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Comment by costanzaDynasty | Hacker News Reader

And the other 50% are poor.

If you want everyone to drive an electric car, then you need to make it the value buy when it comes time to replace their current car.

People are keep cars longer, might be time for another cash for clunkers program with an extra incentive to replace it with a electric. But until interest rate go down and car price level off, people are not rushing to get cars.

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I think it’s fine that used cars (for now) are ICE. We’re still supply constrained on making and selling electric cars, so taking a bunch of ICE off the road would only raise prices.

Part of environmentalism is knowing when not to buy new. What we should do is a cash-for-clunkers exclusively for trucks and SUVs that get replaced with electric sedans. They’re lower fuel efficiency, and way more dangerous.

> I think it’s fine that used cars (for now) are ICE

I hope that I'll be able to buy used ICE cars for the remainder of my life, at least.

I've soured on all modern cars, and especially electric cars, because of their data connections. That's a dealbreaker for me.

If you manage to find an electric model that allows you to pull the modem, that represents ultimate freedom. Think about it: Right now you are dependent on gas stations which can collect info on your transactions via CC or when you visit via surveillance.

With electric, if you set up a solar panel and battery system you have a greater ability to stay private by detaching from the grid and external dependencies(at least until you need to buy a part to fix/maintain your car).

Right now is probably the golden era because its before a lot of the OEM have gotten their act together on making a fully locked down system like Tesla but it still is the EV era so you benefit from the example above.

> If you manage to find an electric model that allows you to pull the modem, that represents ultimate freedom.

Yes, I agree. But it's not a thing that would impact my life enough to bother hacking to accomplish it. I can just buy old ICE cars and be fine.

I only have a limited amount of time in each day, and I have to prioritize things.

>But it's not a thing that would impact my life enough to bother hacking to accomplish it.

Well then you have a limit to how much you actually care about your privacy. So really whats the ultimate point then?

Sounds to me like you just don't like change. If you actually valued privacy this would not be your answer.

Buying used ICE cars is likely for the rest of your life, unless you are extremely young.

Gasoline, however, may become harder to come by. You may have to plan your long-distance trips around the remaining gas stations. I imagine that by then there will be apps to help you plan that trip.

If you look at TCO, electric cars are actually competitive with some of the cheapest ICE cars on the market.

https://cleantechnica.com/2023/06/04/tesla-model-3-lifecycle...

I don't entirely buy the author's depreciation argument, since that assumes you're trading in your car every 5 years as opposed to driving it for 15-20+ years until it ready to literally fall apart.

But even still, when you consider significantly reduced maintenance and fuel costs, it's not that far off.

TCO doesn’t matter, financing is not based on TCO it’s based on sticker cost. The upfront costs of EVs are still prohibitively expensive for a lot of people even if TCO is lower.

“Being poor is expensive.”

Depends. My current SUV costs $1100 a year to insure including tax. I just got a quote for a Tesla Model 3 for the same level of coverage. As of today it's $6014 a year without tax.

I don't drive enough to make up a difference of $5000+ a year in gas and maintenance.

$6k/year for insurance? Wow. I did not expect that.

Yeah it's why I usually have to mention that context matters a lot when talking TCO . Where I live, not only is insurance more costly, electricity is also considerably more expensive (it's hit 20 cents a kilowatt hour though starting to come back down). Then I also have to factor in both the higher upfront costs of the car, but also the costs upgrade my home to support charging the car at home.

For a lot of people that calculation is true, but there's also going to be people like me where the TCO statement is hilariously untrue.

Counterpoint I just ensured a PHEV Tucson and Ioniq 5 (full ev) for $1800 a year. Pretty reasonable. It’s probably a Tesla specific problem because they are in the luxury segment or maybe it’s their atrocious build quality.

I don't think it's Tesla specific, seems more like at least for me EV's in general are significantly more expensive to insure. Mr. Rumor Mill is that part of it is just because of higher rates of cars being written off due to damage to the battery packs. Of course, we all know how trust worthy Mr. Mill is so take it for what it's worth.

> As of today it's $6014 a year without tax.

Wow, that just sucks, even more so if you actually shopped around.

I was quoted $2-300/month for my BMW i4, switched insurance companies and got it back down to $100/month.

I have an S and the cost is $2k a year after tax, about on par with the insurance costs of my old Camry. Probably worth shopping around a bit more if you’re still in the process.

If you are poor, then you should never, ever ever buy a new car. It simply doesn't make financial sense.

EVs have been in production on the market long enough that previously leased and rented models are going to be available to dealerships to sell as used.

Very, very few. Before 2018-2019 there were less than 100k/year sold in the US.

I bought a $50k+ vehicle recently and it’s not an EV by design. Am I poor?

> Am I poor?

Probably not but the comment doesn't seem to engage with their point. Let's say the government had an incentive program for dealers to collect money for buying back the consumer's current vehicle at an increased price but only if the consumer chooses to purchase an electric vehicle. Would it have been a closer decision, even if marginal (even if you still choose the non-EV option)? Even if you don't, someone else will choose the EV option because it's ultimately cheaper.

There is no EV that met my requirements: 500hp luxury coupe.

Looking past my anecdotal experience, there are many other contributing factors to why people don’t want an EV. Yes, high purchase price is a big driver, but things like a lack of charging infrastructure, battery technology not being ready yet (big agree from me on this one), and people just straight up preferring an ICE are not far behind.

To generalize and say that anyone who isn’t buying an EV is doing so because they can’t afford one is factually wrong.

Source: https://epic.uchicago.edu/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/EPIC-En...

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