4 ms·

If only there was a country selling cheap, reliable electric vehicles with extremely low running costs.

JumpCrisscross 1y ago
> If only there was a country selling cheap, reliable electric vehicles with extremely low running costs The missing middle in discussions around Chinese EVs is import quotas (and disconnection mandates). Americans buy over 15 million vehicles a year [1]. Letting China export up to 150,000 EVs into America a year, subject to anti-surveillance measures (e.g. no phoning home), paid for by the importer and thus--ultimately--consumer, would not bankrupt American producers. It would, however, show American consumers what they're missing out on while increasing competition in the American car market. Hell, it might even give some stateside auto engineers some good ideas. [1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TOTALSA https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TOTALSA
- testing22321 1y ago
  Soon you’ll want Americans to know how good healthcare is in other countries, or that people in many countries get paid time off to move home , or that people in other countries don’t go into crippling debt for education. No, no. THAT is not acceptable.
  - serf 1y ago
    >Soon you’ll want Americans to know how good healthcare is in other countries there is a difference between 'good healthcare' and 'available healthcare'. the US has some of the highest quality healthcare in the world to those that it is made available to. the worlds' most rich and famous come to the US for treatment -- and the poorest in the US are among the most plentiful medical tourists to Malaysia and Thailand. It's hard for foreigners to understand, but these two qualities are not mutually exclusive. The availability of healthcare is the favorite talking point of those with socialized medicine programs because.... the quality sucks. How many hundreds of NHS horror-stories are produced a year? Yes, it's great that they are given a card that says they have medical coverage. It's not so great to wait 6 years for a cancer treatment that is nigh useless by the time the scalpel touches the patient.
    - Loocid 1y ago
      Except its not 6 years for the vast majority of people? https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/cancer-waiting-times/ https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas... ~75% of people get diagnosed in <1 month of urgent referral and 90% of people that want treatment get started in <1 month. >and the poorest in the US are among the most plentiful medical tourists to Malaysia and Thailand. This is such an absurd statement. The poorest Americans can absolutely not afford travel to the other side of the world for treatment.
    - decimalenough 1y ago
      > How many hundreds of NHS horror-stories are produced a year? Less than the millions of horror stories produced by the lack of anything like the NHS in the US. That number is not just hyperbole. There are on the order of a million homeless people on the US, and 50-70% of them cite medical debt as a major reason why. This is literally unimaginable in any European country.
      - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
        > This is literally unimaginable in any European country America (19.5/10k, of which 12 unsheltered) has fewer homeless per capita than, in increasing order of homelessness, Czechia (22), Austria (22), Sweden (26), Serbia (29), Canada (29), Germany (31), Latvia (35), Greece (37), Luxembourg (38), France (49, of which 4.5 unsheltered) and the UK (56, of which 0.9 unsheltered) [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_homeless_population https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_ho...
        decimalenough 1y ago
        Your source itself says the numbers are not directly comparable because of different measures of homelessness, and the US is widely reckoned to undercount: https://www.opportunitynowsv.org/blog/invisible-people-region-likely-undercounting-homeless-population-significantly https://www.opportunitynowsv.org/blog/invisible-people-regio... Nevertheless, medical debt is a significant driver of homelessness in the US, while it is not one in the EU.
- micromacrofoot 1y ago
  I don't even care if china is attempting to surveil me honestly, feels like there are already a dozen American companies trying constantly to collect my data so they can exploit me
  - prawn 1y ago
    A common comment in this context is that the American entities have a greater capacity to influence your life (wreck credit, dob you in, etc) than a foreign one.
  - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
    > don't even care if china is attempting to surveil me Flip it around. You're in China. Would you want the CIA to have access to your life? Of course not, unless you're an idiot. Every intelligence agency has near-limitless utility for disposable stooges.
    - potato3732842 1y ago
      There is no universe in which foreign intel trying to blackmail you over some bit of info is worse than the local agencies doing the same.
      - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
        > no universe in which foreign intel trying to blackmail you over some bit of info is worse than the local agencies doing the same You're comparing conditional probabilities without considering the priors. Given you're being coerced, it's worse to have that done by power close than power afar. The downside for the FBI blackmailing an American is significant. Of course it happens and has happened. But it's weighed. The downside for the CIA doing pretty much fuckall is highly limited. This results in the common asymmetry in non-autocratic countries between domestic and foreign surveillance budgets and, subsequently, targets. (If it came out that the CIA had been leveraging the porn habits of Chinese citizens to coerce them into spying for it, I'm not sure there would be any backlash in Washington. That's literally their job.) That example, by the way, hints at the lack of mutual exclusivity in your example. Every one of those disposable agents would subsequently be punished by Beijing. Same as if you got played by Russia or China (or Pyongyang or a non-state criminal outfit). The blackmail only works because you're rationally afraid of your local agencies--the CIA has limited means by which to directly coerce Chinese citizens in China.
- Animats 1y ago
  Farley, the CEO of Ford, keeps pointing this out. He and his management team went to China recently to look at cars and car factories. They were impressed by BYD's cars and terrified by the factory visits. Ford wants to keep exporting trucks from the US, and Farley says that Ford needs to up their game to compete. Latest thinking at Ford is to have three assembly lines side by side, for front, middle, and back of vehicle. Then assemble the three sections. This improves access so you don't have people crawling into the vehicle to install stuff. Robots can do more of the assembly. Stellantis, is, as usual, screwed up. The only remaining Chrysler product is a mini-van. The Jeeps designed after the Stellantis acquisition are not very good. (A plug-in hybrid with a 21 mile electric range?) The dealers demanded that the CEO of Stellantis be fired for incompetence, which was done. So far it hasn't helped much. General Motors is still trying to push their "ladder of success": "Start your adventure with Chevrolet", and someday, reach Cadillac. This was a good idea around 1955. General Motors, post-bankruptcy, is a much smaller company than it was before the bankruptcy.
  - potato3732842 1y ago
    >A plug-in hybrid with a 21 mile electric range? You fail to understand the magic of the Jeep Wrangler. It is a masterful exercise in checkbox engineering. It is a lifestyle car or a practical SUV. It has a (shitty) 2nd row for the kids. It comes in hard top and soft top. You can get it in a hybrid, or 6spd manual. It is literally the car that has a "well askshually" in response to whatever reason your significant other has for why not to get it. Yeah 21mi plug in range is crap, but that's all it needs to check the box.
johnnyanmac 1y ago
Sorry, 200% tariffs for you. And that wasn't even a Trump thing, surprisingly enough. Sad part is it might still be worth it to buy after tarriffs at the rate American vehicles are going.

> If only there was a country selling cheap, reliable electric vehicles with extremely low running costs The missing middle in discussions around Chinese EVs is import quotas (and disconnection mandates). Americans buy over 15 million vehicles a year [1]. Letting China export up to 150,000 EVs into America a year, subject to anti-surveillance measures (e.g. no phoning home), paid for by the importer and thus--ultimately--consumer, would not bankrupt American producers. It would, however, show American consumers what they're missing out on while increasing competition in the American car market. Hell, it might even give some stateside auto engineers some good ideas. [1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TOTALSA https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TOTALSA

testing22321 1y ago
Soon you’ll want Americans to know how good healthcare is in other countries, or that people in many countries get paid time off to move home , or that people in other countries don’t go into crippling debt for education. No, no. THAT is not acceptable.
- serf 1y ago
  >Soon you’ll want Americans to know how good healthcare is in other countries there is a difference between 'good healthcare' and 'available healthcare'. the US has some of the highest quality healthcare in the world to those that it is made available to. the worlds' most rich and famous come to the US for treatment -- and the poorest in the US are among the most plentiful medical tourists to Malaysia and Thailand. It's hard for foreigners to understand, but these two qualities are not mutually exclusive. The availability of healthcare is the favorite talking point of those with socialized medicine programs because.... the quality sucks. How many hundreds of NHS horror-stories are produced a year? Yes, it's great that they are given a card that says they have medical coverage. It's not so great to wait 6 years for a cancer treatment that is nigh useless by the time the scalpel touches the patient.
  - Loocid 1y ago
    Except its not 6 years for the vast majority of people? https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/cancer-waiting-times/ https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas... ~75% of people get diagnosed in <1 month of urgent referral and 90% of people that want treatment get started in <1 month. >and the poorest in the US are among the most plentiful medical tourists to Malaysia and Thailand. This is such an absurd statement. The poorest Americans can absolutely not afford travel to the other side of the world for treatment.
  - decimalenough 1y ago
    > How many hundreds of NHS horror-stories are produced a year? Less than the millions of horror stories produced by the lack of anything like the NHS in the US. That number is not just hyperbole. There are on the order of a million homeless people on the US, and 50-70% of them cite medical debt as a major reason why. This is literally unimaginable in any European country.
    - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
      > This is literally unimaginable in any European country America (19.5/10k, of which 12 unsheltered) has fewer homeless per capita than, in increasing order of homelessness, Czechia (22), Austria (22), Sweden (26), Serbia (29), Canada (29), Germany (31), Latvia (35), Greece (37), Luxembourg (38), France (49, of which 4.5 unsheltered) and the UK (56, of which 0.9 unsheltered) [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_homeless_population https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_ho...
      - decimalenough 1y ago
        Your source itself says the numbers are not directly comparable because of different measures of homelessness, and the US is widely reckoned to undercount: https://www.opportunitynowsv.org/blog/invisible-people-region-likely-undercounting-homeless-population-significantly https://www.opportunitynowsv.org/blog/invisible-people-regio... Nevertheless, medical debt is a significant driver of homelessness in the US, while it is not one in the EU.
micromacrofoot 1y ago
I don't even care if china is attempting to surveil me honestly, feels like there are already a dozen American companies trying constantly to collect my data so they can exploit me
- prawn 1y ago
  A common comment in this context is that the American entities have a greater capacity to influence your life (wreck credit, dob you in, etc) than a foreign one.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago
  > don't even care if china is attempting to surveil me Flip it around. You're in China. Would you want the CIA to have access to your life? Of course not, unless you're an idiot. Every intelligence agency has near-limitless utility for disposable stooges.
  - potato3732842 1y ago
    There is no universe in which foreign intel trying to blackmail you over some bit of info is worse than the local agencies doing the same.
    - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
      > no universe in which foreign intel trying to blackmail you over some bit of info is worse than the local agencies doing the same You're comparing conditional probabilities without considering the priors. Given you're being coerced, it's worse to have that done by power close than power afar. The downside for the FBI blackmailing an American is significant. Of course it happens and has happened. But it's weighed. The downside for the CIA doing pretty much fuckall is highly limited. This results in the common asymmetry in non-autocratic countries between domestic and foreign surveillance budgets and, subsequently, targets. (If it came out that the CIA had been leveraging the porn habits of Chinese citizens to coerce them into spying for it, I'm not sure there would be any backlash in Washington. That's literally their job.) That example, by the way, hints at the lack of mutual exclusivity in your example. Every one of those disposable agents would subsequently be punished by Beijing. Same as if you got played by Russia or China (or Pyongyang or a non-state criminal outfit). The blackmail only works because you're rationally afraid of your local agencies--the CIA has limited means by which to directly coerce Chinese citizens in China.
Animats 1y ago
Farley, the CEO of Ford, keeps pointing this out. He and his management team went to China recently to look at cars and car factories. They were impressed by BYD's cars and terrified by the factory visits. Ford wants to keep exporting trucks from the US, and Farley says that Ford needs to up their game to compete. Latest thinking at Ford is to have three assembly lines side by side, for front, middle, and back of vehicle. Then assemble the three sections. This improves access so you don't have people crawling into the vehicle to install stuff. Robots can do more of the assembly. Stellantis, is, as usual, screwed up. The only remaining Chrysler product is a mini-van. The Jeeps designed after the Stellantis acquisition are not very good. (A plug-in hybrid with a 21 mile electric range?) The dealers demanded that the CEO of Stellantis be fired for incompetence, which was done. So far it hasn't helped much. General Motors is still trying to push their "ladder of success": "Start your adventure with Chevrolet", and someday, reach Cadillac. This was a good idea around 1955. General Motors, post-bankruptcy, is a much smaller company than it was before the bankruptcy.
- potato3732842 1y ago
  >A plug-in hybrid with a 21 mile electric range? You fail to understand the magic of the Jeep Wrangler. It is a masterful exercise in checkbox engineering. It is a lifestyle car or a practical SUV. It has a (shitty) 2nd row for the kids. It comes in hard top and soft top. You can get it in a hybrid, or 6spd manual. It is literally the car that has a "well askshually" in response to whatever reason your significant other has for why not to get it. Yeah 21mi plug in range is crap, but that's all it needs to check the box.

johnnyanmac 1y ago

Sorry, 200% tariffs for you. And that wasn't even a Trump thing, surprisingly enough. Sad part is it might still be worth it to buy after tarriffs at the rate American vehicles are going.