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Comment by VvR-Ox | Hacker News Reader

It is absolutely no stupid question. That you ask this just shows you are a reasonable person :)

1. It is a status symbol (as in "my car is bigger than your car")

2. It is sturdier and has more weight so it will physically dominate the average car in an accident and provide more security to it's passengers.

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The problem is, they're just bad vehicles. They don't handle well, they guzzle fuel and they kill more pedestrians. There is no point in them unless you're a farmer.

> There is no point in them unless you're a farmer.

There are plenty of trades that benefit from using a truck other than just farming.

Yes true, but I was really referring more to SUVs. Worldwide there is a real problem with this trend, and it is nearly all marketing. Certainly the average school run in the UK does not benefit form the extensive use of SUVs.

What about vans? Do people benefit from them?

Yes of course. But nobody would ever argue that a van is a better vehicle than a normal sized car for moving people around (unless you have a massive family). SUVs are a profitable marketing trend for car companies and nothing more. We are literally burning the planet and people's insecurities are being exploited to persuade them into oversized and (thus poorly performing) vehicles.

VW Jetta does 30MPG in the city, Jeep Wrangler does 22MPG, i.e. 36% more emission. In the winter conditions (e.g. Toronto where I live) Jeep wins hands down. I don't even have winter tires. If you drive kids, the higher and stronger vehicle provides much more safety. Is it worth an extra 36% of pollution? I don't know. But the view that SUVs are just a gas-guzzling marketing ploy is a stretch.

They may be slightly safer for the occupants of the car, but the height factor kills 30% more pedestrians and in actual fact accident fatalities are up as a result of SUVs as they incite risk-taking behaviour and roll over in accidents much more readliy. Additionally, they only have to accede to truck safety regulations with are less stringent than those for cars. I can point you to loads of papers and articles on this. They purely are a marketing ploy as they are more profitable vehicles for the manufacturers. BTW those MPG ratings are shit by today's standards; most cars do 45MPG+.

This is a very rational point of view but to be completely valid consumers would have to be rational consumers which I really don't see.

> physically dominate the average car in an accident

This is just such an American way of putting it. Sounds so much nicer than "kill everyone in the other vehicle to provide a marginally higher chance for its owner" but it's basically the same thing

At a certain point tho, if everyone else is driving a truck, you either drive a compact out of pure moral-high-ground spite or you get a truck/full-size SUV as well to even your chances of survival.

I'm not saying escalation is a Good Thing™, only that it's inevitable when people are culturally obsessed with driving absurd bullshit.

Or you keep driving a sensible car because you don't want to give in to the stupid and prefer to spend your money elsewhere.

Or you do the math and realize that with a modern, safe automobile, your chance of dying in an accident with a pickup is so small that upgrading your own vehicle to a pickup is a rounding error.

To be clear, I agree that humans being humans, we do love to get into escalating arms races.

I've seen at least 3 reports in my area where a head-on collision with an impaired driver (in the truck) usually ended up killing or seriously injuring the passengers in this 'modern, safe automobile'. Some examples:

* https://www.kxan.com/news/local/austin/drunk-driver-who-kill...

* https://www.kxan.com/traffic/two-children-killed-in-cedar-pa...

* https://www.kxan.com/top-stories/two-from-austin-dead-after-...

* https://www.kxan.com/news/texas/married-only-minutes-texas-n...

It is an arms race and it is the right time for the industry to use the growing fear and demand for security in the global population to make some extra $$$ (just seen from a purely economical point of view of course).

I agree that it is probably inevitable but there is also people who don't join the race and that is lifting my hopes.

If they are so dangerous, shouldn't they at the very least require a stricter driver's license?

Things like “danger,” “skill,” “knowledge,” and “safety” aren’t really part of license exams in the US. They’ll pretty much just give a license to anyone here, literally.

It’s actually one of our bigger problems (it has big implications on safety, infrastructure, urban planning, &c.), but not many people really care. Cars are too deeply associated with “freedom” and “success” and individuality; for a lot of people I’d say they might be the biggest icon of America after the flag.

Yeah that's not a thing here. I have driven a 26ft moving truck from a rental company with nothing more than a rental form signed.

https://www.budgettruck.com/moving-trucks-accessories/truckd...

You can huff and puff about things you don't like being "American" but the rest of the world is following along about as fast as they can.

I hope I did not offend you somehow by phrasing it too American but you seem to understand what I say just fine.

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