The $25k car is going extinct?

That's the answer here. They can build cars better, cheaper, faster than we can.

Instead Ford wants to sell a 80k SUPER F-250 BIG MANN TRUCK. All for what, you to drive 10 minutes to Walmart, buy groceries and drive back.

The best car is the one you don't own. No payments, insurance, parking tickets.

Unfortunately most American cities are centered around driving. So much money , and space wasted on these multi ton metal boxes. In many places most(much) of the city is literally just parking spaces.

Though car driving and ownership are a big cultural phenomenon, especially among men 18-50.

> male ego/phalus comment

> car-centric cities

> "N-ton metal box"

I'm 1 square away from a Strong Towns reader bingo. Do you happen to know who invented the concept of jaywalking?

I legit took a girl home after I asked her if she knew why the train was late.

In Amsterdam at least one of the train stations has a piano. It becomes a 3rd place were people can make friends and socialize.

We don’t have many 3rd places in the US where you can exist without spending money.

Politicians and the public don't seem willing to invest to overcome the chicken and egg problem. Doesn't help that the legacy transport we do have is neglected, further harming it's reputation.

If that was true it wouldn't be illegal to sell them.

I would love to sell my truck and get something smaller. But I just got a repair estimate of almost $2500 to replace the from facing camera in my wife's Odyssey, and the Bluetooth stack in my truck has never really worked properly for phone calls. With cars becoming increasingly. "Software defined vehicles" I don't feel comfortable purchasing a $50k+ car that might have software bugs, or may not be supported for over 5-10yrs. I'm currently thinking very seriously that the best options are either to buy used or to lease.

Moreover, I'm thinking the overall percentage of private vehicles that are leased is going to continue to increase as time moves on, until the big mfrs are essentially acting as huge rental fleet operators.

Environment as well. In terms of "safety" it is unfortunately very risky to bike (or even walk) in my area due to the sprawling roads everywhere. Drivers don't look out for anything other than large boxes, and I've quickly had way too many close calls to consider it useful.

We hardly put any miles on it (maybe 15k a year). To get around locally we ride our bikes mostly here in the city.

We do use it for our small business (essential) and also to to a large RV trailer which we use to live in 2-4 months a year visiting loved ones and just decompressing.

The things people don't usually talk about is the total cost of ownership.

One can buy a new F250 diesel for $80k, drive it for 6 years towing heavy loads and working hard. And sellnit for more than half what they paid for it. During that time the only costs are routine maintenance, no major repair bills.

One can also buy a luxury car or SUV, say a BMW, for the same price and 6 years later it is most certainly not worth half what they paid for it, and they typically paid tens of thousands in repair costs.

The next argument people make is that a big truck is inefficient. The simple fact is my F250 diesel gets the same as your BMW M3. But it can be used for work, and is.

Financially, I would argue that it makes no sense to buy a new vehicle above $50k that isn't a diesel pickup.

It does seem to work.

If you feel like buying a 80k truck, that's cool.

The issue with America is the vast majority of truck buyers really can't afford an 80k truck.

This isn't the best source, but it says here the average truck buyer is only making 82k or so.

https://www.myautoconcepts.com/blogdetails?id=4049

From experience talking to friends and sales people plenty of folks with 60 to 80k incomes find themselves in 50k plus vehicles.

I suspect for the majority of truck buyers, if credit wasn't as easily available, they'd find alternatives.

The only reason the typical person can buy an 80k truck is they can get a loan.

Let's say their was a hypothetical car loan limit of 1/4th of your annual income. A lot of people would find out really fast they don't need a massive truck.

Manufacturers would in turn adjust accordingly. A 15k car, maybe without a bunch of touch screens, is possible.

This is probably why cars are cheaper in China, credit isn't as available.

I would say that's not what matters in this discussion (comparing trucks vs cars).

I would also say the same sentence is true for cars, most Americans can't afford 80k cars.

What I am saying is you are not accurate. Most trucks in the US are not 80k trucks bought by suburban folks to buy groceries in. Most trucks are bought by fleets, by small businesses, etc. They're the standard white fleet specs, not the high end trucks. They're bought by farmers, ranchers and drywallers. Most.

Just because you don't hang around in those circles and only see your suburban neighbors and their trucks doesn't mean that's the overall trend.

Everything you highlight here is also true for cars, and worse even.

I'm not justifying anything, I don't owe you $%&#, I am saying you are wrong and giving evidence as to why.

Why the personal insult? Mods is this ok per HN policy?

I use and need it for work, yes big heavy things also need to be done in cities too. I noted this in my original comment. It's very tacky to personally insult a working person for the tools of their trade. You don't like the fact that a plumber needs a plumbing truck? How would a window installer get the windows to the jobsite? How do you bring diesel engines to install in their final locations?

And you are absolutely wrong on the repair of BMWs and especially Audis. Just look at used cars for those brands from a few years ago. You are right on maintenance, but I'm talking about repairs. Things breaking and needing replacement or repair. Anyone who has owned those brands will tell you. Also part prices are a big difference.

If you want a small car buy a Carolla, Camry or a Lexus. I'm not saying buy a big truck.

I'm saying it makes no sense to buy a vehicle over $50k that isn't a diesel pickup, except for "comfort" or "status".

If you don't need one for work, then buy a Camry. They're really nice.

Not a dig at the vehicle; that's a different thing. Rather, I notice that this truck doesn't seem to spend much time as a, ya know, truck.

With other trucks it's less obvious because they don't have a built in bed cover. I suspect many of them also spent very little time trucking, at least here in this suburb. Perhaps it's different in more agricultural areas.

Prior to that comment, you hadn't said anything indicating you personally partook in that antisocial behavior.

I've seen the offroad performance videos, the cybertruck isn't anything to write home about wrt to either ground clearance or scrabble factor (broken road hill climbing, etc).

Other cheaper vehicles perform as well or better.

The tray area is a nightmare, three side access to tools is good, totally flat tray backs are good, side rails for tie downs are good, ability to custom fit racks for carrying stuff (long lumber, or glass and or panels, etc), etc. are all the kinds of practical choices that dictate a practical utility purchase .. none of these are things at which the cybertruck shines.

Well if they're so fucking social, they should start with rich who waste and pollute way way more and buy governments outright.

I go back and forth on how much weight to give the "not being used for truck stuff" criticism. (Maybe because I own a small 2006 Ranger that, while sometimes being used for truck stuff, is mostly used for stuff any vehicle can do. I also put on a cheap bed cover for the first time last week...) I think I'm more partial to the "not ever used for truck stuff" criticism -- that makes it more similar to buying powerful PC hardware. If you aren't ever making use of it, what's the point? But if you only use it from time to time, that seems totally fine. Optionality is generally good, especially when you actually use the options, but of course there's a cost-benefit analysis people don't seem to make with modern car financing.

I'd like to see a cybertruck towing a camper in the wild, as that seems to be a thing some of my older relatives do with their big trucks.

We subsidize our auto industry too.

Imagine if we let in the Chinese EVs stacked with the tax credit, you could get a car for 5000$ or less.

That's a little more than the average American drives per year.

In fact, the other two were so unreliable and underpowered that I’ll never buy a GM or Stellantis (chrysler/dodge/ram/fiat) product again.

Anyway, definitely hold onto the 2016/17 Fords vs switching brands. I’ve driven lower trim line Fords slightly older than that, and they were also way ahead of the newer GM and Ram trucks that we had.

RAM is apparently going to use plastic control arms in it's new vehicles.

It's also not that expensive to rent inner city or buy an apartment. The outer suburbs mostly exist because people have a mentality of invest in land at any cost, even if it means living in a wasteland and commuting 3 hours a day.

So much this. Similar "unbounded" pressure on student loans / tuition. It keeps going up because students are able to get loans.

Comparing the average income around here to MSRP of vehicles I see around here and it's clear that a lot of people are driving around in something that approximates a second mortgage!

Large EVs are pretty silly for exactly that efficiency reason - they may have "400" miles of range, but they do so by packing the biggest possible battery which weighs a ton, wasting even more range per kilowatt-hour beyond the worse aerodynamics.

And then because the battery is so massive, it takes way longer to charge for the same range, so now you need a higher current charger at home and maybe even need to upgrade your home electric service instead of just using a standard 15A circuit to top up a small EV every night enough for a typical day's commute.

And sure you can't use a normal plug very well, whatever. Even without any amp increase, going up to 240 volts will let you charge up that commute and more.

It's a great setup, and/but the very specific infrastructure[0] that I use only services maybe a quarter of the city's mid-suburbia. There's other public transport that services plenty of the rest though.

Doxxing myself here, but anyway: [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O-Bahn_Busway

    > 2-4 months a year visiting loved ones and just decompressing

Please cut out swipes like this in HN comments, it's against the guidelines.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Others are right, I intended to imply "the vibe of the person" you expect when you see an F-250 in a city where even Civic park up on the curb to avoid being clipped. And that being a social cost that any Joe/Jane/Jordan pays in that situation.

Regardless, I'm not really trying to defend myself, just apologize. It was wrong of me and that choice of language was dumb, careless, inflammatory, and just plain rude.

It's got slaved brakes (electrical now, once hydraulic), Hayman-Reese family anti sway bars, uprights and rings on the tow arms to hold gas bottles and spare tyres, and a flat bed.

The smart setup there is removable side and back walls to convert between flat tray and shallow box with sides, and a removable hood with three gull wing doors (so that the tray is a lockable and weather proof space (useful for camping). It's easy to change configuration between the three states.

Our prefered vehicle of choice is a four door family sedan with boot, the trailer can be added for those odd two tonne loads of manure, gravel, straw, sand, etc that get carted about.

Everything else starts getting into dedicated task vehicles - tractors, harveters, chase trucks, etc. The last thing we acquired was an ex military twelve tonne truck with shoulder high tyres on it and enough clearance for pre schoolers to walk under .. it can climb hills, waddle across gullies, and carry 5 tonne of water for fire control (the reason for purchase and fitting).

Yesterday I was delighted to see a nice new piano in its place.

https://youtu.be/r-TuGAHR78w

900 or so people per square km.

To give a random comparison (because I know it well) Sacramento has a density of 2000 per square km and far, far worse transportation.

The US wants them so much that it requires 100% tariffs to keep them off the market.

This is a weird form of American exceptionalism where people insist that the US can't have the nice things that all other rich countries have, because Density. And this might even be true if you're talking about, say, Wyoming. But it absolutely isn't an excuse for places like California or Florida.

Like, why post this? The difference between the two figures is so vast as to be pointless, and it likely just made them up anyway. This is something that you can actually look up.

The federal tax credit in the US is much higher than the Chinese equivalent it appears. But the factory and R&D subsidies are much harder to compute.

So it's not country density, but population center density. Single family homes with yards and individual garages make public transport pretty bad, as the catchment rates of each stop just don't have enough people. Just put the people closer together, and have more farmland/forest around the town.

The interchange has a four level car park that fills up to about three quarters full by 8am-ish. A secondary car park was just finished maybe a couple of years ago, with an additional ~50% capacity.

Anyway the density doesn’t feel high here and maybe that’s the more relevant bit

A lot of people barely make enough to pay rent before factoring in a car.

Your options end up being iffy used cars or financing. The used car market is a nightmare, you can easily end up with a lemon, but legally you have no real recourse.

If Bob sells Bill a used car, and the engine explodes 2 days later Bob owes Bill nothing.

This doesn't always happen, but it's a concern.

Finance a car and you'll probably spend a significant portion of your income just commuting.

Vs living in a transit centric city where bus/metro fair is a nominal cost