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The headline basically says it all. My 15 year old car is starting to get some issues so I was browsing some EVs. They are literally twice as expensive as a co

The headline basically says it all. My 15 year old car is starting to get some issues so I was browsing some EVs. They are literally twice as expensive as a comparable ICE car, even after tax incentives. With interest rates where they are, 22k vs 44k is a huge difference. They are just unaffordable for a lot of people. (Also, was looking for a sedan. They don’t seem to make a lot of EV sedans, and I find the hatchback type ones kinda ugly. That’s just me though)

ZeroGravitas 3y ago
You should really be comparing TCO rather than sticker price. Probably won't totally flip the calculation in your specifically cited case but will still make a serious difference.
slaw 3y ago
15 years is too early to give up on a car unless it is corrosion. Learn how to fix your car yourself. Parts are inexpensive only labor is like $300-$500/real working hour.
- yourusername 3y ago
  Depends on how much you drive. at 30k km a year the average car is done after 15 years and 450k km.
  - sseagull 3y ago
    Wow, it is not driven nearly that much. It has < 120k miles on it :) But it did spend its first 6 or 7 years in Western NY, with snowy, salty roads a good chunk of the year. There definitely is some rusty spots and corrosion. I think people who do stuff like fix their own cars (and lots of other things) very much underestimate the time it takes to acquire the knowledge, and how much intuition they've unknowingly built up while they did it. Replacing a part is relatively easy, knowing what part to replace is its own skill. So cars is one of those things I will happily hand off to someone else to fix, while I focus on home repair or something.
    - evilduck 3y ago
      You've also got to have a place to do it and a modest collection of tools. If you live in dense urban housing you probably aren't up for swapping a transmission for your very first time on the curb of a busy street or doing much multi-day work in your narrow numbered parking spot unless you can borrow a friend's garage to have a place to spread out a little bit. You aren't rolling a toolbox down from your 4th floor apartment, and there's usually a relative void of auto parts and hardware stores inside the city. There just aren't many shade tree mechanics in places where shade trees are rare.
      - SOLAR_FIELDS 3y ago
        Nowadays you can pay a mobile mechanic to come work on your car for a very reasonable rate in most urban areas. I find doing this is usually at least 75% cheaper than the dealerships and much more convenient. I still do minor repairs and things like battery swaps myself and keep an OBD reader in the car for preliminary investigation and research before I call the mechanic. But otherwise I probably average less than $1k USD per year on vehicle maintenance and repairs, tires oil included. Obviously this excludes things like transmission swaps but those are ideally once in a decade occurrences with proper care and maintenance otherwise
vasdae 3y ago
[flagged]
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- timschmidt 3y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_curve#/media/File:Shortruncostcurves.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_curve#/media/File:Shortru... We are at the first tick on the "Output" scale.
  - slaw 3y ago
    How long is that first tick to last? 50 years?
    - timschmidt 3y ago
      Depends entirely on capital invested. Though 9 women can't make a baby in 1 month.
      - jncfhnb 3y ago
        I really hate this quote. 9 women can’t make a baby in 1 month. But 9 women can produce babies 9x faster than 1 woman. Which is the effect you would hope to achieve by scaling production facilities. Increasing the rate of unit production per facility is something you might also want to achieve, but is not analogous to adding more women.
        timschmidt 3y ago
        Hating the quote does not make it less true. 9 women may be able to make babies 9x faster than 1 woman, but they still cannot manage to make one in a single month. The quote is meant to point out that scaling is often limited by factors in addition to production capacity. Sometimes throwing money at the problem can solve it. Sometimes not. Sometimes there is only one person in the world, who is the rate limiting factor. Or a raw material or process. Manufacturing physical goods is a series of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem nested like Matryoshka dolls.

ZeroGravitas 3y ago

You should really be comparing TCO rather than sticker price. Probably won't totally flip the calculation in your specifically cited case but will still make a serious difference.

slaw 3y ago

15 years is too early to give up on a car unless it is corrosion. Learn how to fix your car yourself. Parts are inexpensive only labor is like $300-$500/real working hour.

yourusername 3y ago
Depends on how much you drive. at 30k km a year the average car is done after 15 years and 450k km.
- sseagull 3y ago
  Wow, it is not driven nearly that much. It has < 120k miles on it :) But it did spend its first 6 or 7 years in Western NY, with snowy, salty roads a good chunk of the year. There definitely is some rusty spots and corrosion. I think people who do stuff like fix their own cars (and lots of other things) very much underestimate the time it takes to acquire the knowledge, and how much intuition they've unknowingly built up while they did it. Replacing a part is relatively easy, knowing what part to replace is its own skill. So cars is one of those things I will happily hand off to someone else to fix, while I focus on home repair or something.
  - evilduck 3y ago
    You've also got to have a place to do it and a modest collection of tools. If you live in dense urban housing you probably aren't up for swapping a transmission for your very first time on the curb of a busy street or doing much multi-day work in your narrow numbered parking spot unless you can borrow a friend's garage to have a place to spread out a little bit. You aren't rolling a toolbox down from your 4th floor apartment, and there's usually a relative void of auto parts and hardware stores inside the city. There just aren't many shade tree mechanics in places where shade trees are rare.
    - SOLAR_FIELDS 3y ago
      Nowadays you can pay a mobile mechanic to come work on your car for a very reasonable rate in most urban areas. I find doing this is usually at least 75% cheaper than the dealerships and much more convenient. I still do minor repairs and things like battery swaps myself and keep an OBD reader in the car for preliminary investigation and research before I call the mechanic. But otherwise I probably average less than $1k USD per year on vehicle maintenance and repairs, tires oil included. Obviously this excludes things like transmission swaps but those are ideally once in a decade occurrences with proper care and maintenance otherwise

vasdae 3y ago

[flagged]

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
timschmidt 3y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_curve#/media/File:Shortruncostcurves.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_curve#/media/File:Shortru... We are at the first tick on the "Output" scale.
- slaw 3y ago
  How long is that first tick to last? 50 years?
  - timschmidt 3y ago
    Depends entirely on capital invested. Though 9 women can't make a baby in 1 month.
    - jncfhnb 3y ago
      I really hate this quote. 9 women can’t make a baby in 1 month. But 9 women can produce babies 9x faster than 1 woman. Which is the effect you would hope to achieve by scaling production facilities. Increasing the rate of unit production per facility is something you might also want to achieve, but is not analogous to adding more women.
      - timschmidt 3y ago
        Hating the quote does not make it less true. 9 women may be able to make babies 9x faster than 1 woman, but they still cannot manage to make one in a single month. The quote is meant to point out that scaling is often limited by factors in addition to production capacity. Sometimes throwing money at the problem can solve it. Sometimes not. Sometimes there is only one person in the world, who is the rate limiting factor. Or a raw material or process. Manufacturing physical goods is a series of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem nested like Matryoshka dolls.