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by rdl 3039 days ago
I put in a preorder for the Workhorse W-15 pickup at CES (I'd been following them for a year). $1k fully-refundable, same as Model 3.

http://workhorse.com/pickup/

80 mile electric-only range is great, and it gets electric incentives (federal and more importantly for me, exempt from 40% import duty to Puerto Rico). The great thing as a pickup truck is it works as a stationary power source for tools, either from battery or generator. It's probably inferior to a Tacoma or something for offroad/etc. use, but is still adequate. Apparently their main market for these is the electric utility market, for outside plant maintenance/etc.
1 comments
slimsag 3039 days ago
I didn't see this mentioned on their site anywhere / had to Google it. The truck is $52,000.. I can't imagine picking that over a Tundra for $31,120.
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seanmcdirmid 3039 days ago
Incentives + taxes. I didn't know Puerto Rico normally had a 40% tax on vehicles! Kind of like how a Tesla Model S is economical in Norway given the taxes on the alternatives.
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rdl 3039 days ago
The Puerto Rico tax is...weird. It goes up highly progressively on value (I think 40% over 40k), it seems to be different for importer/dealer vs. individual, etc., but the 2015 electric exemption is nice.

(But, in exchange via act 20+22: zero capital gains (LT/ST), zero tax on dividends, and consulting/services/export revenue are taxed at 0-4% -- all guaranteed through at least 2035. Seems to be becoming quite the hub for traders and cryptocurrency people, plus some saas/consultancy types, which becomes interesting to me for network effect reasons.)

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seanmcdirmid 3039 days ago
> (But, in exchange via act 20+22: zero capital gains (LT/ST), zero tax on dividends, and consulting/services/export revenue are taxed at 0-4% -- all guaranteed through at least 2035. Seems to be becoming quite the hub for traders and cryptocurrency people, plus some saas/consultancy types, which becomes interesting to me for network effect reasons.)

And in exchange for that, Puerto Rico is broke. But that is not a topic for here and now :)

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rdl 3039 days ago
I think it's in the other direction of causality "Puerto Rico was broke, so they passed all these incentives in 2006 and enhanced them in 2017".

But it does create a lot of perverse incentives; it's a better deal for me to move to PR and do stuff than for a PR-born kid to go to HS on-island, college in the US, and then return to PR to run a business. There is almost an argument for constitutionality/equal protection.

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