The high gas prices may have added fuel to the fire, but the best news here is that used EVs are growing in popularity. That is a consequence of us finding out batteries don’t degrade as fast as we first imagined, which makes used EVs a lot more interesting.
In the short term, that kills the market for new EVs, since used ones were so dirt cheap. In the long run, the resale value of new EVs will be much more stable, eliminating the last downside they had.
(Obviously, many car makers saw the short term pain and gave up on the entire market. That is of course because car maker CEOs are absolutely brilliant people with foresight and strategic thinking. Just kidding: they occupy the only category of jobs that should absolutely be replaced by AI.)
I think there’s also a problem with the kinds of EVs everyone tried to sell.
Tesla has seen legitimate success in making EVs a desirable luxury item. The Prius became something of a fashion statement among kale chip eating Californians in the 2000s because of its alleged economy, but it was still an economy car. It wasn’t that nice or luxurious. Tesla made cars people wanted to drive and be seen driving, with an all-electric powertrain.
Pretty much everyone tried to copy that business model, making excessively fast luxury sport sedanover blobs with price tags that make car shoppers start muttering the word “depreciation.”
Meanwhile, EVs tend to be the breeding ground for shit features everybody hates, like touch screen HVAC controls. Nobody wants to make a normal car that happens to be electric, which is what a lot of the buying public wants, but can’t find.
The high gas prices may have added fuel to the fire, but the best news here is that used EVs are growing in popularity. That is a consequence of us finding out batteries don’t degrade as fast as we first imagined, which makes used EVs a lot more interesting.
In the short term, that kills the market for new EVs, since used ones were so dirt cheap. In the long run, the resale value of new EVs will be much more stable, eliminating the last downside they had.
(Obviously, many car makers saw the short term pain and gave up on the entire market. That is of course because car maker CEOs are absolutely brilliant people with foresight and strategic thinking. Just kidding: they occupy the only category of jobs that should absolutely be replaced by AI.)
I think there’s also a problem with the kinds of EVs everyone tried to sell.
Tesla has seen legitimate success in making EVs a desirable luxury item. The Prius became something of a fashion statement among kale chip eating Californians in the 2000s because of its alleged economy, but it was still an economy car. It wasn’t that nice or luxurious. Tesla made cars people wanted to drive and be seen driving, with an all-electric powertrain.
Pretty much everyone tried to copy that business model, making excessively fast luxury sport sedanover blobs with price tags that make car shoppers start muttering the word “depreciation.”
Meanwhile, EVs tend to be the breeding ground for shit features everybody hates, like touch screen HVAC controls. Nobody wants to make a normal car that happens to be electric, which is what a lot of the buying public wants, but can’t find.