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Comment by ganley | Hacker News Reader

Aside from those whose livelihood depends on car sales, who have an obvious incentive not to believe it, why is it so hard to believe that people might simply not want to own a car? The whole tone of this article seems like: It appears that millennials don't want to own cars, but that can't be right, can it? If I could get away with not owning one, I certainly would. As it is, I spend as little time in it as possible (much preferring to bike).

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Well this is written from the perspective of economists who lack imagination. If consumers don't spend money on cars then they will just spend it on other things. It means car companies will get smaller, less influential, and probably go out of business in many cases. I assume the public doesn't have the stomach for another round of bailouts for car makers but it's not like we were consulted about that anyway so who knows if it matters.

If consumers don't spend money on cars then they will just spend it on other things.

Not necessarily true. Half the comments in this thread are saying that consumers don't spend money on cars, and don't spend it on other things, because NOBODY HAS MONEY.

I thought that assumption throughout the article strange, too. A factor no one else seems to have mentioned (which admittedly only applies to transport, not housing) is that public transport is, overall, getting better. In London I have an Oyster card which actually gets me all the way to my dad's house too, even though he lives well outside London. Something like this just would not have been possible in the 90s, and now I can check how much money is on my Oyster from my phone, and see live train and bus (!) times on it as well. Not to mention that having tools like Google Maps makes using public transport in an unfamiliar city a doddle, I just punch in a postcode and it tells me which bus to get on, and which stop to get off at.

Although Londoners complain about their public transport, it really is exceptionally good. For many routes within London it's quicker and far cheaper to take public transport (or a bike!) than to use a private vehicle.

Most places aren't like that, unfortunately.

It is awful by comparison to many continental cities though. Have you used the U-bahn in berlin? It's so clean, so efficient, so cheap!

That's what we get for inventing this stuff I suppose...

While I would say that London's public transport is good (not exceptionally good, Germany, Switzerland and Japan are exceptionally good, London is merely good), I think:

> For many routes within London it's quicker and far cheaper to take public transport (or a bike!) than to use a private vehicle.

Is a rather poor way to look at it in the context of London, because walking is often quicker than using a private vehicle here!

Public transportation in America might as well be non-existent, and American suburbs which is where the largest portion of the country lives in, are un-walkable. You can't do anything if you don't have a car. I think this isn't clear to people who live in the few very large cities in the US, or live elsewhere in the word where public transportation does a good job of getting you around in a timely manner.

To give you an example, I live in San Jose area. To get to downtown san jose, it'll take me less than 10 minutes in a car on the high way, 45 minutes on the bike through the streets, or 1.5 hours on the bus.

The great majority of Americans, including millenials, live in unwalkable areas where not having a car is a major PITA at best. They can't get away with not owning a car any more than you can.

Me too. I only use my car when I absolutely have to. My bike, however, I use every day for commuting.

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