Currently, more than 80% of the public income with which states and municipalities operate are transferred by the federation, to reduce dependence on these resources, the importance of collecting local taxes, such as the ownership or use of vehicles, stands out.
Despite the growth of the vehicle fleet, the larger size of cars and the use of larger engines, only 13 of the 32 entities in Mexico collect this tax. By the end of this year, 20,375 million pesos are expected to come in, this is 9.8% less than what was collected in 2024, according to the investigation Redesign of the holding tax: collection potential and progressivity, carried out by the CIEP and Transparencia Mexicana.
The states that maintain this collection measure are: Baja California, Colima, Hidalgo, State of Mexico, Mexico City, Morelos, Puebla, Querétaro, Quintana Roo, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Tlaxcala and Veracruz.
“States that charge for ownership have the advantage, over those that do not, of having more resources available. As they are their own income, local authorities can decide what to spend on, because the resources that are distributed through Contributions, for example, are already labeled. Meanwhile, Participations are freely available, but they are insufficient to fully finance state public policies. So strengthening own income is precisely to depend less on federalized spending,” adds Macías.
Potential
The tax collection potential of possession in the 32 states of the Mexican Republic is notable. A model carried out by CIEP and Transparencia Mexicana indicates that if applied in the 32 states in 2024, and assuming that 80% of the vehicle fleet would pay said tax, 121,249 million pesos would be collected, that is, an additional 98,966 million.
This ownership redesign model retains its progressive nature, that is, a rate according to the price of the vehicle; in addition to the Environment components (40 pesos per 100 cubic centimeters of engine size) and Mobility and infrastructure use (2% of the depreciated price of the vehicle).
Furthermore, it suggests that the tax would become a federalized national tax, that is, it is homogeneous throughout the national territory and collected and administered by the states.
Reduce dependency
According to the research, this new ownership tax would be capable of reducing dependence on transfers for federalized spending. On average, dependency would be reduced by 2.4%. The entity with the greatest reduction would be Morelos with 4.8% and the one with the smallest decrease would be Oaxaca with 0.9%.
CDMX establishes subsidy
CDMX is one of the entities that has the least dependence on federal income and that generates the most income from ownership. Recently, his government expanded the subsidy in 2026 to vehicles with a value of less than 638,000 pesos with VAT included. With this they hope to raise 4,582 million pesos and double the number of registered vehicles.
The director of the CIEP says that it is important to consider electric and hybrid cars in these charges.
“Maybe they don’t generate as many emissions as gasoline ones, but anyway when the battery is discarded, they will pollute. They also take up space,” says Macías.
