What Are Tire Fees?
When you pay for a new set of tires, the bill includes a handful of extra fees you may not recognize. Beyond the customary installation and sales tax charges, new tire purchases carry other charges like “disposal” or “recycling.”
What are these mysterious tire fees you’re paying for? And who is imposing them on you?
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Why you’re charged money for the disposal of old car tires
Tire fees apply to cars, trucks, buses, trailers, motorcycles, ATVs, RVs, golf carts, and any other motorized vehicles that have replaceable tires. Whenever you buy a new tire for one of these vehicles, the old one must be properly discarded to protect the environment. And that effort costs money.
A tire fee, or tire tax, is an amount of money that the government uses to fund the proper disposal of rubber tires. Scrap tire legislation regulates how old tires are handled after being replaced, and that system involves specialized recycling methods to safely disperse the remains of these nonbiodegradable items.
State legislation imposes tire fees on retailers, and that charge is passed on to you as the buyer/consumer. The tire fee amount varies based on each state’s particular laws. So in New York for instance, the state’s Environmental Conservation Law imposes a $2.50 fee per tire on a business selling new tires, which buyers must pay for (and a certain portion of the fee is kept by the retailer to recoup admin costs).
You replace your car’s tires approximately every five years, which means every person in the country yields one scrap tire every year. That means over 300 million tires in the trash every year in the USA alone. And that’s only counting automobiles. It’s a good thing that we can pay a couple extra bucks to keep our Earth clean and green from mountains of scrap tires!
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Aaron is unashamed to be a native Clevelander and the proud driver of a Hyundai Veloster Turbo (which recently replaced his 1995 Saturn SC-2). He gleefully utilizes his background in theater, literature, and communication to dramatically recite his own articles to nearby youth. Mr. Widmar happily resides in Dayton, Ohio with his magnificent wife, Vicki, but is often on the road with her exploring new destinations. Aaron has high aspirations for his writing career but often gets distracted pondering the profound nature of the human condition and forgets what he was writing… See more articles by Aaron.