The withering dream of a cheap American electric car

Some Americans. The average car in the US is 12 years old. I just checked my local craigslist, most cars of that age are under 10k, and almost none are more than 20k. Since that is average we can assume cars of that age will run (with maintenance) for another decade and so shouldn't be very expensive. Of course at that age almost nothing is electric.

I do think part of it is how darned long cars last now.

I have an 18 year old car that I purchased used long ago and currently has no mechanical issues. I've had a few repairs but nothing terribly expensive. I have no interest in replacing it.

When you think about it, people who are frugal will buy practical and cost effective cars and drive them for a decade or more (that is, if they buy a car at all!). That means they either never buy new at all, or when they do they do so only seldom.

People who are chasing the new shiny will continue to churn through new shiny. And of course they want to pay a lot to get only the shiniest.

So I can see why the average new car cost would creep up, because buying a new car at all is a luxury in most cases.

The average car in the US? Or the average daily driver car?

Cars just don't disappear, so all vehicles would "polute" the statistics right?

From what I have gathered, I assume average age of registered vehicles. I would also assume that collector cars would "pollute" the statistics, unless they are filtered out -- the details of the research are not stated.

https://www.spglobal.com/mobility/en/research-analysis/avera...

The difference is that new cars are safe cars. Old cars are death traps.

If you value your life you will be buying the new shiny every 5 years or less.

Is there evidence for the rationale for five years or less for the age of a car?

I hate all the entertainment systems and believe anything beyond Bluetooth and no complex entertainment system to be a lethal distraction that makes cars just as unsafe as older or weaker safety controls.

While it’s certainly true that old cars are death traps I’d live to see a source showing that car safety is increasing at notable levels every five years. Federal safety standards haven’t.

I think of the last generation of pro-level film cameras.

They were expensive, but well designed and durable, yet ... who wants to pay in time and money to develop film every 36 pictures?

I think some really good gas cars only make sense if you use them infrequently to haul heavy things or lots of passengers.

Otherwise it is getting cheaper to run an EV - you might even charge it with electricity you capture yourself.

Develop film takes time, same as why somebody wait for hours and hours just to get an EV charged? The “last generation” can “recharge” to 450miles in 3 minutes at a gas station then move on.

It is one of those 'was it really that long ago? I am getting old' moments to actually look this up, but the last major safety features which moved the needle on keeping you alive in a car were the mandates for side-impact protection and anti-lock braking systems. Both are more than ten years old.

I think you would be hard-pressed to name a single innovation from the past five years which has increased your lifespan in a car as either a driver or a passenger. Given the fact that things like adaptive braking, lane-following assist, and blind-spot sensors are old enough to be showing up in low-end cars these days I cannot name a single new or shiny safety feature which would not be available in a mid-tier car from 2014. Can you?

Adaptive cruise was still higher end at that time. Certainly not ubiquitous at the mid tier. Heck, it's barely ubiquitous now. Both adaptive cruise and automatic emergency braking are game changer features for safety on the highway.

Seems like the kind of advice that was true up until about 10 years ago

AEB is pretty recent, though I'm not sure of the exact timeline, and it has already saved lives.

Everyone says this but the number of accidents (of which injurious, let alone fatal ones are a small minority) the typical person gets into in a lifetime are low enough to make the tradeoff worthwhile.

> same as why somebody wait for hours and hours just to get an EV charged?

I spend hours a year more waiting for gas pumps for my ICE than I spend waiting on my EV to charge. And I put way more miles on my EV than my ICE.

The EV charges while you sleep. You always start your journey with a full tank.

If you can't do that then, yes, an EV is less convenient than a gas car that is true.

Home ownership is a distant dream for most Americans, and the sort of rentals that have parking AND EV charging tend to be extremely pricy luxury new-builds.

Gas is unfortunately going to be around for a long, long time for normal working-class Americans.

Are you lucky enough to own your own house, do you put up with a corporate landlord/big condo, or are you in street parking?

That's incredibly wrong. 10-year old cars are quite safe.

Nah, it's the same game.

I live in a single family residence like the majority of households in the US.

My point still stands. Despite driving more miles on my EV my ICE wastes my time on pumping gas especially before all the time I waste with routine maintenance. I am far from alone.

Why would anyone waste their time going to gas stations all the time and wait for oil changes and have to deal with all that maintenance of things like timing belts and what not?

Home ownership rate today is pretty similar to what it's been for decades.

An older "nice" car is also a lot nicer than a new economy car and in most cases even a newer luxury model car. There may be more bells and whistles which are nice on new cars but it's fairly evident they have skimped on elements of the suspension and body that reduce roughness and road noise. There's a very marked difference in quality of vehicles made before and after the "realignment" prompted by the great recession, even as those cars are approaching 14-16 years old.

Adaptive driving is a nuisance for me whenever I rent a new car (it seems most of the rentals have this feature). Those visual and audio cues going off when I am in the middle of changing lanes is very disconcerting - and makes me lose focus for a fraction of a second. I wish I could turn it off - but after one look at that hot mess on that center touch-screen I back off in repulsion.

(I also do not like the lights on the side mirrors that indicate a vehicle coming by. I constantly think - what about false positives - and then I double check my blind spot)

If only those 4 people that burned to death in a Tesla last week [1] would have a chance to revisit their vehicle choice...

[1] https://people.com/4-killed-after-tesla-crash-sparks-fire-in...

I do think CarPlay is very helpful for navigation, I mean, I can read map because I’m old but my kids and my wife when they’re driving need a onscreen display if they’re going somewhere new. And the CarPlay or similar provides a good navigation option that I think is safer than mounting a phone.

Anti-lock brakes, if I remember correctly, had essentially no safety effect in the real world. Stability control, on the other hand, dropped single car accidents by something like a third. Perhaps you were thinking of that?

Regardless of that, the threat environment has changed pretty dramatically in the last two decades. I gave up my 2006 VW sedan for a new SUV this year because the IIHS numbers had started to look bad for lighter vehicles.

https://www.iihs.org/ratings/driver-death-rates-by-make-and-...

Back in 2006 the previous gen VW Passat was basically as safe as anything you could buy (according to their dataset). Now you need something a lot bigger to be upper tier.

The new vehicle is a plug-in so in the first 4 months of driving I've more than doubled my fuel efficiency. So there's that, anyway.

With PG&E it really feels like the cost to run an EV keeps increasing.

Usually they don’t beep on lane changes when you use the indicators before switching.

The lights in the side mirrors are also not removing the obligation to check your blind spot.

Both help, but don’t take away your responsibility as driver.

> If only those 4 people that burned to death in a Tesla last week [1] would have a chance to revisit their vehicle choice... >

Kind of a weird story for People magazine to be covering, but I guess any story with Tesla gets clicks. Doesn't say if the fire or the high speed impact killed those passengers.

Anyhoo, I'd bet those 140+ people killed by GMs ignition switch wish they had a chance to revisit their car buying choice.

Homeownership Rate in the United States

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RHORUSQ156N

Sounds like you have a residence where you can charge overnight. That's a nicety right there. For everyone who can't, is it faster to get 400 miles by finding a place to charge and waiting on the charging or by filling a tank?

Sure it's a nicety, but it's also pretty common. Most households in the US would be able to do it.

You'll spend considerably more of your life standing next to a gas pump than they spend waiting for their cars to charge. And you'll spend more money per mile in the end for the energy cost. And yet somehow you'll continue to feel superior about it. Congrats on spending so much of your life pumping gas my dude. I'm glad I don't have to spend nearly as much time anymore.

You are correct, I was thinking of stability control. Both were mandated by NHTSA at the same time I think.

^ This is patently false.