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The point that he's making is that your figure includes survival bias-- you're looking only at the cars that "make it" rather than are scrapped before this poin

by mlyle 3y ago

The point that he's making is that your figure includes survival bias-- you're looking only at the cars that "make it" rather than are scrapped before this point. And you're also ignoring that upkeep and maintenance isn't linear with mileage. A big fraction of things that we consider depreciated to zero are still worth something. A big fraction fail before the point where we would do that. A big fraction incur larger operating costs later in their lifetime.

AnthonyMouse 3y ago
The full value of the car if you hadn't put any additional miles on it, and it hadn't died without you putting any additional miles on it, is $4000. That's the most you can lose, and you can't even lose that much because a car that needs a new engine and transmission is still worth some money as scrap metal and parts. You may incur some repairs as a result of the additional miles, but that's not depreciation, and it's also not a covert cost you don't pay until later even though you're committing to it now. The cost of expected future repairs is already reflected in the market value. The cost of past and present repairs is not a hidden future cost.
- mlyle 3y ago
  > That's the most you can lose, It's not the most you can lose, because you have a bunch of repeated times where you're making a choice about whether to repair or not, and then whether to keep in service driving it. You can easily be wrong or get unlucky. You can choose to do an expensive repair because it seems to be the thing that preserves the most value, and continue to drive it for Uber because you expect to have a good operating history from this point.
  - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
    It's the most you can lose from depreciation, which I reiterate was the original claim. You can incur arbitrarily high operating costs if you're unlucky, but if you're unlucky you can incur arbitrarily high operating costs without putting any additional miles on it. There is a reason the vehicles used in car service skew towards specific models with a strong reliability record.

by mlyle 3y ago

AnthonyMouse 3y ago

The full value of the car if you hadn't put any additional miles on it, and it hadn't died without you putting any additional miles on it, is $4000. That's the most you can lose, and you can't even lose that much because a car that needs a new engine and transmission is still worth some money as scrap metal and parts. You may incur some repairs as a result of the additional miles, but that's not depreciation, and it's also not a covert cost you don't pay until later even though you're committing to it now. The cost of expected future repairs is already reflected in the market value. The cost of past and present repairs is not a hidden future cost.

mlyle 3y ago
> That's the most you can lose, It's not the most you can lose, because you have a bunch of repeated times where you're making a choice about whether to repair or not, and then whether to keep in service driving it. You can easily be wrong or get unlucky. You can choose to do an expensive repair because it seems to be the thing that preserves the most value, and continue to drive it for Uber because you expect to have a good operating history from this point.
- AnthonyMouse 3y ago
  It's the most you can lose from depreciation, which I reiterate was the original claim. You can incur arbitrarily high operating costs if you're unlucky, but if you're unlucky you can incur arbitrarily high operating costs without putting any additional miles on it. There is a reason the vehicles used in car service skew towards specific models with a strong reliability record.