The decision represents an abandonment of a longstanding goal that Tesla chief Elon Musk has often characterized as its primary mission: affordable electric cars for the masses. His first “master plan”, opens new tab for the company in 2006 called for manufacturing luxury models first, then using the profits to finance a “low cost family car.”
Tesla shares were down about 3% in early afternoon trading after the Reuters report.
Musk has since repeatedly promised such a vehicle to investors and consumers. As recently as January, Musk told investors that Tesla planned to start production of the affordable model at its Texas factory in the second half of 2025, following an exclusive Reuters report detailing those plans.
What do Chinese EVs have to do with the American market?
BYD (Chinese company) is building an auto plant in Mexico specifically so they can sell in the North American market. Their EVs are actually pretty decent and sold like hotcakes in SEA and home markets. They’re set to produce and sell locally in Europe, Africa, SA and NA now. Their cars are targetting the sub-$20k-$24k market. Overseas their cars sell for the equivalent of $14k-$19k
Does this mean BYD will be able to sell Mexican produced cars in America?
I’d honestly be surprised if they didn’t update the laws to prevent Chinese competition no matter what the companies do. They’ve done it for the auto industry in the past, to countries they’re not hostile towards, and they’ve done it to Chinese companies in other industries with substantial lobbying dollars, notably phones, IT infra, social media, and weapon manufacture.
There is Mexican competition too in this sector. They’re building their own national brand of EV and are gunning to beat BYD to the market.
And despite the Lemmy/Reddit circle jerk that “EVs are bad”, BYD pass the notoriously strict Australian safety standards and sell well here. The BYD Seal seems to be everywhere of late
The theory is that if they were able to be sold here at a reasonable price while meeting our much stricter safety standards, it would create competition and this apply downward pressure on prices.
So Biden blocked Chinese EV from entering the American market in order to keep automaker CEOs wealthy af? I feel like this is a silly question to bring up, but why is it that a car can be built in China, shipped to the other side of the planet, eat the cost of tariffs, and it’s still either so good or so cheap that it is dangerous competition to American automakers? It kinda feels like we only encourage free market capitalism until old money gets challenged by innovation. It’s frustrating. We want boring, basic sedans with limited features with EV tech slapped inside instead of ICE tech, and we want to pay under $25k for it. I’m all for phasing out ICE vehicles, but every EV is a luxury vehicle at a time when half the country is living paycheck to paycheck. We need uncool, cheap EVs to replace uncool, cheap gasoline cars. We need a Prius or Yaris of EVs. We need Civic and Accord EVs. Taurus, Impala, Neon, Escort, etc. Average Americans don’t want and cannot afford a goddamn EV Escalade or whatever.
The Nissan Leaf is pretty decent. Grab a used one and it’s quite cheap.
I just checked and even new, base model ones are right around the price point I said. I’ll keep an eye on Nissan. I have heard good things about Kia/Hyundai EVs too but I haven’t done much research. I’m hoping to not need a new vehicle for a long while, so I’m not particularly motivated to dig deep yet.
As a civic owner. Yes please, give me an electric civic. I drove a Benz previously and they’re a pain in the ass and expensive when anything goes wrong with them, and trust me, it will.