as someone whos never had a car but is interested.. is there a good estimate for what modal maintenance costs look like? is the used car market efficiently priced for accounting for those costs?
OT: I don't know why Consumer Reports isn't overwhelmingly popular on HN, why their articles aren't regularly on the front page: Empirical, professional, scientific research on consumer products. They have a budget, labs, serious expertise. Also, they are a non-profit serving the public interest with exceptional integrity - they refuse advertising, buy every product they test at retail, even forbid manufacturers from citing CR, etc. It's the HN dream.
I suspect it's a generational thing - for people on HN, Consumer Reports is their parents' publication, a magazine with old-fashioned-looking layout.
Not to question your preference, but to understand: How can you imagine that? The UI isn't great, but it works: search, click, read. Where else will you find anything like it? Almost all other reviewers seem to be astroturf or bought off, and the more serious prominent ones are someone's opinion trying one, not empircal, objective research.
This depends heavily on the make and model. Some publications like Consumer Reports will try to estimate this, and this is generally a good way to compare makes and models, but the costs also depend on things like how you drive, where you drive, and where you take the vehicle for repairs.
Maintenance can be a lot less expensive when you do it yourself.
> is the used car market efficiently priced for accounting for those costs?
Definitely not. Used cars are priced based on a large number of factors, maintenance costs being only one, and the buyers (and, for that matter, sellers) generally don't have any better information on it than you do.