Car Dealers Complain To DMV About Tesla's Website 364
cartechboy writes "State and national car dealer groups have been battling Tesla Motors for years, trying to stop them from selling its electric cars directly to buyers. Most of the time, the dealers work behind the scenes to change state laws and and force Tesla to conduct its sales through 'independently-owned third parties' which are... well, car dealers. But in California, Tesla's operations are legal, so that tactic won't work. So dealers there are taking an interesting new tack — complaining to the DMV about Tesla's website."
Sour Grapes (Score:5, Insightful)
The dealers have a few good points, but EVERYONE knows this is just sour grapes because the dealerships can't fleece potential buyers out of some more money off the top.
Fucking scum.
Re:Sour Grapes (Score:5, Insightful)
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Indeed.
This is yet another dead business model which is not willing to admit it's time is past.
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Just last week a co-worker used their website tool to figure out his monthly payment. Pretty standard stuff that most car websites provide. What Tesla didn't do was make it obvious that they were subtracting the estimated fuel cost from the amount. It was dishonest.
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Re:Sour Grapes (Score:4, Informative)
kWh is not an SI unit.
While h is not technically SI, it is officially sanctioned for use as a multiplier with SI. So saying that kWh is not SI is more of a half truth.
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Re:Sour Grapes (Score:5, Interesting)
Forcing someone to use a middle man by law is pants-on-head retarded. If your model can't compete you're going to lose. This sounds an awful lot like RIAA/MPAA crap.
It's not like tesla is going to impact their bottom line heavily - hybrids and electrics are disliked by a lot of people. Not to mention most people don't have that kind of money to drop on a car.
This is just ridiculous. I hate people that bitch about "the corporations" at every possible chance, but this is almost certainly a result of our corporate overlords.
So these dealers are entitled BY LAW to make money off someone's product? And you wonder why conservatives bitch about market regulation (even if they do hypocritically regulate the market anyways) well here's why. Regulation is good, but this isn't regulation this is bribery of our elected officials.
I would give so much to be able to catch these corrupt fucks in the act of accepting a bribe.
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Battery costs will likely go down significantly in the future, although electricity costs will likely go up at least slightly.
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Points are smoke and mirrors in this article. Dealers want to sell an electric car, superior to the garbage put out by mainstream mfg. That is ALL that this article is about. You just need to be able to translate Lying Shit Car Dealer language into proper English. More crap going on in this article than a presidential election campaign.
Re:Missing Point (Score:5, Informative)
the fuel costs must include the battery wear cost
That would fall under normal wear and tear, not fuel costs. And before you argue that battery is a costly component that gasoline cars lack: it is more than offset by much simplier car design with fewer moving parts. In fact, what I heard was that the dealers do not want Tesla's business because they would lose out on those fat maintenance cash flows.
Re:Missing Point (Score:5, Interesting)
Bingo. You've hit the nail on the head. Dealerships make most their money in repairs, not in selling cars. Over the life of a car, the 5-20% profit they make on the sale is a small fraction of what they can make on repairs and maintenance.
If Telsa has the audacity to create a product that requires significantly less repairs, it puts dealerships at a competitive disadvantage, which is exactly where they should be in a truly free and open market.
Many in the fossil fuels business like to downplay the savings gained from small fuel costs for battery technology, but they don't want to address the larger costs associated with maintenance issues inherent in internal combustion technology because they know it makes electric car technology even more attractive financially.
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Re:Missing Point (Score:5, Informative)
As an owner of a Tesla, I must correct you. Maintenance costs are FAR lower than in my old BMW. I've driven it for almost a year now, and spent 10x overall than I did with a BMW or Mercedes. Do you forget that gas powered luxury cars have all those same features that require just as much (if not more) maintenance than an electric luxury car does? And no more $5-6 a gallon premium gasoline! The savings are astronomical. I know this from experience.
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I'm interested in what sort of maintenance requirements you expect from any car in its first few years?
All new cars I have owned (in the UK) have had precisely no mantenance requirements in the first four or five years other than additional oil, coolant (just water) etc. I use the annual service as a health check, but nothing has ever been required.
The British motoring authorities even recognise this as they do to require a certificate of roadworthyness for the first three years of a cars life.
Re:Missing Point (Score:4, Insightful)
Same here in Finland. My last two cars (VW, Audi) did not even require routine service until they hit 30,000 km (19k mi). With my daily commute that's about 2 years. In between, just top off fluids, if needed. The routine service is little more than a simple oil change, checking the brakes, tires, etc.
I completely support Tesla's idea of selling direct, even if I'm not an owner (yet). I hope that they someday find a solution for batteries in Nordic climes, so it's a viable car here as well. After all, we already use the grid to keep our cars warm and start-able in the winter.
I find it appalling that some states, including my own home state, are using legal means to try and block Tesla from entering the market. Whatever happened to the so-called free market in the US? This sounds decidedly less free market.
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Dealerships definitely do tires. Whenever I take one of our vehicles in for the regular maintance they let us know what the tread depth is like and push us to get new tires through them when they get worn.
Steering I half agree with you since I only ever have the alignment checked when the tires seem to be wearing funny or the car doesn't drive straight on it's own. In the last decade and a half the only cars I had which needed an alignment were in pretty bad shape. And I'm not really sure how people mess up
Re:Missing Point (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Missing Point (Score:4, Informative)
Quite simply, a Tesla (or any all electric car) has significantly less moving parts. Faults will occur, but susbstantially less often than with an ICE. Some of those faults though will require very specialist knowledge to fix though.
The Wankel rotary engine also had significantly fewer moving parts than a standard internal combustion engine, but a Mazda RX-7 was just as costly to maintain as any other car. Why? Because, it's not the moving parts in the engine that cause most of the maintenance costs, it's all the rest of them, like suspension, steering, brakes, air compressors, and the like.
So, you will need to get your oil changed less often, like not at all versus once a year, so you save $19.95 at the dealer, but all the other regular maintenance stuff is still there and then some since the Tesla is a specialized vehicle, one can expect it's parts and labor to be more costly. And unlike a regular automobile, you have to also maintain the charging/battery system, the dynamic braking, and a several other components that only an electric car will have.
Arguing that an electric car will save because of maintenance is probably not a valid argument. Arguing on fuel costs, possibly. But in reality, the argument should be on the total cost of ownership over say, 100,000 or 200,000 miles. The reason you don't see TCO figures for electric cars in those ranges is that the battery packs need to be replaced before then and when you figure in that cost, the savings disappear.
So, if you have an electric car and plan on keeping it, all the money you save on fuel, you should set aside to replace the battery pack when that time comes. Of course, you could just trade it in before then, but if the battery pack is shot, well, so will be the trade in value.
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All EVs will require most of the above (but remember, the only air compressor is on the a/c). There is no clutch and no conventional auto-transmission. Braking though is partly friction but is also electric (regenerative), this should lengthen the life considerably.
I know what you are getting at but internal combustion engines certainly do need addit
Re:Missing Point (Score:5, Informative)
Elon Musk stated that his goal is for Tesla to not make a profit out of service. My experience when I broke something on my car (so it wasn't handled by warranty) was that their repair cost was a fraction of what the local Toyota dealership would have charged me to make a similar repair.
There really is a lot less to go wrong.
No oil and filter changes. No spark plugs. The coolant should last a lot longer. No belts to replace. No fuel pumps to die, exhaust leaks or oil leaks to deal with. No gaskets to be replaced or leak. No smog and related components like catalytic converters to deal with. No transmission fluid to change or clutches to wear out. The brake pads should last a lot longer since most braking is regenerative. The car is very well engineered. They did not cut corners to reduce costs in terms of suspension and drive train. According to a friend of mine who works there (an engineer on the drive train) they significantly over engineered things since they had to get it right the first time.
While I have had some things fixed under service, those things typically fall under creaks and rattles which are understandable given that my car has a VIN a little over 5000. They've addressed most if not all of the issues in later VIN numbers.
A gasoline engine has far more mechanical parts and things to go wrong, a lot more pumps and hoses, parts rubbing against each other, etc.
As for the battery, from my research the cells should be good for at least 3000 full charge discharge cycles. If I'm extremely conservative in estimating 200 miles of range per charge (I get significantly more) that works out to 600,000 miles.
There are some things that may wear out faster, such as the pop-out door handles (the early versions had problems). The electric motor, as opposed to an internal combustion engine, has no friction points other than the bearings, and it has a lot less than a gasoline engine.
One of the issues I had was the 12V battery dying. They got a bad batch of lead acid batteries and I ended up with one of them. They called me up when they detected the problem in the logs to schedule its replacement.
As for software issues, they regularly update it to fix bugs and add new features. They do this over the air and allow me to choose if and when to install an update.
not just charge cycles (Score:3)
Charge cycles are not a lithium ion batteries worst problem. Rather it is age. They lose 20% of their capacity every year in ideal temperatures. In Phoenix the nissan leaf was losing upwards of 50% of its capacity (read range) in the first year due to the heat. Also I wish the batteries weren't so heavy, I like tiny light cars, and the tesla roadster's battery pack was 450kg, the only reason they got the weight down to 2700lbs was all the carbon fiber. ICE + fuel tank still weighs less than electric mot
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Reality disagrees with your 20% claim. There are more than enough Tesla cars on the road to provide real world evidence of battery longevity despite what some naysayers keep preaching.
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The Leaf is an example of how not to do batteries. The Leaf does not have proper cooling of the battery pack. Tesla has much better battery management with active cooling as well as they use a different chemistry. The energy density of Tesla's batteries is also much higher than the Leaf.
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> They lose 20% of their capacity every year in ideal temperatures. In Phoenix the nissan leaf was losing upwards of 50% of its capacity (read range) in the first year due to the heat
Yea, that's because Nissan was a little dopey and decided to put an air-cooled battery in first-generation Leafs (supposedly they are moving to a liquid cooling system in the next revision). Tesla uses a liquid cooling system for the battery for a reason, you know...
Any your numbers are off, by the way. A survey of Roads
Re:Missing Point (Score:4, Interesting)
Years ago, I remember reading in my Time-Life books, which were an amazing series that I re-bought for my own kids, about how cars were manufactured.
There was a Time-Life book on almost every topic of the modern world. This one talked about how early transport was done, and when they talked about cars they SPECIFICALLY mentioned how engineers would put the car on a machine to simulate use, and deliberately weaken parts that lasted longer than the "designed" life of the car.
There was no whispered conspiratorial tone to this; it was stated matter-of-factly in that matter-of-fact tone of voice you do not find in modern media. So, basically, it's not a myth or a conspiracy that our modern conveniences have been deliberately and intentionally made to fall apart at a certain rate in order to ensure profitability for the parts manufacturers.
Kudos to Elon Musk for his willingness to break this absurd paradigm.
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Re:Missing Point (Score:4, Interesting)
Tesla offers a plan where for $12,000 you will get a new battery pack after 8 years. For every additional year you wait they knock off $1000. In my case I took a good chunk of that and bought a bunch of Tesla stock at $35. It's hovering around $185/share right now.
The A/C should need a lot less maintenance since unlike mode ICE cars the compressor is electric and is completely sealed. Since no hoses are needed to go to an ICE that vibrates and moves, leaks should be less likely. There's no clutch to wear out either. As far as electrical systems, I have never had a problem with any of my cars, my last being a 2007 Prius, which has a lot of electrical systems. In some ways Tesla is simpler. It lacks many of the sensors an ICE car has, i.e. knock sensors, mass air flow sensors, throttle controls, oxygen sensors, oil pressure, fuel gauge, etc.
What sensors it does have tend to be temperature sensors, voltage and current sensors. The model S does have a number of valves and pumps for coolant since the cooling system is more complex, cooling the motor, inverter, charging units and battery as well as tying into the A/C system. It changes the flow depending on conditions and whether it's warming or cooling the battery and the climate control system. This is one of the main reasons the Model S does not suffer the problems the Leaf does. There have not been reports of any significant loss of range in hot climates and the cooling system was tested in Death Valley.
To help the battery last longer typically it is not charged to 100%. While it is possible it is not recommended to do it all the time. The only time I do a range charge is if I know I'm going on a long trip, otherwise I let it charge to 80%. Also unlike the Leaf, there are no issues doing rapid charges at the Superchargers. The Leaf's battery suffers when using the high output Chademo chargers.
Re:Missing Point (Score:5, Insightful)
While true if you factor in the cost of the wear on the battery per km driven then cost of an electric car's fuel is actually far higher than a petrol car.
Interesting point - but wouldn't that mean that petrol car dealers should be adding the costs of, "carburetor wear and tear; carburetor cleaning; air filter replacement; gas tank wear and tear; etc." to their fuel costs; all those costs that electric cars don't incur.
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Cars haven't had carburetors since 1990 when fuel injection became the standard. After that was just one or two models that still had it for another couple years, the very last being the Isuzu truck in 1994.
Re:Missing Point (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't change the oil in your car? You've never had to replace a belt? Do you just let your car sit in a garage all the time?
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It's not illegal to buy the car in Texas. It's illegal for Tesla to sell them directly. You have to buy one from Tesla in Arizona or California, have it delivered, and register it with the state on your own (something the dealership usually does). All in all, it's not really a hard thing to do. More of a pain in the ass than just going to the show room and buying one, of course... But in my mind, worth it to stick it to the car dealer scum.
Tesla also cannot do warranty service on the car directly. They must
Re:Sour Grapes (Score:4, Insightful)
As a Texan I am absolutely disguisted by this. So having a conservative state legislature is bad for a lot of reasons. However, supposedly one of the benefits is keeping the government out of things it has no business in. So what the living fuck happened.
Re:Sour Grapes (Score:5, Insightful)
As a Texan I am absolutely disguisted by this. So having a conservative state legislature is bad for a lot of reasons. However, supposedly one of the benefits is keeping the government out of things it has no business in. So what the living fuck happened.
To be a cynic:
The voters got exactly what they wanted: Private enterprises buying their own law with no government in sight to stop them. That's what privilege means in its pure form: Private Law.
After all, remember that a democracy needs at least three pillars to survive: A strong executive (government), a strong legislative (parliament) and a strong judicative (courts).
Weaken one of them, and you open up the chance for people to abuse the disproportional strength of the other two (or even one).
Strong executive/legislative with a weak judicative leads to a police state, where the due-process of law is abandonded.
Strong legislative/judicative with a weak executive leads to corporatism with a nice load of loophole abuse and unfair privileges -- which is what you see above.
Strong executive/judicative with a weak legislative leads to a static, reactionary state, where a small elite forms a wall against any change.
Do note that countries that lose yet another pillar are usually civil-war-torn dysfunctional messes or dictatorships of the worst calibre.
So, why do you want a weak executive again? Or, if you interpret "small government" to include both legislative and executive, why are you so crazy to want that?
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Well, you have to recognize that "conservatives" aren't anymore, they are con-artists. The "conservative" movement has been sabotaged by a pack of slimy con-men who are out to loot the public's treasure wherever they can get their hands on it. That is all they are about anymore, and the sooner people wake up to this, the better.
"Small government" is just small for the con-artists, whose scams are now being legalized so that the maximum number of people can be fleeced.
how amusing (Score:5, Insightful)
Telsa's claims might be misleading, but if you want a pathological lying sack of shit, look no further than your local car dealer.
Re:how amusing (Score:5, Insightful)
Tesla's claims ARE misleading.
They need to be clear about your out-of-pocket costs - your actual payment to Tesla's finance company.
ALSO, dealerships exist only to fuck customers out of useless middleman money by skimming off the top and providing overpriced service.
Re:how amusing (Score:5, Insightful)
Tesla's claims ARE misleading.
They need to be clear about your out-of-pocket costs - your actual payment to Tesla's finance company.
ALSO, dealerships exist only to fuck customers out of useless middleman money by skimming off the top and providing overpriced service.
If you actually buy the car, the payment is quite clear on the paperwork... But really, If someone buying a $70,000 car can't float the $7500 tax refund until next year when he gets it back from taxes, then he shouldn't be buying a $70,000 car.
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You may have stumbled onto why Tesla cars are so popular amongst the people who've bought them despite all the saber-rattling the dealerships are doing.
Re:Tax Credit? (Score:5, Informative)
The maximum tax credit is $7,500.00, but it adjusts on a sliding scale inversely proportional to your gross taxable earnings. In reality, anyone who can afford a $70,000.00 car will get a significantly smaller credit, like $1,500.00 or less.
This isn't true. The tax credit is a pure credit, no sliding scale based on income. It's not a refundable credit, meaning that if your net federal income tax liability is less than $7500 then you'll only get a credit equal to the amount of your liability, but that's unlikely to be a problem for anyone who is buying a $70K car.
There is a phase-out of the credit that begins to kick in once a manufacturer has sold at least 200,000 of the qualifying model, and the amount of the credit depends on vehicle battery capacity ($2500 for 5 kWh of capacity, plus $417 for each additional kWh, up to $7500), but the Tesla qualifies for the full amount, and Tesla hasn't yet sold 200K cars, so neither of those are an issue.
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so what happens if Tesla decides to cap each models production to 199,999 vehicals, then just comes out with a slightly different model? It's a reality with a small car company
I re-checked the IRS site and I was mistaken. It's not 200,000 per model, it's 200,000 qualifying vehicles per manufacturer. So they'd actually have to spin up a new company.
Re:how amusing (Score:5, Insightful)
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But then again, most makers that sell both direct and thru distributers/wholesalers/dealers will typically price their in-house sales to the public at full retail price (hey, lets call that the MSRP!) and heavily discount to the distributers/wholesalers/dealers, which lets the second tier dealer charge the same or less and still make $.
Re:how amusing (Score:4, Informative)
...dealerships exist only to fuck customers out of useless middleman money by skimming off the top and providing overpriced service.
I believe the term for this is, PIMP
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Re:how amusing (Score:5, Informative)
My first new car was Saturn, with the no-haggle price up front. So when I bought it and ended up at the finance guy I told him I was paying in cash, and the sparkle left his eyes so fast I thought the lights had gone out. Nothing like being forced to do some paperwork without getting a commission to ruin a dealer's day.
Re:how amusing (Score:4, Insightful)
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But at least their EPA estimates are right. (Score:3, Insightful)
After 30 years of automakers blatantly providing theoretical and incredibly optimistic EPA estimates for gas mileage, you'd think that dealers would be willing to give a little on another car maker fudging some other numbers on their site.
Re:But at least their EPA estimates are right. (Score:4, Insightful)
Dealerships aren't entirely parasitic. That is an overstatement of reality. There is a benefit to having a local dealership to go to when things go wrong as they always do. Murphy makes sure of that.
I really don't see the route to complaining to the DMV is going to do dealerships much good as the effort only serves to widen awareness of the economic issues involved and these are trending toward Tesla's favor. If dealers are really concerned about Tesla, they would do better to insist that the car manufacturers they buy from have a better electric car than does Tesla. Once battery swap stations become more widely available for Tesla's new 400 mile per charge battery, they better have some other alternatives or they are going to quickly start to loose business quickly. Dealerships that branch out to provide battery swaps may well be those that survive, because the 2-4000 dollars per year you can save if you don't have to buy gas is a big incentive over the life of a car becomes increasingly attractive to those with slimmer wallets, especially if lower overall maintenance costs go with it.
If you cant beat em... (Score:2)
bitch about it.
let's all shed a tear for car dealers (Score:5, Insightful)
there's a reason why they call it disruptive technology, scumbags
we don't need you
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Hey, car dealers!!!
I've got a buggy whip business I'm willing to franchise out to you!!!
no problem (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure car dealers will have no troubles rallying massive grassroots support to put a stop to this menace to a cherished American institution.
Re:no problem (Score:5, Insightful)
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If not directly, they will try it indirectly like associating Tesla with political movements that make them sound socialist or otherwise un-american...
Didn't Al Gore invent the electric car? Isn't that all you need to know?
But seriously, this is clearly "sour grapes". Can there really be any reasonable reason why a consumer products company should not sell their product to anyone who wants to buy it?
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what's the point of a car dealer anyhow. i'd rather buy directly from the manufacturer.
Re:no problem (Score:4, Insightful)
The manufacturers generally don’t want the hassle of owning and managing a nation-wide network of storefronts. As with any large retail franchise, having independent dealers provides them with a buffer of sorts: If the manufacturer’s much-hyped new model turns out to be a lemon, it’s the dealers who are stuck with the inventory. If a dealership goes out of business for whatever reason, it’s no skin off the company’s teeth.
Dealerships exist for the convenience of the manufacturers, not the customers.
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If the dealers are a convenience for the manufacturers then would not Tesla also take advantage of this? I understand your point but if private dealers are such a benefit then Tesla would not bother with direct sales.
I believe that economies of scale come into play here, for very large auto makers independent dealers are advantageous. For small auto makers direct sales are advantageous. Should Tesla do well and sell many more cars there may come a time where direct sales do not grant them an advantage.
Re:no problem (Score:5, Informative)
Dealers dont get stuck with anything. The cars on the dealer lot are not paid for. If the dealer goes out of business the manufacterer eats it all. The cars are financed to the dealer through a credit agency owned by the manufacterer on a no money down, no interest, net 45 day till sale arrangement.
Free Enterprise! (Score:5, Insightful)
Ain't free enterprise great in America? You can do anything, as long as you cut the vested interests in for a piece of the action. Thankfully though we're not a bunch of economically ignorant Neanderthals that would do something stupid like put a nickel tariff on a pair of socks. That would be interfering in commerce!
Re:Free Enterprise! (Score:5, Informative)
I think the reason we don't do heavy tariffs anymore is because it's already known that they only serve to damage the local economy. Sure you might save the sock salesman's job, but it'll have a much greater cost elsewhere in the economy that isn't immediately obvious.
Say we put that nickel tariff on socks, does that make Canada (or any country for that matter) find our socks more attractive than China's? Nope, in fact they're now less attractive because they cost more here. In Canada the sock prices will go down, but ours will be more likely to remain higher (That's the whole point right? Otherwise why bother with this tariff?) Everybody needs socks though, so we all pay more for socks here than Canada might pay (because they don't have said tariff.) Since Canada now pays less for socks, they also now have more money to spend on other things than we do. So in the end, we've crippled our own economy relative to theirs by sticking that tariff on there.
Historically this holds true - imports and domestic production rise and fall with one another. If you add that tariff to slow those imports, you're guaranteed to not only reduce exports, but you're also going to kill local jobs.
Go have a look at the effect of the Smoot-Hawley tariff act. That was the cause of the great depression. It is the ultimate lesson to be learned about tariffs and why mercantilism is flat out wrong on so many levels.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQQon4tjlSA [youtube.com]
Personally I think we should get rid of all tariffs. Corporations love tariffs by the way - and so do unions. They want tariffs so that they can protect themselves against competition and raise prices instead of competing proper. They do this at the expense of somebody else's job somewhere else, not really giving a fuck about them.
Re:Free Enterprise! (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, but such a complex historical event can not be simplified to a single 'cause'. Then again, your entire argument reeks of simplification. A good tax strategy requires careful balancing of multiple types since they ALL have consequences. Tarrifs benefit some segments and hurt others, same with personal income, sales, property, license, and pretty much any other tax type. All of them try to take a cut of economic movement, but if you cut too deeply into one type or another it just moves elsewhere or breaks down.
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Of course it benefits some segments, I don't think anybody will argue against that one.
Just it benefits them at an even bigger cost to somebody else, which is a rather dick move. I often get accused of being a cold hearted libertarian, yet the people who make those accusations seem to think that having the government protect your job while kicking somebody else to the curb is such a nice benevolent thing to do.
It's not just jobs that this impacts though. I mean the sugar sellers love not having to compete,
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You helped prove my point. The whole issue of unnecessary rent seeking middle men like car dealerships, and how they get their cozy little businesses locked in by law, passes you by without comment. Meanwhile, a nickel tariff on socks merits a treatise on the wonders of "free trade". Hint 1: a nickel on a pair of socks ain't Smoot-Hawley. Hint 2: the political lock-in of car dealerships costs you a lot more than a nickel on a pair of imported socks would. That was kinda my point.
I have a Tesla S (Score:5, Informative)
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Let me begin by saying I Hate You. Don't worry, it's entirely due to jealousy. If you had the roadster, I'd probably be coming after you with a knife. :^D
That said, I'm somewhat curious what happens when you have mechanical problems with your car? I'm not defending the dealer network but are there "Tesla Certified" car-repair places? It's kind of pricey to ship it back to Fremont. I'm sure there's a way to deal with it--I'm just curious what it is.
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Air pollution and the relative lack thereof, duh.
Re:You're welcome... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:You're welcome... (Score:5, Insightful)
If they were doing everything right then why the need for the tax credit?
It's a mere pittance compared to the decades-old infrastructure that a fossil-fuel powered car gets for "free" because we essentially subsidize the entire petroleum fuel supply chain at a federal level [1] to the tune of $10s of billions of dollars. Yes, that's for mega-corporations who are making record profits every quarter [2].
So 200k models qualify for the credit at $7500 a piece. That's a neat $1.5M for each car manufacturer - how does that compare to the $Billions in yearly subsidies that the petro infrastructure gets that's passed on to each gas/diesel guzzling car/truck on the road?
Quit whining about the tiny tax credit. Instead start complaining about how the big three auto manufacturers and Big oil are bending us over a barrel.
[1] http://priceofoil.org/fossil-fuel-subsidies/ [priceofoil.org]
[2] http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=5503955&page=1 [go.com]
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If they were doing everything right then why the need for the tax credit?
The tax credit is necessary because every single one of the other EV manufacturers out there is completely incapable of building a compelling EV that people actually want to buy, so they need to be bribed into buying it. Tesla gets to have its cake and eat it too by both building a car people actually want and simultaneously cashing in on the incompetence of its competition by partaking of the tax credit.
Ford Vs Musk (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Ford Vs Musk (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Ford Vs Musk (Score:5, Informative)
Not to troll, but i wonder what would happen in the "IP" era of the US economy? If Ford tried this today would he still win or would the "patent holders"?
Only people unfamiliar with history would call today the IP era. The period from the late 1800's through the early 1900's had vastly more corporate, patent, IP and such shenanigans going on. Today is almost comically tame compared to then.
Oh, the paragons of virtue! (Score:3)
It recently blasted Tesla Motors [NSDQ:TSLA] by accusing it of deceptive marketing and pricing practices in the information it shows on its website.
The "It" in this quote is the auto dealers, a very well known group to be the paragons of virtue and personification of integrity when it comes to selling automobiles and providing accurate information.
And of course we *ALL* know how misleading... (Score:2)
I'd call it even, personally.
You know it's the future... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I guess we're past the ignoring and laughing phases.
Re: (Score:2)
Dealers Have Much Worse Ads! (Score:5, Interesting)
From the fine article:
Tesla fails to provide required information and shatters the notion of comparison finance shopping by including the potential availability of incentives, gas savings, and tax savings into final payment quotes for prospective customers.
So the beef is that Tesla isn't being clear about everything and that upsets the dealers. hmm..
In my local paper, the dealers have ads in every Sunday that advertise a low price. As it was a few weeks ago, I was looking to buy a minivan for the family (I'm not completely domesticate, I still have my convertible). Great price of $22k for a Town and Country...pretty amazing actually. Way at the bottom of the ad were the caveats--includes first car buyer discount, veteran discount, bonus trade-in amount, etc.
Looking at the discounts there was no way you could be eligible for all of them at the same time. In my case, none of them. Yeah, those Tesla guys are devious and misleading.
Re:Dealers Have Much Worse Ads! (Score:5, Funny)
How could you get both a first car buyer discount AND a trade-in bonus?
Simple: trade in a car that you didn't buy. I believe GTA5 can provide you with a tutorial for procuring such a vehicle.
Those poor car dealers (Score:5, Funny)
Just trying to make an honest livi---
wait
Re: (Score:2)
Well, if you call that living...
CNCDA - Pure as Driven Snow (Score:5, Informative)
It is really shameful that Tesla is misleading customers with deceptive advertising about its electric cars. Here is a part of the complaint:
"... the Association says that purchase prices on Tesla's website routinely include a $7,500 federal TAX CREDIT, despite the fact that the Congressional Budget Office states that only 20 percent of shoppers qualify for the alternative vehicle credit."
None of the members of the California New Car Dealer's Association would ever stoop so low. Especially GENERAL MOTORS dealers. Especially since, according to this report: http://cncda.org/resources/10-20-08_CNCDA_Ltr-GMAC_CEO_Alvaro_deMolina.pdf [cncda.org] GENERAL MOTORS dealers represent over 25% of CDCDA's members. Surely none of them would ...
Oh wait.
http://www.chevrolet.com/volt-electric-car.html [chevrolet.com]
"Chevrolet 2014 Volt"
"Net price shown includes the FULL $7,500 TAX CREDIT"
Never mind, move along, nothing to see.
Re: (Score:2)
When the system is to try and make as much money as possible, how many Fair-Handed Champions of Equality and Justice do you expect? Of course people are only going to complain about the competition. The point is that the competition will do the same. If competition is too brittle to function in this padded jungle gym, then an entire free market would be a complete non-starter.
btw, the chevy site gives only a pricing guideline since they're not selling the vehicle; the dealer is. Tesla is the actual dealer.
Ah, yes. (Score:2)
Remember this next time some businessman says he shouldn't be regulated because competition will sort everything out.
Car dealers in the same bunch (Score:3)
Dear US car dealerships... (Score:5, Insightful)
But now? Congratulations, the internet has made you nothing more than the place I go to test drive your products before I let the nearest 50 of you bid against each other for my next buy (and don't think I won't buy from the other side of the country if someone there has a good enough sale going on to cover the cost of shipping the damned thing to me).
You had a good run. Congratulations. Now cash out before you run out of cash. Simple as that.
Please, go down gracefully. Don't let this turn into yet another "when you can't compete, legislate" disaster. That just never goes well for the "legacy" side of the battle.
Rent seeking (Score:3)
Of course, we'll get a bunch of comments on how this proves that business men are hypocrites because they are against regulation accept where it benefits them and how stupid the libertarians are.
But this is precisely the libertarian argument - if government becomes (overly) involved in business, rent seeking behavior is the natural result. Capitalism is a cruel mistress and businesses routinely fail, so they look for any edge they can get.
In a lightly regulated market with low barriers to entry, they have to compete on service, price, convenience, etc. In a more heavily regulated market, first movers and existing and heavily capitalized businesses look to create new barriers to entry to prevent competition and create artificial scarcity to keep prices high. This can be via licensing (taxis and beauticians), regulations that have high fixed costs but low per unit/worker costs, monopoly/captive markets like dealerships and liquor distribution, and other regulatory structures that that favor fewer, larger firms to more, smaller firms.
Ironically, the dealership structure began as a true capitalist trade-off - dealership networks allowed automobile companies to become large, centralized and efficient by helping to limit their capital costs - as inventory was created, it was immediately purchased and distributed across the country to local sources of capital. Car manufacturers got less money per vehicle but could concentrate their capital on plants, raw goods, workforces, etc. That dealership network absorbed a huge amount of the capital costs of the vehicles themselves. Once a lot of the manufacturers' fixed costs were paid off, the dealers saw the writing on the wall and used their local political connections to modify state laws everywhere to fix the existing model in place.
Playing devil's advocate for one minute, the summary is misleading when it says dealers are "working behind the scenes to change state laws". In fact, they are working in the open to preserve the existing state laws - Tesla was the company attempting to have various laws changed to their benefit (in the Texas case, to their sole benefit as it was very narrowly written). That said, I would prefer a more broadly written version of the "Tesla law" to prevail.
Re:Rent seeking (Score:4, Interesting)
VP of Marketing (Score:5, Interesting)
So wherever that guy is I am pretty sure he is cheering Tesla on. Plus based on what he said, I suspect the other manufacturers are watching and hoping but keeping quiet about it.
Complaints about deceptive costs? (Score:3)
WTF? Dealers complaining that Tesla may be deceiving customers about the true cost of their cars? Have they tried to purchase a car at their own dealerships?
You're lucky you can get close to knowing what the final price will be before you start to waste hours in the salesperson "office" wondering why after all these decades they still perform the "Wizard of Oz" maneuver of having to ask the boss for a better price...
Lets hope Musk doesn't get framed a for drug deal (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)