All auto manufacturers are subsidized in some sense. Remember that GM was straight up insolvent in 2009 and had to be bailed out with enormous federally-guaran

All auto manufacturers are subsidized in some sense. Remember that GM was straight up insolvent in 2009 and had to be bailed out with enormous federally-guaranteed loans. But none of that discounts the value of talking about engineering activities involved in reducing the costs of production, because that stuff matters too. And yes, single-piece chassis are absolutely part of that, as is the minimalist interior (the cockpit BOM for a Tesla is a tiny fraction of what you see on competing EVs), the ongoing sensor fusion architecture (yes, everyone loves to scream about it here, but the upshot is that Tesla doesn't pay for the radar units everyone else uses), etc... They're actually extremely trim vehicles from an assembly perspective. There's a Munroe video out somewhere where he estimates production costs for a Y vs. a Mach-E and figures there's something like a $10k advantage for Tesla.