Why would they? their whole plan from the beginning was to do a reverse Uber - a fleet of self driving cars that acts as a taxi service.
Cost of a model 3 to TSLA: 25k
Average Revenue per year for self driving taxi: $12/hr * 24 * 365 = 105k
Producing just 100k cars a year for this program would generate 10B dollars a year in revenue, if they can make 1M cars a year, it's 100B... making TSLA a trillion dollar company even with a Ford valuation.
Most of that revenue will be more profitable than a gas powered car since they also own an energy company, and the software that runs the cars.
(Very glad I got a reservation worth of stock when the Model 3 was announced a few years ago, so I am biased)