[api]

It's an entire economy. When someone else buys a Tesla, oil demand is rendered less inelastic. This also primes the market so that more EVs get sold, including cheaper ones, and eventually used EVs become available at a much lower price.

You can get a used Nissan Leaf for <$10K now in good condition with enough range for most commuter needs, and those things are super reliable and require virtually no maintenance.

I guess we should not do anything if it can't immediately be made affordable to everyone in the very first generation. So we should never have done ocean travel, air travel, non-emergency medicine, higher education, personal computers, ...

Everything is always expensive when it's new.

[ejb999]

so what you are saying is you are in favor of trickle-down economics? - where people who make $300K+ a year, buy government subsidized Tesla's, and somehow, somewhere, the poor single mother who now has decide between filling her car to get to work, and buying food - will somehow benefit from wealthy tech-bros driving $100K cars.

[api]

Bash that straw man!

I agree that current inequality is excessive, but the argument I made applies if there is any inequality at all. There has never been a human society with absolutely zero inequality. If there is any inequality at all there is always some "trickle down" effect in the form of aftermarkets, priming of industrial production leading to future lower prices, etc.

It's possible to simultaneously acknowledge certain "trickle down" effects and believe they can be beneficial while also being in favor of reducing inequality.