So is this where the founders all get to come in and contemplate, compare, and contrast their expensive luxury toys? And then move on to another thread on HN and wax philosophical about economic inequality?
As a founder of a startup, I don't own a Tesla (nor do I wax philosophical about economic inequality often), but there are plenty of articles and comment threads that I find valuable. It's also healthy to keep abreast of a broad understanding of what people find interesting. It just so happens that Teslas are at an intersection of featureset and price that interests a lot of people here and I find that valuable for HN content.
Also, a model 3 is something like $40k-50k (realistically) which is probably above the range for a ramen profitable founder but certain well within range of most of the middle class to upper-middle class such that I wouldn't consider it an expensive luxury toy.
The currently "available" versions start at $44K, and features (seriously, paying $1k for 'non-black' paint?) can easily push that to over $60K.
So the base model really is 35k. If you’re in California, you get 2500 tax credit + 7500 federal. That’s 25k + tax. Sure it’s not something everyone can afford but definitely not in the expensive luxury toy range. IMO it’s more in the “deal of a lifetime” category than the “expensive luxury toy” category.