> People buy large cars in the U.S. simply because they are useful. You surely know that this cannot be true. In China, again, many rich people buy expensive l

> People buy large cars in the U.S. simply because they are useful. You surely know that this cannot be true. In China, again, many rich people buy expensive luxury cars, and really have no need for them, except if you include "social status" in "needs". I have a simple litmus test for detecting unneeded goods that people are trying to force into our minds: ads. We need normal food (neither fast nor organic), normal shoes (not Nikes), a door on our house with keys, etc. Except if it is very different in the US, I think no big ads campain are selling these. However, each product that require a heavy handed ad campaigns is certainly lacking in desirability or usefulness. And it also means these industries are spending a lot of money selling you goods, instead of spending money making these goods better or cheaper. Anyways, my bet is that the car industry is rotten to the bones, selling worldwide dangerous and superfluous multi-tons machines that could be replaced by many other, more useful, safe and scalable transportation means. And I hope Google and others will break this industry apart as soon as possible.