Are cars cheaper today? How about all that construction equipment the Caterpillar sells?
Are the price of tanks and jets getting cheaper?
https://www.hotcars.com/these-are-the-cheapest-new-cars-you-...
I also didn't expect one to receive significant damage from a lightweight cardboard box.
There's "unsafe", and then there's this.
And roof rack damage is definitely not a safety issue.
At $1,000, it's probably safe to assume these aren't the only cheaply made parts of the vehicle.
> At $1,000, it's probably safe to assume these aren't the only cheaply made parts of the vehicle.
Sure but if you're doing that then you don't need the pinata test at all.
The cars in the 60s were rigid. This meant that, by and large, the car did damage to everything else until that threshold was passed.
The problem was two fold:
1) You tended to get thrown around inside the rigid box since internal restraints weren't very good (poor seatbelts, poor headrests, no airbags, etc.).
2) Once you finally had enough energy to get past the failure point, the car collapse was uncontrolled. This generally meant that the steering column got pushed into the driver.
GA airplane production collapsed from a peak production of 17k a year in the 1970s to a few thousand a year starting in the 90s continuing to today. Cars and tractors and tanks and even jets have all seen their markets grow, not disappear.
A new Model T in 1925 cost had fallen to 260$, that’s roughly $4,348 in todays money. Sure it’s missing a great deal of modern features, but it’s hard to get a new golf cart at that price.
People can afford much nicer cars now. Regulations also require decent crash safety. There's not much of a market for these kinds of super-cheap cars.
Though it'd be interesting to work out how much an exact clone of the Model T would cost today (mass produced using modern technology).
The model T was pretty simple, and you can buy engines with waaaay more power - and longer life, quieter, more efficient, etc. too for sub $500 at harbor freight and strap it to a frame, and off you go.
Assuming we’re talking ‘functional equivalent’, compared to ‘exact copy’.
Aside from that, there's the fact that if you can actually afford it, then it's likely better to finance than to pay cash because you can invest the full purchase price of the car for a higher return than the interest you would pay.
Anyway, that’s an unexpected 500$ expense. My point was people financing a 50+k new car could fairly easily buy a 17,600 car out of pocket by waiting a little longer before purchase. Large scale changes in purchasing habits would have significant knock on effects for the used car market, but that’s another story.
Holding off on a X$/month car payment on a 50k car can very quickly turn into a new 18k car. Continuing to put away that same car payment and you’re able to buy a 50k car out of pocket quite soon. Essentially financing doesn’t make expensive cars more affordable it simply allows people to buy them sooner.
There was a real nasty lawsuit against one of the GA manufacturers. I believe it was Cirrus but it could be Cessna. Basically, this person sued everyone because their relative died in a flight. I mean everyone, if your part could be installed in this aircraft, sued.
The result was that Cessna stopped making the 172 in 1986 because the legal liability was too high. The most popular aircraft ever made was not for sale because of the liability. Production has resumed but something like 50% of the cost is just liability insurance for the inevitable lawsuit.
But it’s still crazy because GA is a high income pursuit. So any lawsuit for lifetime earnings is going to be huge.
Cars are AVAILABLE for pretty much the same price.
People WANT more expensive cars.
The Volkswagen Beetle was pretty much the least expensive car on the market for its entire sales run in the United States.
The inflation-adjusted price of a Beetle in 1973 was around $12,000.
The price of a Chevrolet Spark in 2022? $13,000.
Nobody wants a Spark, though. They want an SUV. So Chevy killed the Spark.
Before Chevy discontinued the Spark you could walk onto a lot and drive away in one of the dozen or so Sparks they had rotting away in the corner for less than the price of a VW Beetle in 1973-- and the Spark was superior in every measurable way.
2023's cheapest car is the Nissan Versa. You can 100% find dealers who will part with one for less than the cost of a Beetle. It is also better than the Beetle.
Because it's very easy to get financing for a car, that's why. If they had to pay it out of pocket you bet they'd choose the cheaper car.
Back in the 1970s my dad had plenty of stories about how American car dealers had all kinds of excuses why they couldn't, wouldn't or shouldn't sell you a small car.
Now the Japanese car dealers do the same thing.
A few years I went to a Honda dealer looking for a new Fit, found they didn't have any because "the factory washed out in a flood" but they had 50 CR-Vs which are made in the same factory which were somehow not affected by the flood.
They really ought to put up or shut up: when they have a $7000 sales incentive on that monster vehicle that is not a sign that people want to buy a monster vehicle but it is a sign they want to sell you a monster vehicle.
>when they have a $7000 sales incentive on that monster vehicle that is not a sign that people want to buy a monster vehicle
What cars are you talking about? It's generally the "monster vehicles" that have the greatest markup (e.g. Bronco Raptor)
Manufacturer's can only increase prices (and thus keep ahead of inflation) by innovating the edge with new features, wanted or not.
Is Ford or Caterpillar really best positioned to design and deliver a mobile flat-panel touch screen device? Not likely, but putting one in their vehicles creates opportunities for higher prices and new innovations.
VERY LITTLE of this is available in the aircraft market where every new part number requires justification, testing, and approval.
The health-care market is very similar yet demand is so high and inelastic that it still justifies huge investments.
Aviation... not so much
I think the OP is complaining that they're paying "modern vehicle" prices to rent a plane that has had minimal changes since the 1960s. The vast majority of old cars (other than collectable ones with low mileage) are gonna be cheaper than they were new.
In the end I replaced it with a 5 year old low mileage Tacoma, but paid close to twice what the Ranger’s inflation-adjusted MSRP was, and that was before the used car market went crazy. If I’d wanted to I could have probably resold it and made a $10k profit on it 6 months later. Do I love this truck? Definitely. Would I have been perfectly happy with a 4WD no-frills manual transmission truck and a $300 aftermarket deck with Bluetooth? Definitely, but it wasn’t an option.
Tanks and jets are probably much more expensive. But some of that is because there is literately an arms race.
You need to pay for something that is much better than you had before or you service men will die because the enemy did get something that is better and more expensive.
I would love to own a classic sports car. I would happily pay for the extra fuels and take the risk of not having airbags, ABS brakes etc.
I am grateful that I do not have to go to war. But if I were, I would not want to do it a "classic" tank or fighter jet.
Now Ukraine is getting our old Leopard 1 tanks which have a lot of firepower and moves fast but have less armour than modern tanks, which might work because the Russians most have old tanks left.
But there is a good reason that European countries have bought Leopard 2 tanks that are much more expensive and 24 tonnes heavier.
The government doesn't. They artificially suppress inflation numbers by counting technological progress as deflation.
Is it just Cessnas though? Is this the way all small planes are?
Compared to the doctor owner pilot who flies 1 hour to get a hamburger once or twice a year, and keeps it hangared the rest of the time.
There's plenty of neat little planes out there, my favorite was basically the go cart equivalent of a jet that I saw at our club airport. Something like this https://www.esato.com/board/viewtopic.php?topic=92070
The only example in that class (sub $750k) I can think off the top of my head with a better engine is DA40 NG, which uses a modified Mercedes diesel engine.
Even the 172 went totally out of production for a decade. Cessna almost went under.
I have a feeling I'm perpetrating a certain angle to the truth (maybe that product-liability lawyers suck). I'm just passing on what I heard -- please don't shoot the messenger. A more comprehensive retelling would be appreciated.
Obviously an aviation application has other added constraints like elevation changes, inverted operation, packaging requirements, etc, but "runs at 75% max power for hours at a time" is certainly in common with the marine applications, and trivially demonstrated on a dyno stand.
Probably airplanes, even in GA situations, are able to operate under negative Gs far more often that a typical marine application.... A person adapting such an engine would ideally think about oil pickup under such scenarios.