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by Factorium 1663 days ago
We could ban all gas-powered cars now: just start with vehicles priced over $100,000, and decrease the threshold by $10,000 annually.
2 comments

Why ban higher priced vehicles first? If it's only about the environment you should ban by level of emissions.
Sure, so do both. One reason to limit the high priced ones is that those buyers should be able, with that money, to afford a truly fantastic EV, so there is generally little sensible reason for them to be buying an ICE vehicle given the circumstances.
There isn’t really an affordable option for people with kids, so it’s not a great idea regardless.
Model Y seats seven and the post said start with $100k cars. If they can afford a $100k ICE car they can easily afford a Model Y.

Or even two Model Ys, for the same money, because while 2x purchase price is over $100k, the TCO is so much lower than for an ICE car, and it’s really the TCO (total cost of ownership including everything after purchase) that matters if your worry is affordability.

So assuming two parents, it works for people with up to five kids, or if they have two drivers in the family, up to 12 kids. Most families have fewer than 12 children.

Just having 7 seats doesn’t mean that 7 can actually be seated. I would argue that if you had two car seats the third row would be completely in accessible.

Even if you didn’t have two car seats it’s unlikely that any of the kids stuff will fit as well. Kids come with a lot of stuff in general.

I bought my Tahoe for $30k, I looked at Tesla but we couldn’t afford the 100k price tag of the model X.

For people who are in lower or lower middle class total cost of ownership is something that you can’t really take into consideration because it’s easy to flex the amount spent on gas by reducing the driving around and being more efficient with your errands, but you can’t flex your payments.

Lastly while 57k isn’t bad for an electric vehicle, it’s still far from affordable for a large portion of Americans.

> but you can’t flex your payments.

Interesting point, sounds like an unserved need that maybe could be a business opportunity for somebody.

Another thing you can’t flex is repairs, which tend to be more frequent for ICE cars.

> I would argue that if you had two car seats the third row would be completely in accessible.

I think you meant to say “I would imagine.”

And as is frequently the case with people underestimating Tesla, you would imagine wrong.

You can put not just two, but THREE car seats in the second row and still access the third row. The second row seats move forward easily and temporarily to enable this.

Hard to put a price on safety of your family.

Hank Williams’ daughter died in a Tahoe and my thought at the time was: someone like that, why weren’t they in a Model Y?

Later found out they were towing a boat. Choices.

Because people with kids should have to take public transit?

There really isn’t an affordable electric option for people with kids.

There are are a number of lower and lower middle class that people with kids do in fact have to take public transit. And if not public at least extended friend, family transit. Even, non electric, there is an SUV premium that only the top 30% of Americans ~can afford.
Asking for over half of all Americans - what public transit?? Even in cities like Dallas it's totally not a feasible alternative to a vehicle.
Over half? I think you've read my post incorrectly.

I preemptively answered this by saying extended friends and family are a top source of transit.

But yes, walking, bus systems, getting rides, for some demographics, ride shares. Cities like Atlanta and Dallas have low economic mobility because you can't get anywhere except by car.

It’s the buses in Dallas that drive around all day with only the driver. If your on the outskirts sometimes there are two empty buses driving together.