people have a beach house in California because they like California. The people who relocate to avoid taxes are upper-middle class people who are overextended on their finances.

  • SoftTalker · 15 hours ago

    Well they go through the trouble to form an LLC in Montana to own the car, to (illegally) avoid that tax bill. So clearly the tax isn't something they are just happy to pay. The LLC probably owns the beach house too, for some other tax dodge.

    • CyberMacGyver · 12 hours ago

      But you can’t buy a beach house in Montana. The point being they still prefer living in California while mooching off residents who paid for the roads they want to drive on.

      • 15155 · 51 minutes ago

        > mooching off residents who paid for the roads they want to drive on. ...While 99% of road damage is being done by out-of-state semi trucks exempt from CA registration.

  • paustint · 10 hours ago

    Disagree - wealthy people don't become wealthy by giving all their money to the government. Expensive cars generally retain a decent value, but the taxes paid evaporate. Many people don't relocate, but instead try to figure out a way to save a bunch of money on a large purchase - why pay more if it can be avoided?

    • hnav · 9 hours ago

      Because not paying is tax evasion. If you go abroad, purchase a $50k watch, get a VAT refund then fail to declare, US Customs will fine you and probably pull your trusted traveler status. Are those people going to leave the US?

    • kube-system · 6 hours ago

      A wealthy person would spend much more than the tax bill on an exotic car just in relocation costs > Many people don't relocate, but instead try to figure out a way to save a bunch of money on a large purchase - why pay more if it can be avoided? There isn’t one, nor was there ever. You always had to pay CA sales tax on cars that were primarily used in CA. The only thing the Montana plate ever did was to make it easier to plausibly lie to cops when you get pulled over… not the kind of shit a wealthy person’s accountant is recommending The majority of people who did the Montana “loophole” in California were always overextended yahoos trying to save 40k to look richer than they are. It was always illegal to do in CA.

  • MisterMower · 6 hours ago

    On the margin they will.

    • kube-system · 5 hours ago

      If someone’s accountant is even mentioning their sales tax bill on their car to them, they might be cosplaying as wealthy. The tax evaders who are being targeted here aren’t wealthy people, they’re people who couldn’t afford the tax bill on their financed Lambo because they need that money for the gap insurance.

      • MisterMower · 3 hours ago

        It adds up. And in a state with tens of thousands of high net worth individuals, that marginal tax increase might be the nudge that causes a few of them to relocate to a lower tax jurisdiction.

Thank you California Our willingness as a society to tolerate the expense, danger, and health issues brought by extensive car use will be looked back on with bewilderment. You can start to see the insanity when a 'classic' car drives by. It's noisy, heavy, dangerous, and smelly. It's allowed to noticeably pollute any area it passes through. We've made progress, but that level of noise, danger, and pollution is how every car on your street used to be. Car culture has a unique flavor of regressive entitlement. Every bit of societal and legislative progress that has made cars cleaner and safer has been fought tooth and nail by this group. Our government created a vast, expensive, open to use resource in roads and infrastructure, offers minimal restrictions an licensing for its use, barely enforces existing safety laws, and the combustion crowd shows outrage at the loss of their illegal activities. I wish our culture was less tolerant of this behavior. It is a tiny percentage that costs the rest of us constantly. Sometimes its a motorcycle club, others it just rich people shucking the social contract. I'm looking forward to the last Harley getting recycled.

• cowlevel · 16 hours ago

  Is California making itself less car dependent or is it just taxing cars while remaining car dependent?

• soperj · 16 hours ago

  Still is pretty pollutant. You just don't see the brake and wheel dust as much as the fumes coming out of the car dusting everything with lead like they used to.

• hydrogen7800 · 15 hours ago

  >Car culture has a unique flavor of regressive entitlement. Every bit of societal and legislative progress that has made cars cleaner and safer has been fought tooth and nail by this group. I'm a newcomer to this hobby, and am amazed how this resentment has perpetuated since their muscle cars were neutered in the 70's by emissions regulations. The resentment has transferred to subsequent generations who were not alive then, who still complain about all the emissions and efficiency efforts that carmakers undertake. Too much unnecessary machismo hanging around.

  • linksnapzz · 15 hours ago

    You might be young enough to not remember how much engine performance turned to suck after about '74, and stayed that way for 15 years. Those '70s changes were worthwhile, but the 90-10 rule absolutely applies here.

    • hydrogen7800 · 15 hours ago

      I am too young to have lived it, but I have read about the Malaise era. To me, it's just when American car manufacturers had to start competing globally, and couldn't, so kept making the same giant V8's, but with 160 hp.

      • linksnapzz · 15 hours ago

        More wouldn't than couldn't. The management was mostly of the opinion that gas prices would come down eventually, so there was little interest initially in making anything more efficient. Also, since small, efficient, cheap cars had miniscule or negative margins, there was a belief that competing in that market was optional.

• linksnapzz · 15 hours ago

  I am not overfond of Harley noise; and I understand that some people really object to the VOC-smell of poorly-tuned carburetors...but this is a bit much. There's artistic merit in historic industrial design & engineering, and keeping those things in an operational state; for which I am willing to tolerate the occasional puff of blue smoke.

• Lammy · 10 hours ago

  Anything that enables humans to exercise their freedom of movement is objectively good.

  • unrented7977 · 10 hours ago

    How many other people are you willing to kill for that freedom?

    • Lammy · 9 hours ago

      How many are you alleging me to have killed? Last time I checked, that was wrong no matter how you might do it. Do you struggle to avoid temptation when you have the means to kill and must choose not to?

  • vineyardmike · 10 hours ago

    I find walking with transit more freeing. You can just go anywhere, no dealing with parking nor worrying about a massive expensive vehicle. You don’t need to apply for a license and take classes before you can do it, and people of all ages can safely participate. No worrying about taking the same modality back either. When did we decide that isolation was freedom.

    • some_random · 10 hours ago

      You're welcome to own nothing and be happy, you don't get to force that "freedom" on others.

    • Lammy · 9 hours ago

      > I find walking with transit more freeing. You can just go anywhere Here was my summer vacation this year — good luck with that lmfao https://i.ibb.co/5XxDvbyK/Emi-2026-10-06-18-12-00.png

    • sokoloff · 9 hours ago

      Do that if that’s what you like. No one is stopping you. In exchange, consider extending that same optionality to others whose preferences are different from your own.

  • otterley · 9 hours ago

    No it isn't. Choices we make must consider externalities, tragedy of the commons, etc. Otherwise we're not bearing the full cost of and responsibility for our decisions.

• King-Aaron · 10 hours ago

  I disagree with basically everything you said.

• jollyllama · 9 hours ago

  > I'm looking forward to the last Harley getting recycled. Dream on. It'll never happen.

I've seen car dealers in MA use Montana dealer plates. At the very least they are cheaper, avoids $220 / year excise tax and registration fees vs. $25 for Montana. I don't think it helps with any sales taxes- dealers don't have to pay when they buy cars, unlike customers. It would help if dealer uses the car personal reasons instead of just having it for resale. Hmm... maybe I should start a car dealer just to avoid taxes on my next car.. The Montana plate for owners reminds of registering your boat in Wilmington Delaware to avoid state sales tax. You had to create an LLC to do this I think.

• colingauvin · 10 hours ago

  I certainly don't pay $25 to register. Maybe it's different for businesses? But for me on a 2024 truck it's $300-$400/year in Montana.

  • DANmode · 9 hours ago

    What’s the perma plate cost?

    • swozey · 8 hours ago

      I think the reqs were 12 years old and $171 or $271 Coming from $300/yr colorado insurance its a steal I'm full time in a camper right now so this entire conversation is extra fun because I don't have a physical address anywhere which is a whole other ball of worms just insuring and registering my truck.

• kart23 · 9 hours ago

  this is actually happening in california now. a lot of people are using dealer plates on expensive cars they just drive around normally. no registration, no taxes.

Can I just take this moment to mention that I think we need a better system for car registrations across the board? I don't like that there are all these edge cases with titles, insurance, inspections/smog, window tint, plate expiry, taxes etc whenever you move or even travel. It feels like we've just turned vehicle ownership into a profit opportunity for the police to harass everyone over completely inconsequential nonsense the second you cross any state line (emissions/insurance aren't nonsense but bear with me pedants). Similarly it creates a mountain of work every time you move. I wish you could just register under an LLC or trust or something wherever and have a generic plate that can go anywhere and force the states to agree on a set of standards that apply across the country. Alternatively allow people to keep their plates indefinitely like phone numbers. Yes, this creates arbitrage opportunities but maybe we should be bringing up the standards of the arbitrage states instead of having assholes threaten everyone with guns for random infractions. I'm kinda just throwing ideas out there but this current system is Kafkaesque.

• sandworm101 · 16 hours ago

  So a race to the bottom on licensing/taxation/safety/insurance/emissions? But only for those wealthy enough to have family trusts? No. Each state needs the power to set minimum standards as to who can drive what. I don't want to see millionaires be allowed to drive around without insurance in unsafe cars simply because their daddy purchased them a share in a Delaware family-held plates LLC.

  • fedpost · 15 hours ago

    You can create trusts for a few bucks. It's not an inherently rich people thing

    • sandworm101 · 15 hours ago

      Ya, good luck trying to defend your 2$ out-of-state trust in local court when it is sued after not having proper insurance to cover the cars it "owns". But wait, you won't even be allowed into court as you need to be a lawyer to represent a corporate entity.

• fluidcruft · 15 hours ago

  States could harmonize laws (if they wanted to).

  • fedpost · 15 hours ago

    That's kinda what I'm getting at I think. We've created a patchwork hell full of arbitrage and petty harassment and everyone's just kind of fine with it

    • kotaKat · 15 hours ago

      Similarly, the car purchasing process is a nightmare. Carvana faced that one the hard way trying to sell across the US and ended up forming their own lobbying band to push for digital and electronic titling and registration. https://www.estartcoalition.org/ I suspect eSTART is... a start to what you're looking for.

    • Spooky23 · 15 hours ago

      The problem is you’re optimizing for bureaucratic efficiency over the needs of the people. There’s even issues with that at the state level that would be way worse. So many Californians live in valleys that trap pollution. Strict emissions regulations have an immediate, tangible impact. South Carolina doesn’t have the same local issues and their standards vary. Likewise, tint stuff is mostly a police / safety issue, and is more of a problem in major metro areas. High tint is an issue in the Bronx. Not so much in rural Alabama. I’d argue that the worst part of the system we have now is that we have a weird hybrid as disenfranchisement has become a political priority. Integration between states is driven by compacts between states and Canadian provinces and mediated through private entities like AAMVA and NLETS. That has facilitated other sharing agreements with insurers and other entities that is a serious and significant privacy violation. We should be able to get a free passport card for identity, and make driving privilege licensure, vehicle registration, etc a purely state matter.

      • stickfigure · 9 hours ago

        There are many sketchy PoliceActivity videos from the highways of Alabama. Tint restrictions make sense everywhere.

      • jimbob45 · 9 hours ago

        Car pollution isn’t likely to still be a problem in 5 years when we’re all using electric cars.

        • simonh · 6 hours ago

          We will not all (even 80% of us) be using electric vehicles in 10 years, or even 20 years. I don’t think even half of new vehicles will be fully electric by then, let alone half of all vehicles on the road.

      • dylan604 · 7 hours ago

        > The problem is you’re optimizing for bureaucratic efficiency over the needs of the people. There's a reason there are 50 states and not just one federal land. The needs of the people of Montana are definitely different than the needs of New Yorkers, so expecting the two states to have the same laws is just illogical. It's also why things like the electoral college is a thing to prevent the population centers dictating what the rural people have to do.

  • PHGamer · 5 hours ago

    thats up to the federal government. states rights should stop at their fucking border. california has no right taxing anything NOT IN ITS STATE

• axus · 15 hours ago

  Someone could compile every vehicle regulation from all the states into one common list. It'd be more restrictive than any single state, but it would be consistent. And if someone doesn't like it, they can fall back to their local laws.

  • m463 · 8 hours ago

    I think people have a valid point complaining about california writing the laws for the rest of the nation.

• cmckn · 15 hours ago

  Moves to different states are just not that common for the average American, and I would prefer for states to retain the power to implement their own policies in this area. I would not want to see e.g. California unable to change emissions policy because Texas isn’t on board. Complexity is a cost of our federal system and I am okay paying it in most cases.

  • balderdash · 15 hours ago

    I’m not sure what you mean by not that common. The ta millions of people a year- yes maybe it’s only ~1% of the population, buts it’s one percent every year, and I quarter you it’s no evenly distributed. https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2026/2024-sta...

    • bloppe · 9 hours ago

      Somewhat inconveniencing 1% of people per year seems like a reasonable price to pay for local legislative control. That said, I've moved across state lines before and didn't find it that inconvenient. I just had to re-register and do a smog check.

  • NDlurker · 9 hours ago

    I moved between 4 states 5 times before I was 25. I currently live a mile from a state I drive into almost everyday where my tint is illegal.

    • bloppe · 9 hours ago

      Congratulations. You're an edge case. In my experience there's enough slack in practice for these edge cases. At least in CA, it's very strange for a cop to cite a tourist because their car is not road legal in CA but is road legal in their home state. I've known many people who just get off with warnings, sometimes years after they've actually moved to CA (and just never bothered re-registering their car their, even though that's technically legally required). Ofc YMMV

      • sokoloff · 9 hours ago

        Edge cases, as you call them, are very common in New England. It’s common in small states to live in one and work or shop in another.

        • bombcar · 8 hours ago

          California is strange (for various reasons) but one of them is that it has a very large population, and a very long border with other states, and yet very little population near the borders (unless you count Mexico).

      • NDlurker · 7 hours ago

        I wouldn't say that's an edge case. Would you consider a huge chunk of our military edge cases too?

        • saghm · 6 hours ago

          What portion of the military do you think owns vehicles that have tints that legal where they live but illegal on the other side of a state border within an hour of them? That still seems like an edge case to me.

          • NewJazz · 4 hours ago

            Service members often have to move around to new areas for e.g. training.

    • NewJazz · 9 hours ago

      Then get your windows untainted.

      • NDlurker · 9 hours ago

        I'm not going to remove my legal tint to comply with rules for a state I don't live in. It's incredibly unlikely I'd get pulled over for it, but it is possible if a cop wanted a reason to pull me over.

        • NewJazz · 9 hours ago

          It is not a legal tint because you drive in a jurisdiction where it is not legal. Don't like that law? Don't drive there.

          • NDlurker · 8 hours ago

            That's funny

            • saghm · 6 hours ago

              It's funny that laws of a state should apply to you when you're in that state? That seems like a pretty normal opinion to me

              • NDlurker · 6 hours ago

                Yes because people can't be expected to make expensive modifications to their vehicles while visiting another state. And the law in Minnesota is ridiculous especially in situations like a Crosstrek vs an Impreza. They have the same body but the allowed tint levels are different because one is classified as an SUV and the other as a station wagon. I could lift my Impreza and make it look exactly like a Crosstrek, but the tint would still be illegal. I find that funny.

                • saghm · 6 hours ago

                  Okay, so if I buy something expensive, and then go to a different state, I should be exempted from laws saying it's illegal because I happen to disagree with them? That seems way more "funny" to me

                  • NDlurker · 6 hours ago

                    Yeah. There's no reason the legal tint level should be different on an SUV vs car.

              • jandrewrogers · 3 hours ago

                There are limits on the laws of a State when it involves inter-State commerce. The US Supreme Court recognizes a general principle that you can transit a State with things that are illegal in that State. An individual State cannot impose a de facto ban on commerce between States, which includes the right to transport goods through a State in the normal fashion regardless of the laws of that State.

                • projektfu · 16 minutes ago

                  I'd be interested to know what case recognizes such a general principle. I would recommend not publicizing that you are transiting with cannabis from Oregon to Montana through Idaho, for example.

        • npunt · 8 hours ago

          If you go by the letter of the law (your legal residence is another state) then you should apply it uniformly (your vehicle's tint is illegal where you currently are). You can't pick and choose which technicalities apply to you. If you go by the spirit of the law, then a grace period would be reasonable to apply to infrequent visitors. However, you travel there daily, so that does not apply to you. Doesn’t really seem like you have a leg to stand on here.

          • NDlurker · 8 hours ago

            Their tint law is stupid. See my previous comment on Crosstrek vs Impreza. Also, I've never heard of anyone getting pulled over for tint unless it's like really dark, so I'm not concerned, just pointing out it's ridiculous.

            • hansvm · 7 hours ago

              Every time somebody decides to ram their suburban up the ass end of my car and flee the scene, the first thing the police ask is "did you get a good look at the driver" followed closely by "did you see the make/model/plates" and "what state was it registered in?" I don't have a lot of sympathy for windows dark enough to prevent me from making out the driver, the blatantly illegal license plate hiders so common in CA, and other such nonsense. If we want to adopt a policy of registration/licensure/insurance/whatever not being legally required for privacy reasons or something then that's one thing, but current policy tries to make sure people are responsible for their actions with a relatively small impact on privacy, and unless you're arguing against the broader issue then I think any tint law complaints are misplaced.

              • Pragmata · 3 hours ago

                >the first thing the police ask is "did you get a good look at the driver" followed closely by "did you see the make/model/plates" and "what state was it registered in?" If your argument for this law is that it forces people to incriminate themselves, that's really an argument that the whole thing should be thrown out. Under no circumstances should you be able to be compelled to assist in your own prosecution, either directly or indirectly.

            • saghm · 6 hours ago

              You're certainly entitled to think the law of a state you don't live in is stupid. The state you don't live in is equally entitled to not care whether people outside the state think a law is stupid.

      • lemoncucumber · 8 hours ago

        Or just add a toleration for the taint, it's a simple YAML tweak (I'll see myself out...)

    • ssl-3 · 6 hours ago

      Some states allow that. For example: The tint that Florida law allows is way, way darker than what Ohio law allows. But the Ohio Revised Code has carveouts that make it perfectly legal for Florida Man to drive his darker-tinted Florida-registered car in Ohio.

  • DarmokJalad1701 · 7 hours ago

    > California unable to change emissions policy The same one that needed me to show them the smog sticker to show that I didn't need to do a smog check ... for my out-of-state Model 3

• imoverclocked · 15 hours ago

  Except that states want their pound of flesh; California is definitely no exception. There are entities that are federal registrations (eg: an aircraft with an "N-number" -- that N-number is federal) that individual states still try really hard to tax the same way as cars/trucks. Individual counties even take a stab at this. It seems that the rules might be there for some benefit but mostly the rules help the state/county make income.

• jeffbee · 15 hours ago

  Window tint isn't nonsense, either. I think every stanced-out pickup with a tinted windshield should be apprehended and destroyed the instant it crosses my state's line.

  • NDlurker · 9 hours ago

    States have so many variances on what kind of tint is legal and sometimes just absurd rules. For example, Minnesota has very little limitations on tinting SUVs but strict limits on cars. A Subaru Crosstrek is pretty much a lifted Impreza. The tint on my Impreza is illegal in Minnesota, but would be legal if it was a Crosstrek.

• gumby · 14 hours ago

  Nobody seems to recognize how deranged it is that we drive around with easily identifiable numbers plastered on our vehicle. This has seemed weird and privacy-violating to me since I was a kid, yet even today when people complain about Flock cameras they don’t complain about what the cameras are looking for. What if gun owners had to walk around wearing a huge plate with their gun registration number when they wanted to carry a gun? And why do driver’s licenses have all sorts of extraneous info (all you need is a biometric, like a photo, expiration date, class of license, and any restrictions)? Just because I walked into a bar or bought a beer at the supermarket doesn’t mean they should be allowed to harvest my address, DOB etc. The whole edifice is absurd.

  • shrx · 13 hours ago

    > What if gun owners had to walk around wearing a huge plate with their gun registration number when they wanted to carry a gun? Actually a very sensible proposition.

    • subhobroto · 9 hours ago

      No. Not sensible at all. Do you wear a name tag in public with your SSN, or some unique identifying information on it? If not, why not? If I asked you to vote on this, would you vote in favor for it? Why not? People can strangle other people so it makes sense to know who is who at all times in the case that someone strangles someone else and then tries to run away. If this isn't making sense yet - This is as sensible as expecting software engineers to walk around with equipment that prominently display uniquely identifying information because computers can be used to hack and doxx people. The fact that license plates were/are necessary is to address shortcomings of technology. Most states in 2026 are slowly removing the need to display license plates at all because it never made sense but had to be done to address shortcomings that are no longer so in 2026.

      • gumby · 7 hours ago

        > Most states in 2026 are slowly removing the need to display license plates at all Do you have a reference? I have not read this, and California is going the opposite way.

  • greycol · 13 hours ago

    It is worth considering that without being able to identify people then only unacceptable behaviour that rises to the level of needing and having an immediate response can actually be punished. It's the qualitative change than comes with the change in quantity and ease of monitoring (and accessibility of that info) that means being identifiable is so much worse now days.

  • pixl97 · 10 hours ago

    Why, a license place is the cost for you moving around a multiple ton object capable of high speeds and causing death and huge financial losses. You have zero right to a car. It is a privilege, one that you should be able to lose a lot easier.

    • subhobroto · 9 hours ago

      Setting aside how things are, I'm curious about this thought experiment: > You have zero right to a car. It is a privilege, one that you should be able to lose a lot easier. Do I have a right to feed myself and my family? If yes, is that right absolute or relative? If absolute, and my ability to feed requires me to commute in a car, is having a car a right or a privilege? Next, assume I cannot use my legs and need an electric wheelchair to move around. Do I have a right to an electric wheelchair? What if that electric wheelchair has 50 miles of range which is more than sufficient for my daily commute and more. Am I now at an advantage compared to a person who needs a car for that exact same commute?

      • mandevil · 9 hours ago

        You do not have a right to drive a car in the United States. It is a privilege for which you must be licensed, which necessarily means you can lose your license and not be able to drive. There are medical conditions which absolutely prohibit you from driving. At least in the state where I did Drivers Ed, if you had certain kinds of seizures you could not drive again until you'd been seizure free for 18 months. It is your responsibility to arrange your life to match that. No matter what other thought experiment you create, you do not have a right to drive a car in the US, it can be revoked quite easily.

      • wat10000 · 9 hours ago

        That last “if” is smuggling in a huge assumption.

      • pixl97 · 8 hours ago

        Again, you have zero right to a car and there are a hundred different things you can do to get that privilege taken away. But hey, I'm sure you're the first to vote against any measures that would actually improve things like urban density or public transportation.

        • subhobroto · 8 hours ago

          > But hey, I'm sure you're the first to vote against any measures that would actually improve things like urban density or public transportation. To the contrary. I don't believe in being punitive and taxing people who live a life different from mine or hold conflicting beliefs. I don't believe in lecturing people on how they should live their lives as long as they don't start to lecture me on how I should mine. If someone wants to live in a rural county and drive to and from work or groceries 20 hours a day, they're welcome to. They are adults. If someone on the other hand wants to live right next to the train and bus station, so they can take a ride right out of their balcony, they're welcome to do so as well. They are adults. I do not assume a right over another person's decision and freedom to choose how they want to live their own life as long as they don't tamper with my own. We are adults. The United States was built on these very ideals: mini, hyper-localized governance than a larger centralized governance that is not in touch with the people they govern. Unfortunately, that philosophy has been lost to time, and people in coastal cities in California seem to feel perfectly comfortable lecturing ranch hands in Montana what to do and how to live their lives.

          • pixl97 · 8 hours ago

            >how they want to live their own life as long as they don't tamper with my own. We are adults. lol, you were then eaten by a bear of your own making. You see, when you're deathmobile is f=mv2 down the highway you present a clear and present danger to every one around you. It doesn't matter if your 5, 55 or 95 physics gives zero shits about your libertarian ideas as your broke ass kills 3 people and leaves one a quadriplegic requiring millions of dollars in care for the rest of their miserable life. >Unfortunately, that philosophy has been lost to time Yea, guess what happens when you connect the world together so were milliseconds away digitally, and 3 days away from each other with modern travel. Suddenly the dumb shit we do effects everyone around us and in our profound ignorance make the world worse for everyone around us. Hyper-localized doesn't exist unless you want to dump all telecommunications in the trash and burn all the cars and planes the go back to horses. You act like the founding fathers, if transported to today, would be completely incapable of making logically informed decisions based on the current state of the world, and not a world 250 years in their past. > and people in coastal cities in California seem to feel perfectly comfortable lecturing ranch hands in Montana And the people in Montana are perfectly fine with making laws at the federal level that effect people in California.

          • jcranmer · 7 hours ago

            > The United States was built on these very ideals: mini, hyper-localized governance than a larger centralized governance that is not in touch with the people they govern. That's a common tale of American mythos, but it's not really an accurate portrayal of American history. Hyper-local governance only really existed in New England and never spread outside of it. Most governance centered on states which are--let's be frank--small countries: the median state in population and area is around 40th percentile among world countries, so smaller than average, but not by that much. And if you look throughout the history of states' rights in US history, invariably those advocating for states' rights are bleeding hypocrites. Note that, e.g., when the southern states established the Confederate States of America, they expressly forbid their own states from having the rights they were claiming for themselves in the antebellum period. Indeed, in many cases, the more localized governance really turns out to just be people who have lost the political debate at the national level, and thus unable to impose their views on everybody, settling for imposing them at the state level and eagerly oppressing those within the jurisdictions where they can win from exercising their differing views.

          • FireBeyond · 7 hours ago

            > Unfortunately, that philosophy has been lost to time, and people in coastal cities in California seem to feel perfectly comfortable lecturing ranch hands in Montana what to do and how to live their lives. The rural folk in Wyoming and Montana get far more say relative to their populace on how Californians should live than vice versa. It's not urban versus rural. That... is just another variation of having more vote proportional to your land. Land doesn't vote, people do. But in the US, land also votes some, which seems ironic given a nation founded in part on getting away from rights largely embued by how much land you own.

      • eqvinox · 7 hours ago

        There are no "absolute" rights. All rights you have are limited by the rights other people have. You don't even have a truly absolute right to your own death in most places.

  • wpietri · 8 hours ago

    It's only required on public roads. You can drive on your own property all you like without plates. I'm all for privacy for things that are truly private. But wanting to secretly consume public resources and remain unaccountable for harm to others is what I think is truly absurd. Although it's an increasingly popular one recently.

    • dylan604 · 7 hours ago

      That's funny. The vast majority of people's "own property" they could drive on would be on average about 50 feet. I grew up on 3/4 acre lot, and my dad let me drive up and down the drive way to practice before I had a license, so I get what you mean. Just funny that it's such a bold suggestion knowing that it's applicable to such a small number of people

      • wpietri · 5 hours ago

        Yes, that's part of what I'm saying. The notion is absurd. The main point of a car for most people is inescapably social. People who claim they want privacy while acting in society instead want something else, usually a lack of accountability.

        • dylan604 · 4 hours ago

          I'm pretty sure, most of these weird laws are for farmers/ranchers. For whatever reason, they chose to word it more generically that sounds ridiculous applying it to everyone. Just like the whole red dye diesel, farmers just get special carve outs to give them a fighting chance on surviving to be able to provide us affordable food.

          • projektfu · 12 minutes ago

            That is more because the gas tax is intended to pay for the roads. Red-dye diesel is declaring your intention to use the vehicle exclusively off-road, and thus not needing to be subject to the gas tax.

        • HWR_14 · 4 hours ago

          I have no idea why privacy and acting in society would be mutually exclusive.

    • mindslight · 6 hours ago

      I contend that the only sensible way to measure freedom (of which privacy is an aspect) is within the context of societal interactions. It's not particularly interesting to move to the middle of nowhere and be able to do do what you want while not interacting with others (what it takes for "on your own [real estate]" to be meaningful). The pertinent metric is how well society can maintain a level of individual liberty (ie tolerance) as it scales up in density of interactions. And nobody said anything about wanting to be unaccountable for harm. Rather it's a matter of being vulnerable to ne'er do wells. When we get a US GDPR equivalent with teeth, develop a widespread societal taboo against the surveillance industries, and so on, then we can talk about an equitable tradeoff with accountability for harm. Until then, the dynamic is an overwhelming vulnerability.

      • wpietri · 5 hours ago

        That analysis seems pretty confused to me. Freedom without accountability for harm to others is nonsensical. As is dramatizing license plates as "overwhelming vulnerability". Just look at the US's 40k traffic deaths per year, with countless lesser injuries and accidents. Balanced against which specific harms of license plates? The problem with Flock, etc, is their massive, unaccountable, for profit surveillance, which uses much more than license plates, and is working hard to move beyond them.

        • mindslight · 4 hours ago

          Nobody but you has said anything about "freedom" from accountability for harm. The specific harms are exemplified by things like Flock, but also individual businesses tracking, private investigators, etc. If you want to stop that harm other ways, I've already agreed that I would find that acceptable. But until something actually changes on that front, it's not really an argument! Given modern technology, we can imagine different ways that would provide less of a general vulnerability while actually providing more of the accountability you're putting foremost. Imagine say e-ink plates or a radio beacon that rotated the broadcasted identifier every minute, only being linkable through a database with an audit trail, etc.

  • ww520 · 7 hours ago

    Driving is a privilege. Gun ownership is a right.

  • eqvinox · 7 hours ago

    > And why do driver’s licenses have all sorts of extraneous info (all you need is a biometric, like a photo, expiration date, class of license, and any restrictions)? That's just the US being stupid and using driver's licenses as primary identity documents. (And if you don't have a passport or other ID document, you're part of that problem.) (Fun fact: I have 2 passports, 1 driver's license and 1 residence permit. None of those have my address. To be fair, they all have my DOB, that's really considered mandatory for any ID document around here.)

  • 3RTB297 · 7 hours ago

    To be fair, it's only privacy-violating if you have access to a way to lookup who owns the blue Toyota Corolla with license plate 1ABC234. The Driver Privacy Protection Act makes it illegal to disclose PII based on a license plate A single bumper sticker or distinctive paint color or a dent in the door can be just as immediately identifying as a license plate at that level. Even in places where the plate is always the same for the car and doesn't change when it's sold, it's just a way to tell one vehicle apart from another. Case in point, my user name is a license plate number of a total stranger, and I imagine you'd be hard pressed to even tell me the color of the car, let alone their name and address. I'm not asking you to doxx someone, but saying it's not trivially easy for the average person, even when considering the boatload of data broker information out there on every individual.

  • dylan604 · 7 hours ago

    Unless you're willing to spend money, you can't just go online to find the registration info for a plate number. It's not impossible, but it's definitely not as simple as flipping through the pages of the phone book to look up someone's address and number.

  • piva00 · 3 hours ago

    I don't think it's deranged at all, driving is a privilege not a right, you need a license for it, and a license for almost anything has requirements to follow. The requirement to identify the vehicle for enforcement of the licensing requirements is not at all strange. Don't get a license if you don't agree with the requirements for it. Would you be saying the same thing for aircraft?

• waterTanuki · 9 hours ago

  This is the cost of living in a federated republic. Power is diffuse across the states so they all have different opinions on how to go about things like vehicle registrations and insurance. The only alternative is for states to relinquish the power over vehicle registrations/plates/insurance requirements to the federal government which could enforce a universal standard, but I'm sure given current events you would see why that would be a terrible idea. I think as programmers we naturally want a single, universal standard for everything, but there are genuine advantages to having the current system as well, even with all of its flaws.

• subhobroto · 9 hours ago

  > and force the states to agree on a set of standards that apply across the country To rephrase, you're asking that the same license plate work across all of the European Union. To realize why this is unrealistic, one has to go back to history and understand the core concept of the United States of America. It's right there in the name itself. It was a compromise to unite and bring agreement across all these disparate states that were in their very own right entire countries (and most, even till date, most states in the US continue to be larger, geographically than most countries in the world), agree on some very basic terms so there could be trade across them, kind of like the European Union. > but this current system is Kafkaesque Of course, this license plate registration thing was optimized for tax and fee collection, and it does that job very well. All it takes is for someone to run for office and say they're going to overturn it all.

  • FabCH · 5 hours ago

    Not sure why you mentioned EU, but in case you didn’t know, the EU does in fact standardize license plates: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_vehicle_registration_...

    • pjc50 · 2 hours ago

      That standardizes the visual appearance, but not the semantics or issuance of the plates. EU residents are generally required to re-register a car when changing which country they reside in, which in turn has its own rules for what constitutes permanent residence.

  • artisinal · 34 minutes ago

    States are not countries. Plus parts of Europe are thousands of years old. You can’t really compare it to the US. It would be nice though, if you could just buy a car across the border and drive it home. I doubt the EU will ever be that integrated.

• hammock · 9 hours ago

  I was with you in the first paragraph. As I was reading I was reminded of old Cold War-era Soviet Union. You lost me in the next paragraph where your solution was to centralize even more into a committee that has the power to bulldoze over more locally relevant needs and desires

  • pas · 5 hours ago

    granting an option for people who want to have this seems strictly better. it could be a bit more expensive to cover the added administration burden. this is a very local need of some people. they are a minority, and they want some accomodations.

• hnav · 9 hours ago

  Even within California there are smog-exempt counties. This makes perfect sense, things like excess NOx simply don't matter if the population density is low enough which incidentally is also true of a lot of the rest of the country. CA is the strictest with smog-related, going as far as barring federal (non-CA) vehicles from being registered unless they're 7500+ miles on the odometer. Tint should be limited to 70% VLT nationally really, but that's another topic. Other than that some north-eastern states have safety inspections which makes total sense given the rust. By developed country standards we have it very easy.

  • zhivota · 2 hours ago

    I ran into a fun one when moving out of the country. Chrysler Town and Country I had bought in Washington state, we were flying out from CA. My thought was to unload the vehicle in the last week before flying. Except no one would buy it, not even Carmax or any of the other "cash for cars" places! Turns out, the car was originally manufactured for Canada, and California doesn't recognize the Canadian smog regulations, even if the car was functionally identical down to the catalytic converter. No one would take the damn thing because they couldn't re-title it. I finally found one guy who would who seemed like he was taking a decent sized risk, but since I gave him a good price he decided he'd just give it his best shot. For all I know he may have had to (illegally) drive it to Nevada just to sell it.

• 3RTB297 · 7 hours ago

  >have a generic plate that can go anywhere Functionally, that's what already exists - the standards are dimensions and readability. There's no CA smog inspection station as you enter the state, this is about people abusing a loophole. I spent all 4 years of college in CA with a CA driver's license, a car with out of state plates, and zero Kafkaesque issues. Maybe tax avoidance loopholes are Kafkaesque because they're not how anyone is supposed to do things. As one more wacky way to do it, some countries rivet the license plate to the car because the plates never change. They're basically shorthand for the VIN, so the owner and their place of residence don't matter, only where the car was first registered.

  • PHGamer · 5 hours ago

    its not abusing a loophole. if something isnt in a state for more than 50% of the calendar year the state should have no claim to it. its a federal matter at the point cross border taxation IMO.

    • notpushkin · 3 hours ago

      So I can buy two cars and just drive each for 162 days in a year?

  • pjc50 · 4 hours ago

    The UK system associates the plates with your car. This incurs basically two pieces of paperwork online when you sell it, one of which is also annual taxation. The administration has gradually modernized so that all the legal requirements of tax/registration/insurance can be checked online. However, there's a loophole that's apparently becoming popular: "ghost plates". Number plates aren't a secure document. They have no authenticity markers. So you can just.. print your own, slap them on, and you're very unlikely to get police attention. A subset of that is plates which are IR scattering so they don't show up on speed cameras.

    • simoncion · 2 hours ago

      > However, there's a loophole that's apparently becoming popular: "ghost plates". We don't call fake IDs either a loophole or "ghost IDs". When presented as identity documents, they're fraudulent identity documents. It doesn't matter if that ID is being presented to a bouncer in order to get in to a bar, or to everyone who cares to look at your car's bumper while it drives down the motorway, it's still a fake ID.

    • quietbritishjim · 1 hour ago

      > A subset of that is plates which are IR scattering so they don't show up on speed cameras. Only these are "ghost plates". So called because the letters appear faint, or ghost like, on ANPR cameras. Using illegal plates, either ghost ones or cloned ones (where they're real plates but for the wrong vehicle) are not loopholes, any more than breaking into someone's house and stealing their stuff is a "loophole" for property ownership.

    • shrikant · 14 minutes ago

      "Loophole"? The secret ingredient is crime...

• pluc · 6 minutes ago

  Hey if you're interested IBM just developed one such system for the Quebec government (called SAAQClic) that was supposed to cost 638 millions but ended up costing 1.1 billion. We are desperate to monetize it so anything you want to pay to license is fine with us

Eventually everything will be a use tax. It's the only fair tax and there will always be loopholes otherwise.

• Schiendelman · 15 hours ago

  You'd think that, but they are deeply unpopular.

  • eli · 15 hours ago

    If we're only doing tax policy that's popular, it's gonna be all corporate and high income household taxes.

    • smallmancontrov · 15 hours ago

      If we're only doing tax policy that's popular with wealthy donors, it's gonna be ~all earned income and sales tax. Oh wait, that's what it is.

    • Computer0 · 10 hours ago

      I think a more popular tax policy would be televised forced (under duress) blood withdrawals of the 1%

    • jfengel · 10 hours ago

      If we're only doing tax policy that's popular, it's gonna be all tax cuts and debts written in exponential notation.

• downrightmike · 15 hours ago

  Land use tax needs to start first

• parineum · 10 hours ago

  If we're going to have a use tax, I'd rather a private company own whatever I'm using.

• Arainach · 8 hours ago

  Use taxes are not "fair" much less "the only fair tax". You and I both benefit from having fire departments even if our possessions never ignite. The same is true for all sorts of common infrastructure.

I don't get how it's constitutional for them to levy a tax on an officer of a company that does not live in the state just because one officer of the company does live in the state. Even weirder the law does not require the one officer that does live in California to have a company car. In other words they are trying to tax out of state cars with no proof those cars were ever in the state. This is gonna cause a mess in the courts.

• downrightmike · 15 hours ago

  Taxation without representation

• jmilloy · 13 hours ago

  They only tax the assets that are held in the state. I don't know where you're getting that they will tax out of state cars. > If anyone running the business is a California resident (by the updated definition outlined above), then the whole business is a California resident, and any assets (including Lamborghinis and Bugattis) held in the state are subject to California taxation.

• floatrock · 10 hours ago

  They're not levying a tax on an officer of the company, they're levying a tax on the company if the company brings assets into the state within 12 months of purchase (so the whole point is there is proof the cars are being used in the state). But since a company can't go to jail, the California officers operating the company are on the hook if the company happens to have weirdly empty balance sheets and can't collect what is owed. And this bill specifically only targets any-share owners of just "shell" companies, which tend to have those weirdly empty balance sheets. Normal companies fall under existing california laws. I mean, we can continue to pick apart the legal language, or we can acknowledge that if people invent elaborate loopholes to avoid paying taxes, the State will adapt and create elaborate corrections to collect those taxes. This is just a cat and mouse game of greed vs. fairness being played out in real-time.

I think the tax hole loop is a bit annoying but I also find it annoying that CA won't allow you to register a shitload of cars in the state, period. It's due to the asinine carb laws. Even if you have a car that would pass smog, they won't let you register it. I don't see this doing anything when a ton of vehicles get a pass. For instance, all motorcycles don't fall under this rule and they are the biggest polluters out there. It's just dumb. All these complaints people have about cars - yet don't see any legislation out there that's bringing the clean energy public transit revolution. Just more rules without any relief.

• tzs · 12 hours ago

  I can't find anything about a limit on the number of cars you can register in California.

  • BobaFloutist · 11 hours ago

    I had the same misread at first, I think they mean "There are a ton of (models of) cars that you cannot register in California"

• paustint · 10 hours ago

  California is over-regulated and over taxed, "the government knows best, give us all your money and we will take care of you and save the planet". Just leave people alone and let them have a good life and do what they want within reason without trying to suck the life out of every penny.

  • JeffRosenberg · 10 hours ago

    Yeah, that’s why the population of California is so tiny, people voting with their feet. /s

  • saagarjha · 10 hours ago

    > the government knows best, give us all your money and we will take care of you and save the planet Yeah this is kind of explicitly what most people living there seem to want

this is all about the money, nothing else. California will get more money out of citizens any way it can.

• jwcacces · 10 hours ago

  This isn't about the state getting more money out of you. This is about shutting down on the tax dodge. Pay your taxes. If you don't like your taxes, vote to have them changed, but don't complain that you can't cheat your way out of the taxes that everyone else is paying.

  • subhobroto · 10 hours ago

    > Pay your taxes. If you don't like your taxes, vote to have them changed, but don't complain that you can't cheat your way out of the taxes that everyone else is paying Let's say there are two classes of software engineers: A and B. - A get paid $50k/year - B get paid double that. The reason why A gets paid lower is because they are commodity software engineers. Due to supply and demand, there is an oversupply of these commodity engineers which make them so cheap. They are very hardworking but so are B. B are very high quality, creative, high impact engineers. These are highly capable people and due to biology and how IQ is distributed, naturally their numbers are way limited than the class A. Due to their productivity, impact and supply, their market price is higher. Given the same inputs, B produces way more useful and valuable (to society) outputs than A. Their incomes reflect this. From a voting perspective, members of both A and B both have the same number of votes. Now questions: 1. What are your thoughts if A passes laws and regulations where their class doesn't pay any taxes but B's pays 60%? 2. given that software engineering is an extremely creative process, problem solving ability typically scales with IQ, and IQ follows a bell distribution, the literal volume of A is much higher than B, aka laws that put B at a disadvantage get passed incredibly faster than the other way around (due to sheer volume in a democratic process). Do these resonate with you? Are there any logical fallacies in these statements? If so, what are your thoughts about them? What should class B do?

    • otterley · 9 hours ago

      This isn't a logical fallacy quiz and shouldn't be presented as one. Besides, it would be illogical--and unlikely--for Class A to tax Class B that much. If they did, and the predictable consequences followed, Class A would likely adjust the tax rate keep the population of Class B at an equilibrium state. Let's stick to realistic what-if scenarios, shall we?

      • subhobroto · 8 hours ago

        > Class A would likely adjust the tax rate keep the population of Class B at an equilibrium state What would be Class A's motivation for keep the population of Class B at an equilibrium state? > Let's stick to realistic what-if scenarios, shall we? Prove to me then, that this is not how it happens right now or has happened for the last century. Software engineers who make mid six figures and even 7 after bonuses and RSUs, working at high-frequency trading firms or the MAG 7 pay way more taxes than most of the typical Hacker News population does, and I would bet that population is faily well paid than the average random person.

        • otterley · 6 hours ago

          > Prove to me then, that this is not how it happens right now or has happened for the last century. That's not the way proof works. The burden is always to prove the presence of things, not the absence of them. I'm not exactly sure what your angle is here. Why don't you just clearly set forth what your position on taxation is, and save us all the trouble?

    • hnav · 9 hours ago

      That's a highly contrived scenario. In reality the rich guy who employs both A & B is using tax avoidance strategies (including registering their Ferrari 812 in Montana) to pay single digit tax on their actual net worth growth and debt taken out against it, while A & B pay 20-35% on their W2 income.

      • subhobroto · 8 hours ago

        > while A & B pay 20-35% on their W2 income Would you be in support of passing laws and regulations that cap A & B's taxes to single digits too?

• jrmg · 10 hours ago

  Yes, it is of course completely reasonable that California residents should be able to register their cars in Montana, where they don’t live. Why would the stat want to put a stop to things like that other than to squeeze their residents for more money?

• plussed_reader · 10 hours ago

  Some of the residents appreciate a higher quality of living; for those that don't there's always Tuolemne or Shasta counties....

• phyzome · 10 hours ago

  Uh, yes? Taxes are, in fact, about money. And tax evasion is about not paying your fair share.

  • 0xbadcafebee · 10 hours ago

    They're probably aware of that, and probably hold a political viewpoint that taxes should be voluntary.

• saagarjha · 10 hours ago

  Which seems like a reasonable way to go about it? If you’re in California and taking advantage of the benefits the state offers, you should be contributing towards it?

• Johnny555 · 10 hours ago

  Have you just now discovered what a tax is? It's a means for residents to pay for the government of the state in which they live. If someone doesn't like California's taxation (or government), they are free to move out of the state, but they can't have it both ways - they don't get to live in California but register assets outside the state to avoid the taxation.

• anigbrowl · 9 hours ago

  Ah, the grifter's lament

Montana person here. I'm on the other side of this trade: trying to buy cars in California[1] that I'm going to register in Montana. My experience has been that it's very hard to exploit this "loophole". I know that because even not trying to exploit the loophole. I have to jump through hoops to prove to a dealer that I really live in Montana. And then the car has to be either put on a transporter, taken to the border (or all the way to Montana), or driven by an employee of the dealership to the border. Then we have to get paperwork notarized by someone at the border that the vehicle really left CA. You also have to pledge in writing that you wont bring the car back into CA except for maintenance. I've had dealers in LA just plain refuse to sell me a car because I lived in Montana. So it was not in recent years anything like as easy as "put a Montana plate on it" <waves hand>. The article calls the ownership entities "fake LLCs". They were in fact completely real kosher Montana LLCs. The issue at hand is that CA wants to disallow the case where the LLC is owned by someone who is a CA resident. That's not the same as "fake". Finally, anyone from California should experience the Montana DMV (called MDT here). It's like checking into the Four Seasons compared to the CA DMV! You can phone them and they'll answer within a few rings and help you out. You can go down to their office at the court house and perhaps have to wait in line for 5 minutes, but perhaps just walk straight up to the counter. They will help you figure out vanity plate letters, endlessly checking whether ideas you have are already registered. I almost make up excuses to go to the DMV, it's so nice there. Montana also has a system of sponsored plates. There are about 100 of them, which allows you to choose a plate of almost any color, which is nice if you want it to match the car color. [1] Why do that? Well there are 100X more cars for sale in CA, and the prices are lower.

• DANmode · 9 hours ago

  > the prices are lower. On what ? Genuinely curious what class of vehicle you’re buying and selling. I’m assuming it’s…not Camrys.

There seems to be a lot of varied and interesting perspectives and lengthy debates on this thread, but the core issue is California is in debt and needs all the money it can get. The California DMV is a fees collection arm and not customer friendly. For example, a lot of Californians don't even know that there is something called PNO, or "planned non-operation", a status possible for vehicles they don't plan to run or use on public streets, where they stop paying recurring registration fees that are now in the hundreds of dollars a year. Every year, I'm aware of at least a few people who do not have an operational car or have a second car in their garage that they are still paying registration fees for, or the state of California places a lien on their unused vehicle, just because that person is unaware that they can just stop paying registration fees on their car by filing a PNO in time. First you have to know this PNO status exists, and then you have to file it correctly within a short 90 day window. There are no exceptions, even if you prove you were in a coma or out of state or country. I'm not going to go into the details of how draconian the process of bringing a car out of PNO is. For example, if you have a car that has passed smog in October, you put a PNO in October and you bring it back out of PNO in November, they're going to make you smog it nonetheless - pretty expensive process that costs now atleast a hundred dollars all in, which runs counter to California's own policy of not requiring a smog within 90 days of the recent smog test. If the DMV was customer empathetic and friendly, they would have by default, placed any cars that have not been registered in time, on PNO. Later, the person who pays the registration then automatically gets their car moved from PNO to registered status. However, this is not how the DMV operates: They will continue to tax you and fine you and add interest on top of all the fees for a car you do not plan to operate. So all the debate about whether this is right or if there is another way of doing it etc is missing the entire point because none of that is the objective. The entire point is to collect taxes and fees to fund a ballooning, unchecked and ever-growing expense account.

• mrpippy · 9 hours ago

  Every time you pay your registration in CA (either online or through the mail) they ask if you want to register PNO or not. Also, it’s not free (like $20) to register PNO, so doing it automatically would still result in an unpaid bill.

  • subhobroto · 9 hours ago

    > Every time you pay your registration in CA (either online or through the mail) they ask if you want to register PNO or not If we agree that owning a car for most people (I'm sure there are exceptions for collectors etc, that don't concern me) requires either paying registration or the PNO, why is not the PNO automatic choice until someone pays the registration? That way, any car not registered is already on PNO and the owner has to do nothing. What's wrong with that? Why is PNO not retroactive? Why is its active window only a short 90 days? Cops can still pull over an late/unregistered car and ticket it. CA civil code authorizes the towing of any car that's due registration at the owner's expense, so why these additional restrictions? > so doing it automatically would still result in an unpaid bill I would imagine a $20 bill would be appreciated by most people over a $200 one. A 20% late fee on a $20 bill is still lower than on $200.

• TacticalCoder · 6 hours ago

  > The entire point is to collect taxes and fees to fund a ballooning, unchecked and ever-growing expense account. And the problem with that is that at some point people just vote with their money, their feet and the future wealth they're going to create and GTFO to greener pastures. There is such a ting as diminishing returns on insane taxation. France is an example. But billionaires leaving California is a thing too. I did personally decided my native country gave me jack shit in return for my taxes: the only thing it'd give me would be ever more public servants collecting ever more taxes, all the while driving my native city (Brussels / Belgium) into the ground. So I packed my stuff and left for a country with less taxes and which is, IMO, better managed and where you don't feel like the state's only mission is to turn you into someone poor by seizing all your wealth.

pretty sure in a lot of these cases it’s already illegal, enforcing the law is another matter. someone actually has to pull over the montana plate owner, then the state has to sue them for tax evasion, build the case, etc. Thats just not gonna happen. ideally there would be a nationwide standard for registration and taxes. also the new hot thing in california is to have dealer plates on your million dollar car. you never register it, never pay taxes, but it’s still legal to drive. you just need to own a dealership, but on paper again that’s not hard if you’re rich

• subhobroto · 9 hours ago

  > you just need to own a dealership, but on paper again that’s not hard if you’re rich You're technically correct, but a dealership is one of the most highly taxed entities in California. In any city or county, a dealership, dollar for dollar, pays one of the highest taxes than any business there. So this recommendation is similar to stabbing yourself in the stomach and waiting to bleed out so that you weigh less on the scale - there are other details, most people don't care about, with those dealer plates on one's million dollar car that has to do more with insurance, liability and taxes than fees to the CA DMV. > someone actually has to pull over the montana plate owner, then the state has to sue them for tax evasion, build the case, etc. Thats just not gonna happen But that's because that's not the path the FTB follows! The reasonable path that has been taken is the FTB finds out that you, as a Californian, own plates in Montana and send you a bill for the registration plus fees and punitive damages so you reconsider pulling the stunt again. If you don't respond in 90 days, it's sent directly to your bank as a demand letter. If you have at least one bank that has a California domicile, that bank is going to pay out from your funds immediately.

  • toast0 · 8 hours ago

    > You're technically correct, but a dealership is one of the most highly taxed entities in California. In any city or county, a dealership, dollar for dollar, pays one of the highest taxes than any business there. That's true for most dealerships, but most of the taxes are transaction based (probably some for property tax on inventory though). If you have a sham dealership that primarily exists so you can have dealer plates and to massage transactions on your personal vehicles, you can probably avoid a lot of taxes. Not my style, I just left the state when I was tired of everything. I'm happier where I landed, but if people want to live in California and use out of state plates, that's less people where I am, so go nuts.