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Comment by twblalock | Hacker News Reader

It's not the government's job to fix everything or engineer a perfect society, and personal choice and freedom matter too.

This YouTuber, like many other people who favor a denser urban lifestyle, looks down on people who disagree with him and wants the government to coerce them into living the way he wants them to. "Externalities" are just an excuse for that, and even if those externalities were removed he would find other justifications because the root cause is that he doesn't like the people who prefer a different lifestyle than him.

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The video goes over all the arguments. Trucks have bad visibility, encourage reckless driving, and wreck smaller cars/pedestrians during collisions. This isn't "hating", these are serious problems.

Trucks are popular specifically because of government meddling. Importing smaller and cheaper transport vehicles like vans is impossible because of import fees. Trucks also don't have to adhere to emissions and crash safety regulations which means trucks are cheap relative to cars. If we leveled the regulatory playing field trucks wouldn't be nearly as popular.

> If we leveled the regulatory playing field trucks wouldn't be nearly as popular.

Yes they would. People aren't buying big trucks because they have no choice. Very few people would cross-shop trucks and small import vans. They want the big trucks.

Look at the F150 or the Silverado. They are bigger than they used to be. Import restrictions cannot explain that. They are bigger because every time they grow, customers like it.

He addresses this point when he talks about how the most popular car 40 years ago was the Ford Escort.

Saying things doesn't make them true. He does not make a convincing argument.

Trucks are much nicer than they were 40 years ago and our culture has changed as a result. 40 years ago few people would have considered driving a truck, they were all basically farm trucks with limited creature comforts. Now they are luxury vehicles.

In the US there are strong incentives for light trucks / SUVs and that's the result we see - they're the most popular vehicles. In Europe / Japan the incentives are different and we see an entirely different class of vehicles on the road.

The point is that marketing and incentives matter. Trucks are not objectively better, they are subjectively preferred among certain demographics in the US because of marketing. He addresses very clearly that manufacturers make more money selling SUVs due to regulation - so it tracks that those are the vehicles pushed by manufacturers

Culture matters too. Americans want different things than Europeans and Japanese people. We see this in most areas of life and it's not always because of marketing.

There are also an increasing number of SUVs and automatic transmission vehicles on European roads compared to a decade or two ago...

This is nothing to do with urban/suburban/rural life, and everything to do with dangerous vehicles.

Working people in Europe tend to use a van, which has much better pedestrian safety. The video praises that. (That's both urban and rural, since it's not clear.) People in rural areas drive normal cars.

Yet the government builds the roads that these things put pointless wear and tear on.

Wear and tear on roads is exponentially related to the weight of the vehicle, a 9000lb hummer should be taxed appropriately along with requiring a different class of license for the danger such mass presents to other road users.

Without the government, the obvious conclusion is that individuals should take it in their own hands and start taking action against the owners. Deflating the tires and vandalism come to mind.

“The obvious conclusion” only seems “obvious” for a small group of people who always seem to think their violence is justified by their odd morals.

Sounds great, when the SUV loses control and flips into a kindergarten before exploding, where will you be?

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