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Comment by yardie | Hacker News Reader

Who knew that $70k+ pickup trucks were also a 0% interest rate phenomenon.

I'll never understand the attraction of these "light duty" vehicles. Very impractical. Unnecessarily large vehicles. You are sitting so high up and a large amount of your view is obstructed by the hood (additional view obstructed by the pillars). The bed of these pickups will barely fit your lumber for a DIY project. Have to put the tailgate down and secure it properly. Let's not forget the poor efficiency due to extra weight and will drive like shit on the road.

I would say 99% of the people that own these "light duty" trucks are really just compensating for their insecurities.

They are dangerous to pretty much anyone and anything not inside of them. Only 15% are actually used for work.

I have to wonder if part of the attraction of very large vehicles is getting enough elevation so that headlights aren't quite so annoying/dangerous. Driving around a sedan, I'm regularly blinded by oncoming traffic when driving at night.

Something needs to be done. Some of these headlights that people are driving with are not safe for others on the road.

It's an arms race. To feel safe, you need a larger car. When you get a larger car, now other people feel unsafe. And so the bloat goes, until the best selling cars in the US are glorified tanks and Ford doesn't even manufacture sedans anymore.

Same old tired “if you have a big truck you have a small peepee” nonsense. Trucks are useful, I’m a full on convert now after years of shitting on them. Plus big vehicles look good and feel good, small peepee or not. Couple those things with an electric vehicle that charges for free off my solar panels and it’s a win-win-win.

Upvoting because the sentiment is accurate; most truck detractors do not have adequate understanding of why they are popular (and thus also don't understand how hypocritical an electric truck is, as EV tech stands today) and what purposes they serve their drivers.

That depends. If you’re hauling massive loads like an RV behind you it may not be feasible outside of 100-150 miles on a charge. However for most other things like hauling things in the bed of your truck, or a small camper, you can get very close to the advertised range which makes it very useful and far from hypocritical. Add on benefits like a massive moving source of electricity and it more than makes up for its transitory (batteries are improving fast) deficiencies.

I'm still dismayed that I can fit an 8' long piece of lumber into a Ford Fiesta hatchback but not into a pickup truck. What is up with that?

Even IC trucks are pretty close to 70k these days

Many IC trucks are expensive, but the best selling truck, the Toyota Tacoma has a base price of only 28k. Realistically, they end up being mid-30s once outfitted by the dealer, but still a big value compared to the lightning.

Technically the F-150 has a base price of $33k -- but in the real world, the ASP for one is north of $60k now. Similar to how the $28k starting-price Tacoma actually sells for north of $40k on average.

The price is going up in '24 as well, by about 4k per model. However they are putting their Co-Pilot package (blind spot info system, collision detection, lane keep), extended range fuel tank and 12" screen standard across the board. This is bound to annoy fleet purchases but overall at 37K it's a nice truck at the basic trim level.

The Co-Pilot stuff is good to have standard as it increases the safety of the big, unwieldy trucks.

Some of those higher priced models are priced so business owners and the truck manufacturer can optimize for the Business Use Depreciation Deduction [0] [1] (and also convos with family friends)

[0] - https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/small-business-taxes/bu...

[1] - https://www.crestcapital.com/section-179-deduction-vehicle-l...

Does § 179 look at price? I thought it's only based on weight.

It's based on weight, but the $70k+ models tend to weigh around 10,000-14,000 LB

Not even close.

A new GMC Sierra Denali and mega cab RAM 3500 goes for around that much - though to be fair, it's often bought be people who either have more money than sense or (more commonly) by someone running a small business that requires lugging stuff (eg. Construction)

Neither of those trucks weigh anywhere near the quoted weights. The average full size pickup is around 6000 pounds.

A Megacab 3500 for both GMC and RAM is 16,000 LB, is covered by Section 179, and $70k+. They're also amazing workhogs.

Ah, I see you're quoting the "every seat occupied, full load, with a trailer attached" weight. To be clear, the trucks you referenced weigh only ~7000 pounds.

Yep! The Towing Capacity/Gross Vehicle Weight is the measurement used in Section 179, as this is primarily meant to help smaller construction companies and taxi companies, and they don't want people abusing it to buy a Ferrari or a Lamborghini and still deduct it as business expenses.

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