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The $25k car is going extinct?

(media.hubspot.com)
319 points pseudolus | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.204s | source
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tlogan ◴[] No.44422630[source]
This is a great example of how factually incorrect narratives - so long as they align with a preferred agenda (which is that things are not affordable any more) - it gets upvoted.

Reality check:

- In 2025, there are 12 new car models available under $25,000

- In 2005, there were around 10 new models under $15,000 (25k adjusted by inflation)

So the premise that “cars used to be much more affordable” is not true. This article is full of misleading or outdated information that distorts the real trend.

HN deserves better data-driven discussions.

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SalmoShalazar ◴[] No.44425626[source]
Did you even read the article before making your comment? It is actually data driven like you are demanding, while your own comment is not beyond the most basic sense. A superficial count of models below $25,000k MSRP is not adding to the discussion.
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1. tlogan ◴[] No.44429034[source]
Two examples:

Example 1: The article claims that the affordable Nissan Versa Note cost $16,545 in 2019 and was discontinued. But not saying that this would be $21,168 in today’s dollars and they leave out an important detail: Nissan still sells the Versa in the US, just not the Note hatchback version. The current Nissan Versa starts at $17,190 according to Nissan’s own website: https://www.nissanusa.com/vehicles/cars/versa-sedan.html

That’s actually about 20% less expensive than the inflation-adjusted number from 2019.

Example 2: And then they claim that price increase is: 29.2% - just 3% more than inflation (but they did not want to mention total PCI). But even that number of 29.2% cannot be verified on BLS.gov nor fred.stlouisfed.org . I uploaded FRED and BLS data to chatgpt o3 and it says that new vehicle prices increased 22% from 2019 to 2025 - actually less then inflation:

2019: 146.220

2020: 149.091

2021: 166.653

2022: 176.463

2023: 178.269

2024: 177.552 fred.stlouisfed.org (slight dip from 2023)

2025: ~178.7 (May 2025)

Overall, from 2019 to mid-2025 the index increased from ~146 to ~179, amounting to about a 22% cumulative rise in new vehicle prices.

(https://www.bls.gov/cpi/data.htm - code CUUR0000SETA01).