3 ms·

I don't know, government waste and most policy sucks. But there's no reason we can't do stuff or even try. For instance, take Tesla. It wasn't anything revolut

by bko 1mo ago

I don't know, government waste and most policy sucks. But there's no reason we can't do stuff or even try. For instance, take Tesla. It wasn't anything revolutionary. Any auto manufacturer could have invested in battery technology and building a compelling EV, but they didn't. Same with manufacturing in America. Every manufacturer took as given that they have to outsource manufacturing to oversees and components to third parties. But it didn't have to be that way. It takes someone naive and optimistic enough to try something different.

boplicity 1mo ago
It's easy to forget that Tesla was made possible almost exclusively through government incentives. This is something that most people seem to have forgotten: Tesla exists because the government created incentive programs that paid in cold hard cash. Musk took advantage of those programs, and Tesla absolutely would not have been nearly as successful (and likely not existed) without it.
- fastball 1mo ago
  As much incentive as the oil & gas industry receives?
- bko 1mo ago
  This is incredibly overstated. There are "incentives" for all sorts of activities. These incentives were available to all manufacturers. We should have "incentives" to produce electric vehicles and manufacturing in America. Insane not to. And these incentives are often "you would normally have to pay us X million in taxes, but we'll let you pay less". When the alternative is something not being built and no tax revenue, it makes sense. And a lot of subsidies were to buyers of EVs
  - throwawayqqq11 1mo ago
    > In 2019, the loss was $862 million, but for 2020 there is a huge profit of $721 million. > However: A closer look at the figures published last week shows that Tesla is still making losses with actual sales of electric cars - around $500,000 in 2020. > In 2020, carbon certificates brought in $1.6 billion, without this revenue the numbers would still be below red. https://www.electrichunter.com/ev-news/tesla-makes-money-co2-certificates https://www.electrichunter.com/ev-news/tesla-makes-money-co2... With a "profit" margin that jumpy and a history of unrentability, i think it's fair to say that Tesla only exists today because of subsidies. It's not just tax benefits, as you frame it, but in this case EU-CO2 certificates, a direct "revenue" stream.
    - inemesitaffia 1mo ago
      Also available to other companies
      - throwawayqqq11 1mo ago
        Back then tesla was a unicorn.
        inemesitaffia 1mo ago
        Billionaires can claim child benefits too. And Unicorns are about valuation, not money in the bank.
- Game_Ender 1mo ago
  The government should find ways to strategically invest in developing major industries. The market for them is global and China has/will have a bigger internal market than the US, so without intentional development we'll get a continued industrial consolidation that is bad for the US and the world. I have robotic lawn mowers and vacuum cleaners made by Chinese companies partly because an intentional policy from China's government to grow these capabilities locally.
  - dgellow 1mo ago
    The current administration is literally cutting all those strategic investments
    - sillyfluke 1mo ago
      I think they're cutting strategic investments that they don't have personal investments in, as suggested in their banana republic handbook. They seem to be fine with fossil fuel investments for example. I wouldn't be surprised if they start investing again once they destroy the competition and create rival companies in their stead. Right now they seem to be swatting away wind and solar and propping up nuclear companies that are in their pocket. The titles read like they're straight out of The Onion: "Trump Media To Merge With Nuclear Fusion Startup" https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/Trump-Media-To-Merge-With-Nuclear-Fusion-Startup.html https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/Trump-...
      - dgellow 1mo ago
        wtf, I missed that one. I’m really sorry for anyone living in the US but the country you knew is dead, whatever the new country is, the old rules don’t apply. It’s now closer to a 3rd world country where literally everything all the time is corruption, as a core fundamental value of the administration
  - globalnode 1mo ago
    the way the us govt has behaved internationally i wouldnt be surprised if countries/people actively boycott made in america.. the market for us goods and services would definitely have shrunk.
- YetAnotherNick 1mo ago
  What was the incentive and was that specific to Tesla?
- Rover222 1mo ago
  This is such a braindead take. Ford could have taken advantage of those same EV incentives. Any other new startup could have too. Tesla got nothing special.
- woah 1mo ago
  The biggest miracle of Tesla is that they somehow got liberals to argue against government incentives for electric cars
  - throwawayqqq11 1mo ago
    ... against Alon, not EVs.
- deleted 1mo ago
  [deleted]
- impulser_ 1mo ago
  The government should give incentives to do things that benefit the future of the country. All auto manufactures had the same incentives but instead of building actual good vehicles they instead shipped more production to Mexico and continue to build the absolute most dog shit vehicles in the world. Not a single US auto manufacturer, outside of Tesla, has a good EV, nor FSD. Waymo is buying thousands of Chinese cars because of how shit US car manufacturer are. They are the worst of the worst. They shouldn't even be in business they are that bad at building cars which they literally invented.
- burnerRhodov3 1mo ago
  Can you say point to any other industry that hasn't used subsidies/ selling to the gov? Oil and gas, semi conductors, compute... Everyone sells and gets loans from the gov... Tesla like the least.
bigyabai 1mo ago
> Any auto manufacturer could have invested in battery technology and building a compelling EV, but they didn't ...because Tesla sold luxury vehicles at relatively low volume. By the time Elon reneged his "$25,000 EV" promise, China was ready to export vehicles that actually hit that price point. The only thing preventing Americans from driving affordable EVs is Elon's federal protectionism. Is that really progress?
- decimalenough 1mo ago
  The Model Y has shifted over a million units every year since 2023 and sits at the top of many "world's best selling car" rankings. Obviously it's not a cheap car, but it's still mass market, not luxury.
  - bigyabai 1mo ago
    It's only mass-market in the US because of subsidies and tariffs. Chinese EVs change the equation entirely. Outside the US protectionist bubble, Tesla is seen as a luxury brand and their inability to deliver a $25,000 EV doesn't help.
    - decimalenough 1mo ago
      As of March 2026, the Model Y is the best selling car in China. https://teslamagz.com/tesla/model-y/tesla-model-y-becomes-chinas-best-selling-car-in-march-2026/ https://teslamagz.com/tesla/model-y/tesla-model-y-becomes-ch... Also South Korea, Australia, the EU, etc.
      - manytimesaway 1mo ago
        No it's not. It was the most sold during March, but that's it. Local sources (https://www.autohome.com.cn/hangye/showroom/ https://www.autohome.com.cn/hangye/showroom/) tend to show that it's Xiaomi / Geely that's leading the race in 2026. Additionally, sales numbers doesn't correlate with the brand image of Tesla : it is a luxury brand, no matter how you put it.
dgellow 1mo ago
> It takes someone naive and optimistic enough to try something different. You mean Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, right?
- Rover222 1mo ago
  [flagged]
- jvwww 1mo ago
  Tesla would be nothing without Musk. That doesn't take away from Eberhard and Tarpenning; they started the company after all and are great engineers. But it would be nothing without Musk.
  - sockaddr 1mo ago
    And it would be nothing without Eberhard and Tarpenning
  - dgellow 1mo ago
    The people who tried something different and did the work on batteries weren’t Musk. That’s the comment I was responding to. Musk has been a good showman though, and he seems to be a genius financial engineer with a cult following
    - inemesitaffia 1mo ago
      That's Straubel, sorry

by bko 1mo ago

boplicity 1mo ago

It's easy to forget that Tesla was made possible almost exclusively through government incentives. This is something that most people seem to have forgotten: Tesla exists because the government created incentive programs that paid in cold hard cash. Musk took advantage of those programs, and Tesla absolutely would not have been nearly as successful (and likely not existed) without it.

fastball 1mo ago
As much incentive as the oil & gas industry receives?
bko 1mo ago
This is incredibly overstated. There are "incentives" for all sorts of activities. These incentives were available to all manufacturers. We should have "incentives" to produce electric vehicles and manufacturing in America. Insane not to. And these incentives are often "you would normally have to pay us X million in taxes, but we'll let you pay less". When the alternative is something not being built and no tax revenue, it makes sense. And a lot of subsidies were to buyers of EVs
- throwawayqqq11 1mo ago
  > In 2019, the loss was $862 million, but for 2020 there is a huge profit of $721 million. > However: A closer look at the figures published last week shows that Tesla is still making losses with actual sales of electric cars - around $500,000 in 2020. > In 2020, carbon certificates brought in $1.6 billion, without this revenue the numbers would still be below red. https://www.electrichunter.com/ev-news/tesla-makes-money-co2-certificates https://www.electrichunter.com/ev-news/tesla-makes-money-co2... With a "profit" margin that jumpy and a history of unrentability, i think it's fair to say that Tesla only exists today because of subsidies. It's not just tax benefits, as you frame it, but in this case EU-CO2 certificates, a direct "revenue" stream.
  - inemesitaffia 1mo ago
    Also available to other companies
    - throwawayqqq11 1mo ago
      Back then tesla was a unicorn.
      - inemesitaffia 1mo ago
        Billionaires can claim child benefits too. And Unicorns are about valuation, not money in the bank.
Game_Ender 1mo ago
The government should find ways to strategically invest in developing major industries. The market for them is global and China has/will have a bigger internal market than the US, so without intentional development we'll get a continued industrial consolidation that is bad for the US and the world. I have robotic lawn mowers and vacuum cleaners made by Chinese companies partly because an intentional policy from China's government to grow these capabilities locally.
- dgellow 1mo ago
  The current administration is literally cutting all those strategic investments
  - sillyfluke 1mo ago
    I think they're cutting strategic investments that they don't have personal investments in, as suggested in their banana republic handbook. They seem to be fine with fossil fuel investments for example. I wouldn't be surprised if they start investing again once they destroy the competition and create rival companies in their stead. Right now they seem to be swatting away wind and solar and propping up nuclear companies that are in their pocket. The titles read like they're straight out of The Onion: "Trump Media To Merge With Nuclear Fusion Startup" https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/Trump-Media-To-Merge-With-Nuclear-Fusion-Startup.html https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/Trump-...
    - dgellow 1mo ago
      wtf, I missed that one. I’m really sorry for anyone living in the US but the country you knew is dead, whatever the new country is, the old rules don’t apply. It’s now closer to a 3rd world country where literally everything all the time is corruption, as a core fundamental value of the administration
- globalnode 1mo ago
  the way the us govt has behaved internationally i wouldnt be surprised if countries/people actively boycott made in america.. the market for us goods and services would definitely have shrunk.
YetAnotherNick 1mo ago
What was the incentive and was that specific to Tesla?
Rover222 1mo ago
This is such a braindead take. Ford could have taken advantage of those same EV incentives. Any other new startup could have too. Tesla got nothing special.
woah 1mo ago
The biggest miracle of Tesla is that they somehow got liberals to argue against government incentives for electric cars
- throwawayqqq11 1mo ago
  ... against Alon, not EVs.
deleted 1mo ago
[deleted]
impulser_ 1mo ago
The government should give incentives to do things that benefit the future of the country. All auto manufactures had the same incentives but instead of building actual good vehicles they instead shipped more production to Mexico and continue to build the absolute most dog shit vehicles in the world. Not a single US auto manufacturer, outside of Tesla, has a good EV, nor FSD. Waymo is buying thousands of Chinese cars because of how shit US car manufacturer are. They are the worst of the worst. They shouldn't even be in business they are that bad at building cars which they literally invented.
burnerRhodov3 1mo ago
Can you say point to any other industry that hasn't used subsidies/ selling to the gov? Oil and gas, semi conductors, compute... Everyone sells and gets loans from the gov... Tesla like the least.

bigyabai 1mo ago

> Any auto manufacturer could have invested in battery technology and building a compelling EV, but they didn't ...because Tesla sold luxury vehicles at relatively low volume. By the time Elon reneged his "$25,000 EV" promise, China was ready to export vehicles that actually hit that price point. The only thing preventing Americans from driving affordable EVs is Elon's federal protectionism. Is that really progress?

decimalenough 1mo ago
The Model Y has shifted over a million units every year since 2023 and sits at the top of many "world's best selling car" rankings. Obviously it's not a cheap car, but it's still mass market, not luxury.
- bigyabai 1mo ago
  It's only mass-market in the US because of subsidies and tariffs. Chinese EVs change the equation entirely. Outside the US protectionist bubble, Tesla is seen as a luxury brand and their inability to deliver a $25,000 EV doesn't help.
  - decimalenough 1mo ago
    As of March 2026, the Model Y is the best selling car in China. https://teslamagz.com/tesla/model-y/tesla-model-y-becomes-chinas-best-selling-car-in-march-2026/ https://teslamagz.com/tesla/model-y/tesla-model-y-becomes-ch... Also South Korea, Australia, the EU, etc.
    - manytimesaway 1mo ago
      No it's not. It was the most sold during March, but that's it. Local sources (https://www.autohome.com.cn/hangye/showroom/ https://www.autohome.com.cn/hangye/showroom/) tend to show that it's Xiaomi / Geely that's leading the race in 2026. Additionally, sales numbers doesn't correlate with the brand image of Tesla : it is a luxury brand, no matter how you put it.

dgellow 1mo ago

> It takes someone naive and optimistic enough to try something different. You mean Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, right?

Rover222 1mo ago
[flagged]
jvwww 1mo ago
Tesla would be nothing without Musk. That doesn't take away from Eberhard and Tarpenning; they started the company after all and are great engineers. But it would be nothing without Musk.
- sockaddr 1mo ago
  And it would be nothing without Eberhard and Tarpenning
- dgellow 1mo ago
  The people who tried something different and did the work on batteries weren’t Musk. That’s the comment I was responding to. Musk has been a good showman though, and he seems to be a genius financial engineer with a cult following
  - inemesitaffia 1mo ago
    That's Straubel, sorry