- cross-posted to:
- electricvehicles@slrpnk.net
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Capitalism is all about competition unless it’s not.
Tariffs be damned, I will not buy an American brand car. They’ve been mediocre my whole life and it’s always been easier to source parts for Hondas and Toyotas. I’m not sure how repairable any EV is, but I doubt American brands will top the charts of value in repairability in my lifetime
But it would also help american people. Which is more important, I wonder.
Good, let’s do it. I’m tired of our tax money keeping shitty car companies floating.
So free markets are a terrible idea now and countries practicing import substitution weren’t impoverishing their people.
US hypocrisy at it’s finest.
Our free market’s good, yours is the problem! Gotta read the fine print!
„Free market“? Speaking of hypocrisy. Chinese car brands are so heavily subsidized they probably cost the Chinese economy more than they make selling them at the moment. China is clearly trying to drown the global market with cheap cars so they can ramp up prices immensely once they have killed the competition and have become a monopoly. China hasn‘t been the extreme low income country to produce super cheaply for a long time and they couldn‘t produce cars this cheap in a free market situation.
Many countries and the EU have measures against such practices because state run operations with the sole purpose to destroy an industry (which this is) undermine the very idea of the free market or even trade relationships.
Alternatively we could start subsiding local car makers and play the same little game China is playing but more cars is honestly the last thing we need right now. Tariffs are a much smoother option to deal with this even when they have a bad rep.
Ideally we use that generated money from tariffs to subsidize public transport so we don‘t get cheaper cars but cheaper alternatives but that‘s still just a dream I‘m afraid.
Whatever the case, one should look at super cheap cars and what that means in the long run more critically.
Alternatively we could start subsiding local car makers
We have been. Bailout after bailout. For the longest fucking time, and have had insane trade rules and tarrigs in place for decades and decades. I’d argue this is what it looks like to have another country finally being able to play on a level playing field.
After the auto industry intentionally killed public transport.
The fact that one of the most powerful monopolies in the world went bankrupt and was forced to be bailed out by taxpayers more than once should really be a disqualifier for any future endeavors.
GM received more than $7 billions of subsidies and around $50 billions of “Federal loans, loan guarantees and bailout assistance”.
US auto manufacturers are getting their fair share of subsidies.
To be fair GM sold or closed a lot of its brands and foreign subsidiaries, and paid back the loan.
I fucking hate what the US auto industry has historically and is currently doing (making constantly bigger and more expensive trucks in a time we need smaller lighter EVs), but it’s actually a bit different from the SpaceX or EV credit subsidies and more of a low interest loan.
The US has far too many dispersed rural towns for public transit to cover. Yes we need more high speed rail and light rail, but we’re gonna need personal cars because of distances, weather and employment practices for a long time still. And there’s no reason they need to be 3 ton high speed blind spots.
Is it a level playing field? In China workers rights are pretty non-existent and there’s no OSHA equivalent, at least not to the degree we have in the US. Then add in government subsidies, lower worker pay, reduced R&D costs because they pilfered the engineering from a US company, and you end up with a very lopsided market.
To be clear, I am in no way defending the US auto industry. They have little customer loyalty for a reason – low quality, overpriced, subscription dependent vehicles with terrible warranties, expensive service requirements, and invasive telemetry. They need more competition to force them to make more consumer-friendly decisions, but China is hardly a fair competitor.
In China workers rights are pretty non-existent and there’s no OSHA equivalent, at least not to the degree we have in the US
How much maternity leave d’you get in the US? Cause in China it’s a minimum of 90 days up to 180. And an extra 15~30 days of pat leave. Mandatory paid holiday? US: 0 China: 11. Sick leave? US: 0 China: months (at reduced rate). Vacation? US: 0, China: 1 to 3 weeks.
An employer that fails to allow an employee to take annual leave must pay that employee 300% of the employee’s daily wages for each unused vacation day
The work sfatey certainly remains an issue, like any developing country, but things are rapidly improving.
Efforts at work safety shall be oriented around people and reflect the principle of people first and life first, with top priority given to people’s life safety. The philosophy of safe development shall be adhered to and the principles of safety first, prevention as the main target as well as comprehensive administration shall be followed to forestall and resolve major safety risks at the source.
http://en.npc.gov.cn.cdurl.cn/2021-06/10/c_786248.htm
Things aren’t all roses in China, but y’all have to get off of your high horse when you know fuck all other than bland ass propaganda.
When was the second bailout? Or the first if you’re referring to something older.
You can‘t compare a bailout with an aggressive offensive. Especially since western car makers and many other manufacturers outsourced to China in the process. There are few to no parallels to be drawn here. A more accurate, albeit tasteless comparison would be the China opium wars. Because that‘s essentially what they‘re aiming to do: Making us addicts to their product. They‘re selling us the stuff at a loss because they know we‘ll come back for more and before we know it we‘re completely hooked. It‘s the exact same thing they‘re doing with Temu and TikTok.
If something is being so heavily subsidized, the correct market response is to buy as much as possible, and resell once the prices ramp up.
Setting up tariffs and complaining about subsidies? 100% not the “free market” response. It’s cope.
True, even Milton Friedman (barf) said we should be thankful if someone wants to subsides our lives. Besides these market extremists say all government intervention is bound to fail, so they should have nothing to fear letting the BYDs in. The socialist subsidy of BYD will collapse and we don’t want the government distorting our market either.
This isn’t really my personal take, but i like using their own logic to reach a conclusion they will hate.
Are you trying to be funny or something? Used electric cars aren‘t exactly going up in price. What a bunch of nonsense. Talking about cope.
We have subsidized the big three many times, and they return nothing back. At this point, they should be nationalized.
You have a very simple way of looking at things and are part of the problem that is going on.
Your ignorance is showing. Tuck it in.
You tankies really have a way with words.
Free markets were always a terrible idea, the USA economic system was basically founded on principles of regulation of goods like tea, tobacco, and alcohol.
It’s not a free market.
BYD is heavily subsidized .
Pretty sure big oil and car companies have been bailed out by the US government in the past. Plus america designs most of its cities so that you need to own a car. Seems like both markets are equally “free” at the end of the day.
The majority shareholder at GM is the US treasury.
One of the majority holders at Stelantis is their workers’ union.
A one time loan which made money is hardly a subsidy by comparison to China right now. That’s an absurd comparison. Apples to oranges. Hell apples to baseballs.
There is also CAFE standards that made small, effecient vehicles require extremely high emissions standards while allowing looser standards for larger, less effecient vehicles. Effectively limiting foriegn market influence while increasing both the price and size of the average vehicle on American roads.
That’s not a competitive subsidy though. Anyone can and don take advantage of those emissions. The US does not have access to China subsidized materials or labor to compete in that market.
BYD could build here and take advantage of that.
The US actually heavily tariffs foreign-made vehicles that could skirt the CAFE requirements the way American trucks do. Light trucks suffer the Chicken Tax and can only be made in Canada, US or Mexico to bypass that. Been that way since the UAW boss asked LJB to do something about the German imports growing.
So build them here, like every other foreign auto maker.
They accomplish two completely different effects by two completely different mechanisms. The former being available to every manufacturer.
American car makers famously unsubsidized and holding up their own pants.
The oil industry is famously completely independent from government subsidy. Especially when it comes to setting urban development policy and planning transportation systems, these have no bearing at all oil demand and they also cost nothing.
Compared globally? Yeah mostly so.
What subsides do US cars get that other countries don’t have similar programs?
They have never considered actually competing have they?
They’ve actually done the exact opposite. The lobbying, the import laws, the absence of a foreign export market, and the manufacturing of cars that would never pass safety laws anywhere else, all resulted in the kind of dogshit that Americans have to experience now. Why improve if you’re the only player
They have an export market, its the handful of douchebags in Australia that want compensator trucks instead of a ute
Big corporations know very well how competition works and would like to avoid it at all costs.
Former big corporation*
Who also worked primarily in Chinese Automotive industry*
They do. For example here. Just not in your country.
They don’t compete here either.
They’ve stopped producing passenger cars, and the Chicken Tax means they don’t have to compete on trucks.
They saw what happened in the 70s and said never again will they have to actually compete with better products
What happened in the 70s?
Toyota had small, fuel efficient cars and that’s what people wanted during the oil crisis.
Yeah, them and Datsun. Super reliable cars when US manufacturers were ugly slow tanks that wouldn’t make it 80,000 miles.
Couldn’t have a thought further from his mind
Nah man, that’s not the purpose of unrestrained capitalism. The point is to get big enough that you can buy out all the competition, then make your product cheaper and cheaper once there’s no one to compete against. It’s a bit like an economical algae bloom.
Detroit is easy to hate but there’s more wrong here than how much can-do energy they wake up in the morning with. If they competed on features and quality they could never compete on price. Everything we do to keep the dollar strong makes it impossible to manufacture here.
They saw what happened in the 70s and said never again will they have to actually compete with better products
Michael Dunne has been competing the entire time, for the Chinese. His statements here aren’t fear, they’re shillery.
Oh no! The type of capitalism where we have to compete!
Make it go away, Daddy Trump!
Newsflash: American car manufacturer says “Our cars are crap and overpriced”
Michael Dunne is actually someone who worked in Chinese Automotive manufacturing. He’s the Chinese car manufacturer saying “Chinese cars are good and cheap.”
His word is basically meaningless.
If you’re one of the largest and oldest car manufacturers in the world and the most “innovative” thing you’ve managed to do in the last 20 years is rebrand Buick into a young family brand, then you probably need some good competition.
Don’t forget the courage to not support CarPlay/Android Auto … just stupid.
the most “innovative” thing you’ve managed to do in the last 20 years is rebrand Buick
… then you simply have no excuse anymore to exist at all.
Well they wouldn’t if not for that hefty bailout by the American taxpayers that they got back in 2008.
Ford was the only one not to take a buyout, FYI.
Ford wouldn’t survive BYD either, though.
Greed rules the Western world.
In September 2009, Ford entered into an agreement with the Department of Energy and borrowed $5.9 billion
They still hadn’t paid it back in full in 2022.
This is definitely worth mentioning but it’s also good to note that it was a loan not a bailout and Ford has repaid it.
Ford also received a $9.2B loan for EV battery factory projects from the government.
The compact cars probably being the Fiesta and the Focus. The Fiesta is almost a perfect vehicle. Small but comfy for four decent sized occupants. Great gas mileage. Super reliable motor (I have one with 219,000 miles that’s never even needed a tune-up yet–5 speed manual). They put ultra shitty automatic transmissions in them that failed after 35,000 miles so all the good was nullified by that boneheaded decision. Of course you always run the risk of being turned into a grease pancake by bro-dozers all day every day when driving a car in the US.
I like small cars. I have a 2019 Kona and I love the size but I looked at the newer ones because I’m tempted by hybrid or EV. They the newer ones bigger so I decided to just hold onto my current car for a couple more years and then I’ll look at a Telo.
P.S. Actually the average american would be benefited from that
Ford has been busy corporate decisioning itself into irrelevance for decades now. The only reason Ford is even still around is the F series.
GM, maker of horribly shitty cars, and yeah, the Corvette, we know. We’ve seen it, GM.
“do you want to see the C9?”
…of course I would.
Good. Fuckem. They make shitty, oversized trucks that are a danger to pedestrians and people who drive reasonably sized cars anyway.
The Chinese too know how to make unnecessary large cars, unfortunately.
My boss in the UK got one. In bright red. It looks like he’s driving a fucking fire engine.
My old boss was a huge man who went around in a little yellow convertible. We called him Noddy.
May I suggest calling him Fireman Sam?
Yeah, our VP rides around in a 2-door coupe and he’s very tall, while my coworker (who is shorter) drives a big SUV because “he doesn’t fit in smaller cars.” I’m also tall and drive a Toyota Prius, which is small.
At the end of the day, none of that’s legitimate, it’s just an excuse to buy the car you prefer.
Larger cars should cost more because they take up more space, wear out the roads faster, and impact the environment more.
Dam maybe some of the American automakers who took billions in subsidies should have built cheaper cars instead of the largest trucks possible to skirt regulations.
I literally can’t afford an American car, i can afford a BYD tho.
I can afford neither, but if I had to save up for one it would be the BYD.
American cars are just large, stupid and inefficient. Also the parts are very expensive here in New Zealand
I bought a used Chevrolet Bolt '23 which is the closest I could get, they’re still relatively cheap and mine has been working great.
American cars have sucked compared to Asian cars since the 1970s. I don’t understand why people are acting all surprised that this is true in respect to BYD. Sure in the past products designed in China were stereotyped as poor quality knock offs of western designed goods, but in the past decade Chinese engineers have increasingly proven themselves as perfectly capable of making solid, innovative designs that improve upon those of their competitors. I think it’s kind of fucked up that everyone is so suddenly upset about China’s role in the world economy since everyone was completely fine using them for cheap labor over the past several decades and are just mad that Chinese companies are beating them at high skill labor and technology. Chinese companies do have an “unfair advantage” given how much they are backed by the Chinese government but American companies receive all sorts of money from the government for all sorts of things as well.
Americans have come to think of Chinese products as bad quality because of the American companies who engage them for cheaper labor. Walmart was known to order products made to a certain spec one year, then the next year demand the company increase production, but for the same amount paid as the previous year. The Chinese company, not wanting to lose the contract, obliges, but corners have to be cut. It should be called Americanesium, not Chineseum.
Derek Guy (Die, Workwear!) posted a thread a while back (I think about 6 months ago) about how the Chinese can and do make great quality products, pointing out high quality fabrics. Give them money to buy good raw materials, give them a decent wage, and they’ll put out a good product. Honestly, they probably have a more fair work ethic than some American companies that just feed their CEOs massive salaries or are owned by private equity.
Its largely american cope that they are not that good at manufacturing anymore. Chinese factories build things to spec, and the customer asks for cheap, so they get cheap.
They also iterate very quickly.
First car design - “functional” is being polite about it.
Fifteen years later when they are on their tenth revision - pretty damn good.
Meanwhile US car manufacturers can squeeze in a revision/refresh every 5 years if they’re lucky.
Exactly!
Honestly, there’s a wide range of quality of stuff produced in China, but the expensive stuff isn’t getting brought over. The better stuff is either being used domestically or exported to India/SEA. From my limited experience importing stuff, the biggest common factor is the lack of final quality control. I ordered some small diesel engines because no else makes those but Yanmar and Yanmar prices themselves way out of my range. Even Yanmar doesn’t sell a 5hp engine. The 196cc Chinese diesel was well designed, the parts well built, but final assembly lacks consistence on the bolt torque spec and there was metal shaving left in the crank case. The bigger, more expensive diesel made by a different company had much better quality control, although it’s still necessary to flush the crank case. No one over there seems to do that.
They went through a period in the 90s where they had a huge leap in quality and almost matched Japanese imports of the time. I’d say GM is the only one who’s drivetrain quality is still on any comparable level with Asian imports. Ford gets some parts really right but then their beancounters make really dumb cuts to critical components that make many of their vehicles near lemons. I can’t think of a worse car manufacturer in the world right now than Stellantis, and they aren’t an American company anyway.
The “unfair advantage” bit has been incredibly funny to me ever since I sat in a call to prepare a joint research proposal and the representative of a certain large euro automotive supplier told us that their company would only participate in any project if they got at least a certain amount of government funding.
I am pretty sure there is some financial fuckery going on with BYD. My parents own two, and they are very nice, but way under priced compared to every other EV manufacturer.
Can’t prove anything of course, but there is something odd going on when everyone else is 20-30k more expensive.
Hard to feel sorry for GM though, they suckled at our governments (Australia) teet for decades before giving up and leaving entirely. At least if BYD is being propped up we are at least getting good cheap cars from it.
The financial fuckery is that they’re very heavily subsidized by the CCP. It’s not sustainable.
I’d argue it is.
Just look how Amazon got where it is now: Sell way under market price, till local competition closed shop, then squeeze.
It’s unsustainable to keep prices lower than costs. The Amazon example didn’t have low prices forever.
Yes, I know. That’s why BYD is going to
then squeezethe customers once they are locked in.Thus, not sustainable, as I said.
It worked for Wal-Mart
Which isn’t really a sustainable business model, but it’s quite successful
It didn’t work for Walmart the same way it didn’t work for Amazon
What is sustainable in today’s economy?
Really, what Western corporation actually base their policies on sustainable growth?
Take your time. I’ll wait.
…
All of them that I know of. Which corporations do you see running unsustainable business models until they fold completely? Take your time, I’ll wait.
The point is that they eventually change their tactics. In this case, they’ll have to eventually increase their prices.
I think your muddying sustainable and successful. It definitely can be successful, but its not sustainable.
Its also high risk, especially if you can’t crank up the prices enough later
Sustainable implies that they can keep doing it forever without changing. Switching later means what they are doing is not sustainable. It might be successful, but its not sustainable.
There’s sustainable practices and sustainable businesses. The latter is what others are arguing. Undercutting competition to take over a market is a sustainable practice IF you can hold out long enough. I’d wager the country of China can hold out longer than General Motors.
But the business model has to change in order to survive. The company cannot undercut forever, it actually needs to change in order to survive. The business model of today is not sustainable. They may have a large warchest, they may be able to crush GM, but once they do, or the warchest runs out, the business model must change.
If you want to make the argument that their overall plan with the later change is sustainable, thats fine, but this current phase is not sustainable.
You forgot the part where they raised prices on everything.
It might just be that, since BYD is serving such a large domestic market/population, that allows them to have cheaper cars? Something something, economies of scale. I’m no expert though.
There is a limit to that effect, though. And most observers agree that the state is subsidizing heavily.
BYD is already facing scrutiny for running Evergrande like accounting, and a lot of political pressures from other Chinese manufacturers. The risk is that they collapse like Evergrande, and that they drag public debt into it. The CCP might prop them up, so it light be safe. A car is different from a book, because you need lifetime service for it. If they go under, you might lose access to parts.
While they are subsidised, the Chinese are really good at low cost manufacturing. It’s not the cheap labour anymore but factory automation and robotics. They really outclass anyone else.
the Chinese are really good at low cost manufacturing
They’re not “good” at it, they just have no minimum wage and no semblance of annoying things like worker protections or unions to be concerned with.
like worker protections or unions
That’s just patently false. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-China_Federation_of_Trade_Unions
It is the largest trade union in the world with 302 million members in 1,713,000 primary trade union organizations.
Like all things in China, this is owned by the government, making it pointless.
China doesn’t have a national minimum wage, but minimum wage is delegated to the local level there and definitely exists in every single province. Just echoing what the other user said, literally everything you said here is easily disprovable. https://www.china-briefing.com/news/minimum-wages-China/
Beijing has the highest hourly minimum wage (RMB 26.4/US$3.7 per hour)
Glad you learned something!
They actually have a problem with workers or the lack of them and they have invested heavily in robotics. They aren’t the China of the 70s and 90s. It’s really something that we need to face up to if we want to compete but our political class isn’t really ready for that sort of reality. Years behind because of smugness.
We can’t compete with a country that pays their workers $1/hr without doing the same.
Brazil shuts BYD factory site over ‘slavery’ conditions
From 2016 and still true today:
Chinese Government Subsidies Play Major Part In Electric Car Maker BYD’s Rise
Yeah, subsidies and other benefits from governments exist but China is going all in.
My only point of confusion is that a 20k loss on every car is insane. I’m guessing its a bit of BYD is subsidised somewhat, and everyone else is price gouging somewhat. No idea the ratio.
Also odd that other Chinese brands (really only tried MG) dont seem to have the same high quality, high pricing that suggests the same level of crazy subsidies.
Honestly, there is just so much fuckery going I just have no idea what is what.
Rivian is losing about $30k per vehicle, but with much lower production numbers.
Thats crazy. Are those public numbers from rivian?
Rivian’s financial statements provide insight into its per-unit losses, though calculating an exact figure requires analyzing multiple variables. The company’s cost of goods sold (COGS), which includes direct production expenses, regularly exceeds revenue, leading to negative gross margins. According to its latest SEC filings, Rivian reported a gross loss per vehicle of approximately $39,000 in 2023, though this figure fluctuates based on production volume and operational efficiencies.
Not exactly a number they put in a press release, but as a publicly traded company it is published quarterly.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ttu55nEtC6o - How BYD overtook Tesla?
China subsidises industries it wants to dominate in, allowing them to sell for less than cost. It’s why the EU also tariffs Chinese cars.
Also for anything the big 3 make in the US, I believe they use union labor? Not sure if they did for Aussie market cars.
The same thing happened in the 80s with Japan. The Japanese were no longer making crappy cars but small and very reliable, affordable cars. Detroit was still making rust buckets, obsessing over powerful engines with bodies that rotted out and defects galore. Detroit got beaten up badly (Chrysler had to get a gov bailout) until they cleaned up their act and improved their products. Protecting Detroit from competition would’ve just saddled US consumers with decades more of crappy, overpriced, low quality, cars.
https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/how-detroits-automakers-went-from-kings-of-the-road-to-roadkill/
We still don’t let in the small pickups the rest of the world enjoys.
defects galore
A friend of mine from high school attended the GM Institute and became an engineer for them. One of his first projects was on a team that bought a Lexus and an Infiniti when they first came on the market and took them apart to see how many production defects they had. He said a typical American car at the time (and this was in the '90s after quality had rebounded somewhat from its disastrous nadir) had 300-400 defects. The Infiniti they took apart had 2. The Lexus had 0.
I would kill for a small electric truck… Telo is calling my name, but they don’t have a functioning product yet.
Right there with you on small trucks, the kid and I have been drooling over the Slate even if it is Bezos. I drive a '98 Ranger, and we’ve been kicking around the idea of a Ranger electric conversion.
Did Japan back then pay their assembly line workers the equivalent of $5k USD/year (in today’s dollars) and have nearly no worker protections? Not a rhetorical question; I just don’t know. Seems like Japan had a better standard of living back then compared to Chinese workers now, so I would guess their workers were compensated and treated better.
Not defending US auto corps (or any corp for that matter). The regulatory capture in the US is insane, and workers aren’t treated as well as most of the rest of the first world.
Japan used state capitalism to promote it’s auto industry and other key sectors to sustain strong growth. America’s weakened billionaire owned government system is just being strip mined into the ground. We won’t be able to compete in an economy that’s only product is wealth extraction because of our massive corruption.
Back then American industries were just complacent due to insufficient competition, and Japan’s industrial development was a bit of a miracle (that “living in year 2000 since 1980s” joke).
Japan back then had (and still has) an interesting socioeconomic system, a bit similar to samurai clans went cartels, where workers are supposed to work all their life in one place (or close to that), don’t squeal about worker rights and such, but be covered by lots of company-provided social nets and guarantees.
5K/year isn’t exactly poverty when rent is <200, phone data is 20, and you can get pic for 1.50 USD. I too would like them to be treated better, but I dont know if their overall situation is worse than the average american worker making 50K, but spending 24K on rent, 12K on car payments, and 16USD if they eat out.
Protecting Detroit from competition would’ve just saddled US consumers with decades more of crappy, overpriced, low quality, cars.
And it did. Japanese companies maintained a solid portion of the market in the US, a notable lead in quality, and many consumers no longer willing to waste money on crappy overpriced low quality cars from American companies. American cars were forced to get better and they’re better off for it, but they resisted the entire time, just like today.
Maybe GM could, I don’t know, innovate?
They have some wonderful new finamcial products released just this quarter!
As an European living in Asia and can’t help but cringe at American cars. They’re so far behind. And it’s the car country. Japan has better cars and better rail. Embarassing.
Agreed. I’m American and think American manufacturers make the ugliest and worst cars. Outside of the Corvette, which remains the best spots car in it’s price range.
Targeted tariffs and protectionism can help a situation like this, combined with subsidies like the ones Trump cancelled, to give legacy manufacturers a temporary respite to retool and innovate. However backtracking on your transition, reverting to the tried and true short term profits is just hiding your head in the sand. GM will find itself increasingly marginalized and more years behind. You can’t hide behind trumps skirt forever
