Me too, they look cute and friendly. Unlike most new cars.

Fair enough

Wait, the looks of the micro car, or the PT Cruiser? I’m afraid we’ll have to have an argument if you meant the PT Cruiser.

I have a soft spot for that thing. It’s so ugly that it’s charming

I knew someone was eventually gonna name that monster; I didn’t know that people ouside of italy where aware of it. You know what’s the worst part? It’s actually very reliable, and drives decently; it’s just as ugly as the plague.

My parents had one when I was a kid, the second version was not to ugly and the interior was crazy comfortable for a family car.

It had 3 full front seat and 3 full seat in the back too.

Very few people in the US would buy this car. We can look at how unpopular EVs were until Tesla made them “cool.”

Like or not, outside of car and anti-car communities, most people only want what’s trendy and these aren’t trendy. I appreciate that people in this community like the car, but we’re not exactly a majority in the US, and I live in the US so that’s the market I care about

You’d have a much easier time funding mass transit here than getting the average American into one of these.

Yeah $10k can get a used Lexus in good shape. These things are just nowhere near cheap enough to not be able to carry groceries and kids. It’s the reason I never bought a smart car. $30k was just way too high for what it could do.

Be better off investing in mass transit, like you said

Them suggesting renting cars is also not super viable in most places. It takes at least thirty minutes to fill out the paper work and I don’t know anyone willing to do that for their weekly grocery trip

It is really cheap to have stuff delivered to your doorstep, by the way. You often don’t need to rent a big vehicle, what you need is to get something brought to your home.

Public transport just really is shit here. I’m sorry, it is. It sucks and everyone knows it. It’s used by underage pupils, poors and disabled people. Company is called DeLijn, you can look it up if you want to. It’s dirt cheap to use it, yet still very few people use it. It’s way too unreliable. Busses don’t show up unreliable.

I’m talking to you that micro cars are too expensive compared to old station wagons and you jump to “big luxury cars are expensive”? Yeah no shit, Porsche drivers are for sure the general population and what micro cars are aimed at lmao. It is the financial reason for people with normal incomes: Nobody pays 10k for a glorified scooter with a roof.

There are extensive subsidy regulations in place here, for example “salariswagen” with which employers can almost taxfree pay employees with a car in stead of money. This enforces an already strong way in which the “top of the new market” trickles down to the second hand market in 5-10 years. The cayenne is just to point out that this is not a poor region. Many people are wealthy enough for 8000 € to not be a very big spend. The government does subsidize other large SUV-like vehicle through this salary-car scheme. That trickles down very much. After 3 to 5 years of leasing the cars get second hand sold for still a decent price. 5 years later again. Another sale further down the road, it’s the station car you’ld currently rather buy than the microcar. The vehicles the government chooses to subsidize are a big influence in what will be available here in the second hand market in 10 years time from now. So yes, subsidizing small efficient cars over big SUV-style vehicles does make ecological sense.