Everything about cars is a scam. Buying, insurance, and infrastructure. If you live somewhere where you have to drive, you are a captive audience. We need other methods of transportation to compete with cars to reduce overall transportation costs.
We also need to reduce the need for transportation. There’s no need for traveling to work for many white-collar jobs, except for propping up highly toxic industries such as commercial real estate, restaurants, oil, and of course car sales and manufacturing.
Maybe we should just reduce the need for white-collar jobs? Since we don't exist in the Metaverse yet, most things that we actually "need" are performed by blue-collar people and almost always involve transporting atoms around.
> propping up highly toxic industries such as commercial real estate, restaurants, oil, and of course car sales and manufacturing
This reminds me of the assertion that inflation is below 2% now, if we exclude food, energy, shelter, and used cars[0]. Life is great, if we don't meet in person to do work, break bread together, and get ourselves around to provide goods and services?
What's left, if you remove the "highly toxic" industries?
Counterpoint: A modern-era, used, non-luxury, vehicle is an amazing value for a precision-engineered product with astounding utility. There are a lot of places in the US you can get to by car, but not by public transit.
it's a good counterpoint. but basically we're saying the car is a good bandaid for the foolishness of city planning (spacing things way too far apart, having the stores be min of 2 miles from most houses, placing disproportionate office space to housing ratio, nearest library like 4 miles away and yet its the size of an amusement park).
Over the last few years used cars have been selling at basically the same price as new (sometimes even more). It is no longer a big money saver to buy used, especially when you factor in increased maintenance/repair costs.
Definitely. Not many deals to be had anymore. A lot of this is due to short supply (supply chain issues with chips, strikes, etc.), but some of it is also due to cars being so much more reliable now (and therefor more valuable even when used).
The problem is that people cannot afford to live in city centers. Especially those with families.
You would think corporations would finally place their offices in more liveable areas but for some reason they feel the need to build in city centers, and inconvenience their employees.
"If you live somewhere where you have to drive, you are a captive audience"
I don't think you appreciate just how incredibly massive this country is. I have to drive 15 miles to work everyday. If I couldn't drive, I would literally just starve and die (or, I suppose start working as a local farmhand).
It's funny, I feel the same way about people who live in small areas and don't have the ability to independently go anywhere they want at any time without having to rely on someone else. The "walkable city" feels like a hellscape archetype for the most captive audience you could ever possibly conceive...
What an unwarranted attack. You could equally say that the NPR you listen to in your tiny apartment that you pay $3000 a month for has poisoned your brain to such an extent that you believe walking 50 feet down a government sidewalk makes you the heir of Thoreau, while people who drive to work are idiots.
> I don't think you appreciate just how incredibly massive this country is.
On the other hand, I don’t think you appreciate how much vehicle usage in this country is tied to round trip commutes to and from an urban center
I don’t think anyone is arguing that a rural lifestyle should exist on bikes and trains because that doesn’t make sense. However people who live adjacent to a city and go into the city every day, aren’t living a rural lifestyle.
> It's funny, I feel the same way about people who live in small areas and don't have the ability to independently go anywhere they want at any time without having to rely on someone else. The "walkable city" feels like a hellscape archetype for the most captive audience you could ever possibly conceive...
These are not mutually exclusive concepts unless you live in Manhattan.
I live a 10 minute walk to a subway station that brings me downtown to work. I also have a driveway and a car, and sometimes I drive to the parking garage next to my work. I also drive all over New England on the weekends.
A single subway line in Toronto is 38 km / 24 miles long. A single regional rail line passing through downtown is 114 km / 71 miles long. A 15 mile commute is perfectly achievable on public transit when the facilities exist.
Yeah, I drive through 3 other towns before even getting to the town I work in. And the town I work in is 10-15 minutes off the "main road" (if you can even call it that, lol) so setting this up with public transport means having an entire bus SOLELY for me. You'd waste more than you'd save. I can't live closer, and my work can't move. These are the realities of living in the country. It's awesome and I wouldn't change it for the world, but stuff is just far apart, no matter what.
People really, really do not understand what living rural is like.
> People really, really do not understand what living rural is like.
The same criticism applies equally well to rural dwellers about urban life which is why someone rural could be shocked by the idea someone might actively choose to to travel by high quality public transportation.
I have lived both rural and urban and actively choose urban. Rural is a fine choice too, but rural dwellers shouldn't expect their energy intensive and economically expensive lifestyle to be subsidized by urban dwellers forever. Maintaining a huge road network with relatively low utilization is massively expensive and western rural life is currently among the most carbon intensive lifestyles.
For better or worse, Urban dwellers are the majority in the US - the "Fuck Cars" blanket statements get a bit frustrating to see as someone in a rural environment.
> Maintaining a huge road network with relatively low utilization is massively expensive and western rural life is currently among the most carbon intensive lifestyles.
Yet it's necessary, and cheaper than the alternative when you have industry which must exist in a rural setting (such as farming). Attempting to mandate public transport for rural settings would cost more, and may even be more carbon intensive.
So as much as people who live in rural areas shouldn't dictate how public transport is instituted in dense urban areas, neither should urbanites dictate how transport in rural areas is managed.
Urban dwellers in America isn’t a dense city. It’s a loose collection of smaller cities all over the place. The US census defines urban as having 5,000 people in an area.
Which is fine, but I'm sick of those same people consistently voting against high quality public transport inside cities while insisting on urban highways and tons of parking for when they come to the city. Untold billions have been spent creating a road network to support their rural lifestyle and then they object to any money being spent on transportation modes other than driving.
Farmers get a pass since they are producing things on the land. Everyone else who chooses to live rural or exurban doesn't get to object to urban dwellers wanting quality transit or to reduce the prominence of cars in urban spaces.
> Farmers get a pass since they are producing things on the land.
And the people who maintain farmers' equipment?
Purchasers of farmers' goods?
The people who sell food to farmers?
The people who maintain infrastructure?
Mail?
Which is to say, where there are farmers (or ranchers etc), there is a whole city nearby who supports them. And cities imply infrastructure - like roads.
You're correct that rural life is an exception here, but most Americans don't live in rural areas and I presume that's what the other user is talking about. In many American cities there just aren't good alternative options, you need to spend the money on a car to get around even if you live in a reasonably urban area.
Every able bodied person can cycle 15 miles. What a shame that people don't even know what their own bodies are capable of.
"I would literally starve and die". This is a sad, sad comment. I would laugh but I just find it so sad that you've got all these able bodied adults unable to get around without wheelchairs.
Some of the most fun I've had outdoors with friends is when they want to try biking (or bikepacking) with me. You're right that people generally have no understanding of what they're capable of (and that no herculean effort is required).
I suspect that some of this is a result of humans being increasingly unable to estimate true distances. In my city, it can take 45 minutes to drive 3 miles, so most non-bikers understand 3 miles to be an insurmountable distance.
That's a good point. Americans I've met seem to only associate miles with cars. While a British person might say "let's walk, it's only a mile", Americans would say "you can't walk, it's a mile!".
Of course, if you do walk a mile then that's a "hike". In British that's also just called a walk.
That's the point, due to zoning & parking laws, density is lower, ppl need to drive more. Imagine both laws changed, how much the supply could increase, how many ppl would choose to move into the city instead of long commute. Combined with better pub transport&bike lanes both propulsed by high density, a lot of ppl would be able to live carfree
I think it's fair to say a lot of people bought "too much car" but I completely agree we need better public infrastructure and not be forced to pay the US car tax.
Having experienced the public transit systems in Tokyo, Seoul, Singapore, and the midwest US. It's entirely obvious who is failing.
Though, despite our short comings, in a lot of cities it _is_ possible to use public transit, I did for years and it sucked and I had to compensate with Uber more often then I would have liked but at least I didn't have a car payment (in hindsight I should have just bought a car, but it was a humbling experience that I don't regret.)
> Having experienced the public transit systems in Tokyo, Seoul, Singapore
The Seoul Metro, widely considered to be one of the best in the world, also lost like a billion dollars a year for the past decade or so, with the shortfall made up for by taxes. The story is similar for many transit systems around the world as well as around the US.
Now, you could argue that it's worth it, but let's at least make sure we know that there is also a public transit tax, as well.
And public roads are free? The streets inside a city and highways connecting them are massively expensive and no one bats an eye. Even toll highways often don't really pay for themselves.
Transportation infrastructure of any mode is massively expensive and is undertaken to facilitate all sorts of economic activity. Public transportation being held to a standard of direct profit is something no other public infrastructure is expected to achieve.
It was in response to GP's comment about the "US car tax"; I'm pointing out that no matter how someone gets around, there is going to be some kind of tax. I don't mean to imply that public roads are free.
But I do mean to imply that often times comparisons are made between car-centric cities and public transit-centric cities without any close attention to the actual costs involved, nor a sober cost-benefit analysis. It seems like it's usually categorical statements like "public transit is better and cars shouldn't exist" or "you'll pry the steering wheel from my cold, dead fingers".
> Public transportation being held to a standard of direct profit is something no other public infrastructure is expected to achieve.
Perhaps most people don't think about it, but even roads and bridges need to be profitable one way or another. There are many famous examples of "bridges to nowhere"-type public works projects throughout history where some massive infrastructure work was done in a place that won't use that level of infrastructure, usually through corruption. Everyone loses when that happens.
I guess public transit systems seem to be unfairly targeted for (as you said) "a standard of direct profit" because it's usually built and maintained by a centralized authority, vs. roads which are built and maintained by many different layers of government, with more diffuse paths of revenues and expenditures.
California, with a population 4x that of Seoul, recieved 25 billion dollars in federal highway funding (plus 2 billion dollars of its own money) for a single year (2021). Highway funding. Not counting roads.
That figure, of course, does not include the amount of money that we spent on our cars to drive on those highways. Maintenance. Insurance. Fees.
It does not capture deaths from car accidents (over 4,000, children among them) life changing injuries and maimings (many more than 4,000), choking air pollution, the thousands of tons of tire plastic that washed into the Pacific that year, and obviously the carbon emissions, which probably approached a hundred million tons. Smaller things as well; the stress, the noise, billions of hours spent sitting in traffic. The natural environment that was destroyed to build roads and highways.
If you spent 4 billion to cut that incomprehensible number by just 10 percent you would come out ahead -- not by a little but by a monstrous lot.
Sorry that came off very heated. I really do hate cars, it's not really directed at you.
The Seoul Capital Region is 26 million people crammed in a 4,500 square mile metropolitan area.
California is 40 million spread across 156,000 square miles.
It makes sense that CA gets more funding for roads and highways given that the population is much less dense.
Even when you factor in Metropolitan areas in CA, the distances are much larger - the Bay Area has the same population and area as the state of Massachusetts (9,000 square miles and 9 million people), yet I don't see subway connecting Boston to Worcester or Springfield.
That's functionally the same ask that a lot of Public transit supporters (which I am btw) are pushing for, and it doesn't make sense. The area is way too large for a system like the Boston T or the NYC Subway to be created, and the Bay's current setup of local subways (Muni/VTA) mixed with commuter rails (BART/Caltrain/ACE) makes more sense given the size.
Anecdotally, yeah they are.. a lot more incentives lately and though it's a combination of supply + demand, the "days inventory" on dealer lots is back up to what many consider to be a normal level:
> The total U.S. supply of available unsold new vehicles climbed to 2.21 million units, the highest level since early spring 2021. That is up 60% from the same time a year ago. However, inventory remains 35% lower than pre-pandemic 2019. Inventory numbers include vehicles available on dealer lots and some in transit.
> Days of supply stood at 60 at the start of October, the same as the start of September. Inventory, measured as days’ supply, was 14 days higher than the same time a year ago. Supply has been inching toward that 60-day level, which the industry once considered normal and ideal, throughout the year. It was last in the 60s in March 2021.
Prices have come back a bit too..
> In July, the average transaction price (ATP) – the price paid – rose a scant 0.4% from a year ago, the smallest year-over-year price increase in the last decade. According to Kelley Blue Book, the ATP of a new vehicle in July was $48,334, compared with $48,671 in June. Since the start of the year, transaction prices are down 2.7%, or $1,335, the largest January to July fall in the past decade.*
The various "bailouts" over the years (2008 financial crisis, COVID stimulus, PPP loan forgiveness, student loan relief) have left me pretty cynical. I paid my bills and didn't get "bailed out". What can I do to profit from this?
Some of these "bailouts" make sense. In 2008 these "bailouts" were loans that were paid back in interest. The COVID stimulus was given to everyone below a certain income threshold, so it was effectively a progressive tax cut. The student loan relief is an attempt to fix predatory loans (although it's not a complete solution, it does help though), and while I paid back my loans fully, I don't wish those loans on anyone, especially not those without a high paying job. The PPP loans were very abused, and while they are prosecuting quite a few over it, most of that money is gone forever. The only answer I have for that is not to vote in the politicians who enabled it.
Don't want to "punish" anybody. Those bailouts are all over now. I'm just tired of coming out on the losing end and would like to make something from this crisis, versus just paying for it.
How sure are you that you were on the losing end? What even is the "losing end" of a bailout?
Rising tides lift all boats. Do you know any people who worked on wall street? Then they were helped by a bailout. Do you know any people who worked with the people who worked on wall street? Then they were helped by a bailout. Etc....
Maybe there's a favorite restaurant of yours that stayed open throughout COVID because of PPP. Or there are people who you know who kept their jobs because of PPP.
Maybe there are favorite products of yours that have been created or will be created by people who were able to start companies after their student loans were forgiven.
My point is that these bailouts aren't only helping the people/companies that were directly impacted - we're all connected so it's rare that helping so many people doesn't indirectly affect you in some way.
it's not so much about profit. your earnings (taxes you pay) are paying for other people's debt. and if you save up a little cash then you're really screwed because FIAT is loosing 5 to 10% per year: that's what pays for all that deficit spending.
No kidding, it is dispiriting. You sort of want there to be a little bit of a cost to making irresponsible decisions. In the end, people with access to the same information as you, but who made a more selfish and short-sighted decision, get bailed out—by you, as a matter of fact, as a tax payer. There ought to be an updated parable of the grasshopper and the ants, where the grasshopper has a great time all summer, then gets bailed out in the winter, then has a great time the following summer, and so on indefinitely.
I feel the same way with student loans. I'm all for government sponsored state universities to compete with tuition at private universities, but to see people who are my age, in their 20s, complaining is so frustrating. I knew these people as teenagers, and I would ask them what their goal in life was. "To go to college" was a common answer. I'd ask them what about after that, and they didn't know, they just knew they HAD to go to college to get a degree and figure it out. They'd get upset with me if I pushed too hard on trying to ask them about specifics about anything, because they didn't care and didn't want to be bothered with it. They just wanted to hang out, have a good time, and not worry about the future.
My girlfriend in college had no idea how much her student loans were in total, how long they were financed, whether they were private or federal loans, etc. She just let her parents do all the financing work (they couldn't pay for her, but they did all the paperwork for her), and she just struggled with school while going out and drinking every night. Now she's graduated and we've long since parted ways, but she has a Bachelor's Degree yet she's currently working as a dog groomer and refusing to pay her student loans "because the government shouldn't force me to pay, I was only 18".
To see all of these people online now, complaining about how they were "groomed by the banks" to take out student loans drives me crazy. You made a bad decision. Your parents helped you make a bad decision. You need to live with that, and feel some form of "punishment" (in the form of not bailing them out) for not planning better for the future.
This is just based on what I personally observe while I drive around. But, I can't help thinking we are in a similar situation to the 2007-2008 housing bubble burst. I see a ton of people driving around in cars that have me asking, "How can they afford that?" The number of people driving exotic and luxury cars is higher than I've ever observed before.
It's more accurate to compare the average monthly car payment over time, not the total price of the car. The majority of people don't buy the total price, they buy the monthly payment (whether out of innumeracy or a desire to have a better car than they can really afford). I wasn't able to quickly find data, but I would imagine the rise in the average monthly payment is more in line with the rise in the CPI.
Last time I was shopping for a car ~4 years ago. Most prices were written on the windshield as weekly payments, over an unknown period. Getting the actual price required stopping and reading the small window sticker.
and for the most part it's all those insanely expensive pickup trucks. you'd be surprised what people are willing to pay just for a crappy pickup truck (like 50k, 60k, 70k all the way up to 100k or more).
I grew up thinking of trucks as cheap and functional. I did a spit take while watching a Youtube video running down current truck prices. Does anyone know what is driving this? There's got to be more at work than inflation to produce a 90K pickup truck.
Mostly supply and demand, but it is true that pickups these days are a ton nicer than the cheap and functional single cab, 8 foot bed, rear wheel drive, roll-up windows trucks of yore.
And to be fair, $90k is on the extreme high end of the market currently. I could drive down to my local Ford dealer right now and for $90k, a F-150 Raptor could be mine. It has 450 horsepower and 510 lb-ft of torque, goes 0-60 in less than five and a half seconds, and can carry five grown adults in scrumptious comfort, as well as having a somewhat usable bed for cargo. No one can deny that it's a nice product, though whether it's worth $90k depends on the individual. I certainly wouldn't pay that kind of money.
Most F-150s available on the lot right now are in the $40k range, which is still way more than what I would like to pay, but it's comparable to many other vehicles. That same money would get you a nicely optioned midsize SUV, a sporty car like a Mustang, or an EV on the cheaper side.
There are a few different things all combining to create 100K+ trucks
1) Many people just like driving a truck as their vehicle. Many of those people are wealthy enough to drive 100k+ vehicles. They like a truck, they just want one with a fancy interior.
2) High value trucks are extremely profitable for OEMs. The margins are huge since the engineering and tooling is amortized across a ton of lower cost and fleet trucks, so there is big incentive to have the best luxury truck as it's a license to print money
3) Tax incentives for 6000+lb vehicles that were intended for truly commercial vehicles. Didn't envision Escalades and luxury trucks being used by regular people and not for hauling goods.
4) Buying vehicles based on monthly cost rather than total. 7-8 year loans keep the monthly cost on huge value trucks pretty reasonable
I drive a 20 year old truck that gets categorically ABYSMAL MPG. The problem is, I only drive it less than 10k miles per year and at the cost of a new vehicle, I doubt I would ever "come out ahead" by replacing it.
Instead of a big V8 slab of pig iron for an engine you end up with a smaller turbo charged engine. Coupled with a mostly aluminum body to save weight is how they've been increasing fuel economy of trucks.
There has also been a significant drop in the desire for base model two-seater trucks. Most trucks sold are some variation of extended/crew/king cab. Coupled with a desire to use the truck as a daily driver you end up with a lot of extra like adaptive cruise control, cameras, infotament, etc.
Plus the usual expansion of standard safety features that has been raising the price of all vehicles. Backup cameras being required equipment now comes to mind as an example.
The cheapest way to meet the EPA MPG requirements is to INCREASE the vehicle wheelbase and make it larger. This is much easier than making it lighter or adding fuel efficient engines and technology. Plus, Americans have shown a preference for larger cars.
Lots of fun creative loans now. I’m not shopping for a car, have excellent credit and I see auto loan ads offering 12-14% interest. The balloon payment ones are just crazy though.
>Even expensive sports cars like the BMW M3 and Porsche 911 kept up with inflation. A 2003 E46 M3 cost $46,545 ($78,729 today), while a new M4 (the two-door version of the M3) is only $74,300. In those 20 years, power went up from 333 to 473 hp. Even the 911 Carrera, which seems expensive at $106,100, is way cheaper than the 996 model at $72,435 ($122,521 today).
My point was not about whether the price of the cars is the right price. It was more about whether someone making $75K a year should be purchasing a $60K vehicle.
A lot of the discourse around this phenomenon seems to center "predatory lending" but it has never looked like that to me, and it seems like a defective argument along the lines of "7 companies caused climate change". The lenders don't come to your house and put a gun to your head. The American consumer is a hedonistic buffoon who wants a gigantic truck, regardless of the fact that their job as the assistant manager in the service department of the truck dealership can't support the $2000/mo all-in cost. Mr. Consumerbot expects the government to suppress fuel prices and regulate insurance prices and bail him out of the loan, even while he spends the remainder of his free time railing against taxation.
Then mix in a bad set of EPA curves for cars/trucks and their wheelbase/weight and a small tiny truck which most people would be happy with they can not even buy as they can not make the 50MPG rating they would have to have. So they still want a truck and buy the behemoths we have now.
I, personally, wonder about how much of stuff we're seeing throughout society is due to COVID policy. How many people found themselves flush with money due to things like student loan payment suspension, tax credits, and etc. who went on to spend it frivolously and now can't make their personal finances work with no more cash from the government and resumption of loan payments and so on.
I've noticed this a lot in my previous work sector (real estate). I've seen many coworkers who would buy these luxury cars, paying almost $1,200/month for the payment and insurance. Mainly because it's what was "expected" of someone in that field. My brother who works in construction is paying a $1,300/month car payment and $350/month insurance for an F-150 because it's what everyone else drives, even though he's 19 and the only thing he hauls in groceries from Aldi.
I think a major culprit is our social-focused society creating this desire to keep up with the Jonses' in your social/work circles.
Whenever I hear anyone making dubious claims about struggling (like "we make over 100k credits and barely making ends meet"), I always ask, what car do you drive?
It's amazing how quickly people's expectations change. Once they get in that new car it's the new normal. They'll get just as angry and frustrated in it as any other, but it's now an essential with an insanely high cost.
It's also full of hidden costs. People can usually tell you how much they're spending on rent, but what about how much they spend on the car? You need to add up any interest, depreciation, insurance, tax, fuel, regular maintenance, repairs, consumables, tolls, cleaning, and that's not even counting your priceless time spent driving.
Car people will just gobble up a random 1k credit repair bill when their gearbox randomly gives out then forget all about it in a few months and never once question if this thing is worth it.
That's what I tried to explain to him. He had a paid off '04 Excursion before this car that he wrecked, after putting about $15k worth of aftermarket stuff in it. Now he's wanting to put a lift kit and all this aftermarket stuff in the F-150 and won't listen to reason when I tell him that is the stupidest idea I've ever heard.
> Now he's wanting to put a lift kit and all this aftermarket stuff
This is a perfect place for a facepalm emoji.
I mean, I get it. When everyone else around you is doing it (and frankly, they probably can't afford it any more than he can), it's a legitimately hard thing to not buckle to the pressure. Especially since it's a huge indicator of your "value" these days.
The OP's brother is 19 years old. You expect 19 year olds to make mistakes and learn from them. In terms of life ruining decisions, spending close to $100K on a truck and mods is far from the worst.
But the OP's brother is not alone, the problem is there are lots of 35, 45, 55 and 65 year olds making similar decisions.
> In terms of life ruining decisions, spending close to $100K on a truck and mods is far from the worst.
Not the worst? Perhaps technically. That loan payment is going to be an absurd burden on that young adult for a period of time they can barely relate to. Especially if they lose their job for any appreciable amount of time, or encounter other sudden costs (such as rent being jacked up).
Remaining employed full time for 7 years at the age of 19 with a wage good enough to make $1500 vehicle payments is... well, I would have failed that test.
A 19 year old who works on a building site and has already spent 15k on a vehicle that he wrecked? Sounds like a pampered upbringing has instilled no concept of money.
Likely the opposite, for the same reason you'll never find more luxury cars than at apartment complexes. Mistaking being able to make a payment with being wealthy is a common poverty trap mistake. It's also part of the unfortunate engine of our middle class and upper classes.
I agree but I was referring more to the 19 part. It's presumably close to a minimum wage job and having already dropped the 15k means he somehow had that cash at 18?
Perhaps you're right though. I went to uni etc so didn't have that kind of cash until much later but might be different for those who leave school earlier.
Ah, I read it as "worth" or maybe having spent that much in work across ownership, not as a one time cost. The rest I'm sharing just as a picture of life in the states.
Children in the US can begin work at 14, and assuming he either bought or was gifted a low value project car that he began putting money into from the age of 15 when he would have been eligible for his learner's permit, he could have been earning for up to 5 years before his latest job.
It's also not unheard of for children to own vehicles before they're old enough to legally drive them. There are no license or minimum age requirements for ATVs in some states, and in rural areas, some children begin using them to commute (off-road) as soon as they're large enough to operate them. One of our local schools had stables for horses, and another had chargers for golf carts. While helmets weren't legally required, the schools encouraged them.
In 2020, McDonald's paid cashiers just over $11/hr, so if he worked there just 500 hours each year from the ages of 15 to 18 (10 hours a week), he would have been able to earn over $20K before he was 19 without much effort - or earned all of that in a single year after graduating high school and working full time.
If he was a car enthusiast who wanted to work at an auto shop, like NAPA Auto Parts ($15/hr base), he'd have been able to earn $15K in two years working the same part time schedule. He also would have received full state and federal taxes back each year, so it would have been near to gross earnings.
This isn't really uncommon here. Everything costs something, so most people have to work starting from their teens. Insurance, for instance, is expensive for young men, so if he hadn't been paying on his car's current cash value (or at all) to control costs, he may have received nothing on the vehicle after it was totaled, but he wouldn't have owed anything. By 19, he'd already be used to living paycheck to paycheck.
And while there's no limit to what someone can spend on their car, I'm also taking $15K as an embellishment. $8-10K is more normal for moderate aftermarket work, including labor, and some people buy, sell, and trade up often. I'd believe a teenager spending $3-8K on used aftermarket and then telling people it was "worth $15K", estimating it would have cost around that if they'd bought new and had the work done professionally.
I love a good hatch back. My first was a 1991 civic wagovan. My second was a 2000 Golf TDI. My third and current is an Outback.
If anyone knows of a left hand drive, all wheel drive diesel hatchback, let me know. That's my unicorn car. I'm not even sure something like that exists.
A 19yo paying $1650 every month just to get around! That would have paid for my first car and insurance for six months, just a scant decade and a half ago.
> I think a major culprit is our social-focused society creating this desire to keep up with the Jonses' in your social/work circles.
Society may very well pressure individuals to keep up with the Joneses, but individuals do not have to yield to that pressure. Let's retain some individual agency. Nobody has to put themselves in a lot of debt to appear a certain way to their peers.
> Society may very well pressure individuals to keep up with the Joneses, but individuals do not have to yield to that pressure. Let's retain some individual agency. Nobody has to put themselves in a lot of debt to appear a certain way to their peers.
Agreed, but those outward pressures can be pretty harsh. I left real estate because I was told by my boss I needed to upgrade my car to, at a minimum, 2yr-old Lexus NX or I'd be relegated to internal work rather than meeting with clients. I was driving a 2019 Kia Forte at the time. Some industries just tie your personal life and expenses to your work life way too much.
> I left real estate because I was told by my boss I needed to upgrade my car to, at a minimum, 2yr-old Lexus NX or I'd be relegated to internal work rather than meeting with clients.
Yeah, I grant you that is the case in certain occupations. It's funny, because in other lines of work (like accountancy, for example), you're actually discouraged from meeting clients in a flashy car.
May I ask where you live/worked? And what type of real estate?
I was a real estate in Idaho in the mid 00s and the only people I knew who had the super nice cars were the long-time brokers and the real estate school instructors. People that rarely if ever met with clients. That said, I worked low end stuff. I could see high end stuff very much requiring outward signs of "success" otherwise the clients might think you suck at your job.
I left the field because the incentives and commission structure was so out of whack with what it should be. Selling a house and doing 95%+ of the work got you half of half the commission. 6% total, 1.5% to buyer broker, 1.5% to buyer agent, 1.5% to seller broker, 1.5% to seller agent.
The agents (not the brokers) did 95% of the actual work, but the law required a licensed broker to "oversee" the transaction. People only got paid when a house sold, so there was heavy incentive on both sides of the transaction to get the right person into the right house, and as the great Lionel Hutz (Phil Hartman) tells Marge Simpson, "I'm going to let you in on a little secret. The right house is the house that's for sale. And the right person is anyone." I could go on for a long time, but suffice to say it seems absurd to me that the fee to a seller is directly proportional to the value of the house, completely disconnected from the amount of labor involved in the transaction.
This was just outside of Atlanta in the residential real estate sector. Avg. home prices were $300k around this time. I could see it as a sign of outward success, but I had been an agent for less than a year and had 2 sales (was a part-time agent/full-time transaction coordinator).
Similar to tipping culture. Why does someone make an order of magnitute more in tips at one place over another? Is the work THAT MUCH DIFFERENT based on the price point?
> I was told by my boss I needed to upgrade my car to, at a minimum 2yr-old Lexus NX
to which you should be replying "sure, let me send you the receipt so you can expense it". If it is for work, the employee cannot expect to pay for a required piece of equipment.
Yeah last vehicle I bought was a used truck for $8k cash, put around $5k into it and it lasted ~10 years before the engine conked out. He's paying more a month than I paid per year.
I need to buy another used truck, but I'm sort of waiting for the flood of used cars from these people to saturate the market a bit and drive down prices for me when the recession hits.
At least with a 1300/month payment I assume/hope he actually has a decent loan term. I hear people bragging about their $400/month luxury car payments. What's that, a 7 year term + residual ensuring you are underwater on that loan for 10 years?
I've said this before and I'll say it again but one of the best things the auto industry did for itself was to tie a person's identity to the type of automobile they drive.
In today's society, you can completely disregard someone based solely on the car they drive (cough, Prius).
No, seriously though, a Prius is pretty underrated. Especially when you put it in sport mode and push your passengers into their seat with the acceleration. And you'll still beat 30mpg.
Heck, I bet it has better power:weight than that F-150...
I've never seen a prius in the UK that wasn't a taxi, it's interesting how some car stereotypes (like BMW owners failing to indicate) seem pretty universal but others don't cross borders.
They make pretty fantastic taxis, I have to imagine. Right behind an EV. Small footprint, decent power, great mileage, reasonably sized back seat and storage.
I heard Alexi Sayle (minor celeb in the UK) saying the other day that he had a friend who drove a Prius but got rid of it because he was fed up of people randomly getting in because they assumed it was a taxi.
I have always said, however, that if you're looking a for a good value reliable car you should always take note of what cars taxi drivers buy.
I had a complete stranger suddenly get into the passenger sear of my Prius when I was dropping off a friend at the metro station. We had locked eyes as my friend was getting out, and I waved out of politeness. I guess he misunderstood and assumed I was driving a cab/uber/whatever. My friend later said he got the impression the guy thought I was selling drugs.
I'm not GP, but generally speaking rudeness need not be intended (though certainly may have in this case). I love the idea of a Prius and almost bought one (the deciding factor was purchase $ not the car itself). Society at large though definitely reads a lot into you when you own a Prius. That is is illogical and often inaccurate is beside the broader point that society (or car companies or whoever) has done a great job tying identity to type of car.
To be clear, "how rude" is intended as a humorous way to indicate that I own one.
Societal wealth indicator trends are stupid in many ways, and what car you own is just the latest stupidity. I'll happily laugh my way past the gas pumps in my pariahmobile.
This is why I have two cars: one nice car and my 15 year old prius. At one point, that prius was all I could afford. Stepping into that car grounds me and continually reminds me that I was happy then, and can be happy now, no matter what my financial situation.
hehe, I LOVE the flex of driving a Prius. It's such a perfect utility vehicle, and almost nothing is sadder to me that someone driving a fancy car thinking they're awesome because of that. It's so hard to imagine thinking you have social status because of your car. Yes I'm aware this is most of the world, but its so funny to me.
Particularly when your culture emphasizes it. Conservative heteronormative culture requires performative displays of manhood, and in the USA that means truck ownership. I can't imagine how humiliating it would be for a conservative man in the rural south to drive a sub-compact.
This brings to mind that infamous part of the early Top Gear America special where Clarkson, Hammond, and May are chased out of a rural Alabamian town by some of its inhabitants for decorating some trucks in a less-than-conservative fashion.
I wish I knew, lol. I've never met anyone who's paid less than $100/month for car insurance. For my brother though it's probably on account of him being 19, being at fault for an accident that totaled 2 cars, having a speeding ticket for going 25mph over the limit, a $40k+ truck, and car loans like this requiring a $500 deductible at the highest it can be set.
He's not the best candidate for an insurance policy...
I would guess one difference is that the average distance traveled by car each year is higher in the US. Google results suggest its roughly twice as much.
Safer roads probably. Speaking to Americans it's like crashes are an everyday occurrence and everyone seems to have experience of one. Over here it's more likely someone goes there entire life without a single collision or insurance payout at all.
I make way more money than the people interviewed for this article, but I've never bought a vehicle that was newer than 10 years old or cost more than 8k. The cars these people bought are unthinkable to me.
Presumably there's some cultural difference between me and folks who buy recent vehicles with 5-digit price tags?
You can buy a new base model budget sedan (think Kia Rio, Nissan Versa, etc.) for $20k, or slightly under if you can get a good deal. I myself bought a decent hybrid hatchback for under $30k earlier this year without shopping around too much. It gets over 50mph combined and is quiet and comfortable to drive.
Those cars have 80,000 miles on them and they're 10 years old (or more). I'm sure a Honda is good for 100 - 150 miles. But C'mon- if you pay 8K for a Honda with 80,000 miles in 2 years you're going to be paying 2 or 3 grand every 6 mos. to keep it running. And that's assuming the original owner actually took care of them.
I bought our 2008 Odyssey 3.5 years ago at ~163,000 miles, and it's probably going to roll over 200,000 sometime this year. I'm hoping to get it most of the way to 300,000. Maintenance has been well under 1000$/year so far.
I had a similar experience with the 2001 Honda Accord that I drove for ~7 years before we got the Odyssey.
I bought a 2009 Focus with over 80k on the clock almost 4 years ago. I've done another 80k and spent nothing over and above regular maintenance and tyres. Off hand, I'd guess 2k max?
I would not have expected to be so fortunate with a Ford but with a Honda I would be, not least because Hondas in the UK are synonymous with senior, careful drivers who look after their cars. As a consequence, it's a much sought after brand in the pre-owned market.
When I die I want to leave my kids an advantageous amount of money.
Even if I didn't, vehicles are way down the list of sources of fun I would spend money on, especially if we're talking double-digit percentages of my budget.
Presumably these are a part of the cultural difference between me and people who spend so much on vehicles.
How much "fun" do you think the subjects of the article are getting from their vehicles?
The main difference, I guess, is that you can afford a better car but don't feel the need to display this? Your $8k vehicle does the job you need it to do and spending any more would be a waste of cash.
Someone struggling to afford a fancy car is prioritizing their perceived status over financial prudence.
Maybe because the price of cars is outrageous. A new Honda Civic is 35,000. Less than ten years ago you could get one around 20-25k. So now your car payment is 40% higher to compensate for the higher price of the vehicles. I know inflation was bad but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t this bad.
The base price of a Civic has gone from $18,190 in 2014[1] to $23,950 today[2]. That's 30% which pretty much exactly matches the official CPI inflation numbers.
Assuming USD -- a new Civic is still around $25,000 MSRP. A $20,000 car 10 years ago "should" cost $26,000 now according to the first inflation calculator I could find. 32% cumulative inflation according to them.
The top trim Civic Touring, with the most expensive optional paint job and the biggest, ugliest optional wheels, and the most expensive options package, and literally every accessory in the catalog, has an MSRP of $34165.
I bought a used car from a dealership a few months into COVID before the huge price spike. I had outside financing and the salesman couldn't believe my 2.7% rate. In his words "The average person coming in here is trading in a car with negative equity and taking a 10%+ rate." That was pre rate hikes. I can't imagine how high the payment burden is now.
Pure anecdote, but that guy left soon after our sale. In his words "I feel dirty facilitating these purchases. It's really screwing people over who are incapable of making sound financial decisions."
The new car bubble feels a lot more real to me than the housing bubble. This is exactly one of the ways that higher interest rates are continuing to bring down inflation.
Our household has a 2004 sedan with 140k miles, and a 2014 SUV about to hit 100k. Both fully paid.
I had a college econ professor explain that the best way to save money on a car is not to buy used (everyone's first guess). It's to drive it until "the wheels fall off." Depreciation is the biggest cost of car ownership and it stops at a certain point in a car's life. If the car is maintained well, several hundred thousand miles is even doable. I took that advice to heart.
The best auto advice I ever got was to buy a 2 year old (avoid the depreciation cliff) Toyota (durability) and drive it until it rusts into the ground (drive as many of those depreciation-free miles as possible).
> The best auto advice I ever got was to buy a 2 year old (avoid the depreciation cliff) Toyota (durability) and drive it until it rusts into the ground (drive as many of those depreciation-free miles as possible).
You're still eating a good amount of it at two years. Five is where the curve flattens out. The objectively best used car to buy is a single owner 5 year old Toyota Corolla with 60,000 miles.
10K is a lot of money. But there's something to be said for being really confident (as opposed to just confident) that your car won't have issues for the next 100,000 miles as opposed to the next 50,000. That and there's something nice about knowing the car has been taken care of the way you'd take care of it (because you have) as opposed to a stranger (who, who knows maybe planned to get rid of it after 50K miles?)
:-) This is why everytime I've had to buy a car I think about getting a used one and end up buying new. And honestly, I tend to agree with the overall sentiment of this thread that cars a waste of money. I just don't want to have to think about the damn - I just want to get in and be able to get to where I'm going.
> The objectively best used car to buy is a single owner 5 year old Toyota Corolla with 60,000 miles.
Depends if they did all the 60k service stuff or not. That's the first major service interval that could easily run you $2000 (brakes, battery, all liquid changes, belts, etc.)
Not sure I agree. I've seen people do that and they inevitably end up spending thousands on repair and maintenance the last few years of the cars life. Had they sold 'in time' and bought something used, but slightly newer and more reliable, I'm pretty sure they would have ended up ahead.
If you have the time/skill/equipment to do all your own repairs and maintenance it might be OK, but otherwise keeping an old car on the road gets expensive.
One of ours is a 2006 with just over 230k miles on it (Toyota). The last few trips to the shop for just an oil change and tire rotation has turned into large bills to fix things. I don't think if we sold it earlier we'd come out much ahead but maybe I'm wrong.
We plan to replace this with a similar 2-3 year old model and drive that one into the ground. Our other is a Ford and has not been as reliable. That will be replaced with a Toyota when it's time comes (which sadly may be with a lot less years/mileage than the Toyota).
Knowing when to call "wheels falling off" is definitely important.
I recently replaced the water pump in the 2014 and the dealer quoted between $4,500-10,000+ for replacing the pump or replacing the engine if the coolant being where it's not supposed to be broke bearings or anything else. I got a second opinion from a small independent shop and he took it step by step and confirmed no engine damage before I committed to the pump replacement. It was around $3,500 total.
Replacing the vehicle would have cost $20k plus, so the math made sense for me to repair. If I was looking at an engine replacement might have gone the other way.
Keeping up with routine maintenance is the most important thing and even then random things do break.
I think the 'key' moment is when something non-routine and expensive breaks because then the sums start to move away from your favour. A water pump is maybe not in this category but anything bigger/costlier would be, in my opinion.
Right? This is what my parent's have done for the last 3 decades. It's worked for them, they haven't wasted 1 dollar on a slightly shinier metal box on wheels. That's my plan, too. Bought a 2015 Kia in 2020 for $10k, which was by far the most expensive car I've purchased, and aside from usual maintenance costs (gas, oil, tires, etc.), I haven't had one single issue.
EDIT: Prior to this car, I had a 2002 Pontiac Grand Am. That was the best car I ever had. Bought it for $2,000 and drove it everyday for 5 years until the engine gave up the ghost. Highly recommended.
As others are pointing out, there's a general problem with financial literacy in the USA population, exacerbated by a culture that values flashy signs of wealth. But it's not the whole story.
There's a macro problem that that cars often are necessary to function in USA cities. With limited public transit, especially in the suburbs/exurbs where below median earners are forced to live, getting to a job requires a car. And cars are expensive, no matter how you slice it. Our city designs make it doubly hard to be poor.
I feel for low income earners - They're least able to afford extra expenses, have the least ability to devote mental/time resources to rate/price shopping, and get hit with the highest rates due to low income / low credit. Even if you want to make a good choice, the finances are stacked against you.
Cars have actually only gotten cheaper, it's just that the marketing has convinced people they need things they truly don't.
Take for instance the Nissan Versa: https://www.nissanusa.com/vehicles/cars/versa-sedan.html. This car starts at $17k new, and is an objectively better vehicle in every single possible way than anything you could have bought 20 years ago short of high end luxury. Cars are one of the few consumer goods that have only gotten cheaper and better over time (particularly when inflation is taken into account). But marketers doing what they do, everyone is now convinced they need a $40,000 luxury vehicle to buy groceries and drive to work. It is entirely a cultural issue combined with predatory lending, not a lack of cheap cars to buy.
What are the top 3 ways in which the 2024 Nissan Versa is better than say a 2004 Toyota Corolla? Better fuel efficiency? Less expensive when adjusting for inflation? More electronic doodads?
> What are the top 3 ways in which the 2024 Nissan Versa is better than say a 2004 Toyota Corolla? Better fuel efficiency? Less expensive when adjusting for inflation? More electronic doodads?
Performance: Electronic power steering, traction control, full disc brakes with ABS
Features: Apple carplay, cruise control, push button start, power windows/locks, e-parking brake, LED headlights, keyless entry
You really can't even compare a car today to something 20 years ago, and adjusted for inflation the Versa starts at $5k cheaper than that Corolla did new in 2004.
You can't really be sure what will cause an economic crisis. There's usually multiple factors working in a cascade, and it's only ever clear in retrospect. Even then, you get disagreement.
Car owners falling behind on payments in record numbers could be nothing in terms of the history of the next global economic crisis. Or it could be among the dominoes.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 246 ms ] thread> propping up highly toxic industries such as commercial real estate, restaurants, oil, and of course car sales and manufacturing
This reminds me of the assertion that inflation is below 2% now, if we exclude food, energy, shelter, and used cars[0]. Life is great, if we don't meet in person to do work, break bread together, and get ourselves around to provide goods and services?
What's left, if you remove the "highly toxic" industries?
[0]: https://twitter.com/paulkrugman/status/1712494317024026761
You would think corporations would finally place their offices in more liveable areas but for some reason they feel the need to build in city centers, and inconvenience their employees.
I don't think you appreciate just how incredibly massive this country is. I have to drive 15 miles to work everyday. If I couldn't drive, I would literally just starve and die (or, I suppose start working as a local farmhand).
It's funny, I feel the same way about people who live in small areas and don't have the ability to independently go anywhere they want at any time without having to rely on someone else. The "walkable city" feels like a hellscape archetype for the most captive audience you could ever possibly conceive...
Source: I did such a commute. It sucked royally. Nothing like finishing a shift tired and still looking forward to a 1 hour ride in the rain.
On the other hand, I don’t think you appreciate how much vehicle usage in this country is tied to round trip commutes to and from an urban center
I don’t think anyone is arguing that a rural lifestyle should exist on bikes and trains because that doesn’t make sense. However people who live adjacent to a city and go into the city every day, aren’t living a rural lifestyle.
> It's funny, I feel the same way about people who live in small areas and don't have the ability to independently go anywhere they want at any time without having to rely on someone else. The "walkable city" feels like a hellscape archetype for the most captive audience you could ever possibly conceive...
These are not mutually exclusive concepts unless you live in Manhattan.
I live a 10 minute walk to a subway station that brings me downtown to work. I also have a driveway and a car, and sometimes I drive to the parking garage next to my work. I also drive all over New England on the weekends.
People really, really do not understand what living rural is like.
The same criticism applies equally well to rural dwellers about urban life which is why someone rural could be shocked by the idea someone might actively choose to to travel by high quality public transportation.
I have lived both rural and urban and actively choose urban. Rural is a fine choice too, but rural dwellers shouldn't expect their energy intensive and economically expensive lifestyle to be subsidized by urban dwellers forever. Maintaining a huge road network with relatively low utilization is massively expensive and western rural life is currently among the most carbon intensive lifestyles.
> Maintaining a huge road network with relatively low utilization is massively expensive and western rural life is currently among the most carbon intensive lifestyles.
Yet it's necessary, and cheaper than the alternative when you have industry which must exist in a rural setting (such as farming). Attempting to mandate public transport for rural settings would cost more, and may even be more carbon intensive.
So as much as people who live in rural areas shouldn't dictate how public transport is instituted in dense urban areas, neither should urbanites dictate how transport in rural areas is managed.
Farmers get a pass since they are producing things on the land. Everyone else who chooses to live rural or exurban doesn't get to object to urban dwellers wanting quality transit or to reduce the prominence of cars in urban spaces.
And the people who maintain farmers' equipment?
Purchasers of farmers' goods?
The people who sell food to farmers?
The people who maintain infrastructure?
Mail?
Which is to say, where there are farmers (or ranchers etc), there is a whole city nearby who supports them. And cities imply infrastructure - like roads.
Farms take land, but cities should not. They should be designed to be effective in most ways by minimizing distance travelled for most common trips.
"I would literally starve and die". This is a sad, sad comment. I would laugh but I just find it so sad that you've got all these able bodied adults unable to get around without wheelchairs.
Wall-E isn't about the future.
I suspect that some of this is a result of humans being increasingly unable to estimate true distances. In my city, it can take 45 minutes to drive 3 miles, so most non-bikers understand 3 miles to be an insurmountable distance.
Of course, if you do walk a mile then that's a "hike". In British that's also just called a walk.
Having experienced the public transit systems in Tokyo, Seoul, Singapore, and the midwest US. It's entirely obvious who is failing.
Though, despite our short comings, in a lot of cities it _is_ possible to use public transit, I did for years and it sucked and I had to compensate with Uber more often then I would have liked but at least I didn't have a car payment (in hindsight I should have just bought a car, but it was a humbling experience that I don't regret.)
> Having experienced the public transit systems in Tokyo, Seoul, Singapore
The Seoul Metro, widely considered to be one of the best in the world, also lost like a billion dollars a year for the past decade or so, with the shortfall made up for by taxes. The story is similar for many transit systems around the world as well as around the US.
Now, you could argue that it's worth it, but let's at least make sure we know that there is also a public transit tax, as well.
Transportation infrastructure of any mode is massively expensive and is undertaken to facilitate all sorts of economic activity. Public transportation being held to a standard of direct profit is something no other public infrastructure is expected to achieve.
But I do mean to imply that often times comparisons are made between car-centric cities and public transit-centric cities without any close attention to the actual costs involved, nor a sober cost-benefit analysis. It seems like it's usually categorical statements like "public transit is better and cars shouldn't exist" or "you'll pry the steering wheel from my cold, dead fingers".
> Public transportation being held to a standard of direct profit is something no other public infrastructure is expected to achieve.
Perhaps most people don't think about it, but even roads and bridges need to be profitable one way or another. There are many famous examples of "bridges to nowhere"-type public works projects throughout history where some massive infrastructure work was done in a place that won't use that level of infrastructure, usually through corruption. Everyone loses when that happens.
I guess public transit systems seem to be unfairly targeted for (as you said) "a standard of direct profit" because it's usually built and maintained by a centralized authority, vs. roads which are built and maintained by many different layers of government, with more diffuse paths of revenues and expenditures.
That figure, of course, does not include the amount of money that we spent on our cars to drive on those highways. Maintenance. Insurance. Fees.
It does not capture deaths from car accidents (over 4,000, children among them) life changing injuries and maimings (many more than 4,000), choking air pollution, the thousands of tons of tire plastic that washed into the Pacific that year, and obviously the carbon emissions, which probably approached a hundred million tons. Smaller things as well; the stress, the noise, billions of hours spent sitting in traffic. The natural environment that was destroyed to build roads and highways.
If you spent 4 billion to cut that incomprehensible number by just 10 percent you would come out ahead -- not by a little but by a monstrous lot.
Sorry that came off very heated. I really do hate cars, it's not really directed at you.
The Seoul Capital Region is 26 million people crammed in a 4,500 square mile metropolitan area.
California is 40 million spread across 156,000 square miles.
It makes sense that CA gets more funding for roads and highways given that the population is much less dense.
Even when you factor in Metropolitan areas in CA, the distances are much larger - the Bay Area has the same population and area as the state of Massachusetts (9,000 square miles and 9 million people), yet I don't see subway connecting Boston to Worcester or Springfield.
That's functionally the same ask that a lot of Public transit supporters (which I am btw) are pushing for, and it doesn't make sense. The area is way too large for a system like the Boston T or the NYC Subway to be created, and the Bay's current setup of local subways (Muni/VTA) mixed with commuter rails (BART/Caltrain/ACE) makes more sense given the size.
> The total U.S. supply of available unsold new vehicles climbed to 2.21 million units, the highest level since early spring 2021. That is up 60% from the same time a year ago. However, inventory remains 35% lower than pre-pandemic 2019. Inventory numbers include vehicles available on dealer lots and some in transit.
> Days of supply stood at 60 at the start of October, the same as the start of September. Inventory, measured as days’ supply, was 14 days higher than the same time a year ago. Supply has been inching toward that 60-day level, which the industry once considered normal and ideal, throughout the year. It was last in the 60s in March 2021.
Prices have come back a bit too..
> In July, the average transaction price (ATP) – the price paid – rose a scant 0.4% from a year ago, the smallest year-over-year price increase in the last decade. According to Kelley Blue Book, the ATP of a new vehicle in July was $48,334, compared with $48,671 in June. Since the start of the year, transaction prices are down 2.7%, or $1,335, the largest January to July fall in the past decade.*
https://www.coxautoinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Septem...
https://www.cargurus.com/Cars/price-trends/
Rising tides lift all boats. Do you know any people who worked on wall street? Then they were helped by a bailout. Do you know any people who worked with the people who worked on wall street? Then they were helped by a bailout. Etc....
Maybe there's a favorite restaurant of yours that stayed open throughout COVID because of PPP. Or there are people who you know who kept their jobs because of PPP.
Maybe there are favorite products of yours that have been created or will be created by people who were able to start companies after their student loans were forgiven.
My point is that these bailouts aren't only helping the people/companies that were directly impacted - we're all connected so it's rare that helping so many people doesn't indirectly affect you in some way.
My girlfriend in college had no idea how much her student loans were in total, how long they were financed, whether they were private or federal loans, etc. She just let her parents do all the financing work (they couldn't pay for her, but they did all the paperwork for her), and she just struggled with school while going out and drinking every night. Now she's graduated and we've long since parted ways, but she has a Bachelor's Degree yet she's currently working as a dog groomer and refusing to pay her student loans "because the government shouldn't force me to pay, I was only 18".
To see all of these people online now, complaining about how they were "groomed by the banks" to take out student loans drives me crazy. You made a bad decision. Your parents helped you make a bad decision. You need to live with that, and feel some form of "punishment" (in the form of not bailing them out) for not planning better for the future.
- try to save them from their own stupidity
- let the society collapse
We would ofcourse survive the collapse of society but majority of rich and poor ppl would die.
Rich and powerful want to keep the starus quo of power.
So we stay in this limbo of ppl becoming dumber and powerful bailing them out to not lose power.
Pretty simple stuff.
https://i2.wp.com/financialsamurai.com/wp-content/uploads/20...
Mostly supply and demand, but it is true that pickups these days are a ton nicer than the cheap and functional single cab, 8 foot bed, rear wheel drive, roll-up windows trucks of yore.
And to be fair, $90k is on the extreme high end of the market currently. I could drive down to my local Ford dealer right now and for $90k, a F-150 Raptor could be mine. It has 450 horsepower and 510 lb-ft of torque, goes 0-60 in less than five and a half seconds, and can carry five grown adults in scrumptious comfort, as well as having a somewhat usable bed for cargo. No one can deny that it's a nice product, though whether it's worth $90k depends on the individual. I certainly wouldn't pay that kind of money.
Most F-150s available on the lot right now are in the $40k range, which is still way more than what I would like to pay, but it's comparable to many other vehicles. That same money would get you a nicely optioned midsize SUV, a sporty car like a Mustang, or an EV on the cheaper side.
1) Many people just like driving a truck as their vehicle. Many of those people are wealthy enough to drive 100k+ vehicles. They like a truck, they just want one with a fancy interior.
2) High value trucks are extremely profitable for OEMs. The margins are huge since the engineering and tooling is amortized across a ton of lower cost and fleet trucks, so there is big incentive to have the best luxury truck as it's a license to print money
3) Tax incentives for 6000+lb vehicles that were intended for truly commercial vehicles. Didn't envision Escalades and luxury trucks being used by regular people and not for hauling goods.
4) Buying vehicles based on monthly cost rather than total. 7-8 year loans keep the monthly cost on huge value trucks pretty reasonable
Idiots who complain about inflation and the price of gas yet who also are spending gobs of money on vehicles that get awful MPG.
You can't fix stupid. I have no sympathy for these people.
Instead of a big V8 slab of pig iron for an engine you end up with a smaller turbo charged engine. Coupled with a mostly aluminum body to save weight is how they've been increasing fuel economy of trucks.
There has also been a significant drop in the desire for base model two-seater trucks. Most trucks sold are some variation of extended/crew/king cab. Coupled with a desire to use the truck as a daily driver you end up with a lot of extra like adaptive cruise control, cameras, infotament, etc.
Plus the usual expansion of standard safety features that has been raising the price of all vehicles. Backup cameras being required equipment now comes to mind as an example.
https://www.meche.engineering.cmu.edu/_files/images/research...
The cheapest way to meet the EPA MPG requirements is to INCREASE the vehicle wheelbase and make it larger. This is much easier than making it lighter or adding fuel efficient engines and technology. Plus, Americans have shown a preference for larger cars.
It's a win-win until people can't afford the tin
https://www.financialsamurai.com/tax-rules-for-buying-a-vehi...
A 50k vehicle with 10k down at 3% interest for 84 months is $538 a month.
At 8% interest it is $623 a month.
So even with high interest rates, people afford these vehicles by dragging out the loan term to 5-7 years.
Lots of fun creative loans now. I’m not shopping for a car, have excellent credit and I see auto loan ads offering 12-14% interest. The balloon payment ones are just crazy though.
>Even expensive sports cars like the BMW M3 and Porsche 911 kept up with inflation. A 2003 E46 M3 cost $46,545 ($78,729 today), while a new M4 (the two-door version of the M3) is only $74,300. In those 20 years, power went up from 333 to 473 hp. Even the 911 Carrera, which seems expensive at $106,100, is way cheaper than the 996 model at $72,435 ($122,521 today).
I think a major culprit is our social-focused society creating this desire to keep up with the Jonses' in your social/work circles.
It's amazing how quickly people's expectations change. Once they get in that new car it's the new normal. They'll get just as angry and frustrated in it as any other, but it's now an essential with an insanely high cost.
It's also full of hidden costs. People can usually tell you how much they're spending on rent, but what about how much they spend on the car? You need to add up any interest, depreciation, insurance, tax, fuel, regular maintenance, repairs, consumables, tolls, cleaning, and that's not even counting your priceless time spent driving.
Car people will just gobble up a random 1k credit repair bill when their gearbox randomly gives out then forget all about it in a few months and never once question if this thing is worth it.
Normal rates are doing to shock consumer consumotion, really soon.
This is a perfect place for a facepalm emoji.
I mean, I get it. When everyone else around you is doing it (and frankly, they probably can't afford it any more than he can), it's a legitimately hard thing to not buckle to the pressure. Especially since it's a huge indicator of your "value" these days.
But for a $1500+ monthly payment... Yeesh.
But the OP's brother is not alone, the problem is there are lots of 35, 45, 55 and 65 year olds making similar decisions.
Not the worst? Perhaps technically. That loan payment is going to be an absurd burden on that young adult for a period of time they can barely relate to. Especially if they lose their job for any appreciable amount of time, or encounter other sudden costs (such as rent being jacked up).
Remaining employed full time for 7 years at the age of 19 with a wage good enough to make $1500 vehicle payments is... well, I would have failed that test.
Perhaps you're right though. I went to uni etc so didn't have that kind of cash until much later but might be different for those who leave school earlier.
Children in the US can begin work at 14, and assuming he either bought or was gifted a low value project car that he began putting money into from the age of 15 when he would have been eligible for his learner's permit, he could have been earning for up to 5 years before his latest job.
It's also not unheard of for children to own vehicles before they're old enough to legally drive them. There are no license or minimum age requirements for ATVs in some states, and in rural areas, some children begin using them to commute (off-road) as soon as they're large enough to operate them. One of our local schools had stables for horses, and another had chargers for golf carts. While helmets weren't legally required, the schools encouraged them.
In 2020, McDonald's paid cashiers just over $11/hr, so if he worked there just 500 hours each year from the ages of 15 to 18 (10 hours a week), he would have been able to earn over $20K before he was 19 without much effort - or earned all of that in a single year after graduating high school and working full time.
If he was a car enthusiast who wanted to work at an auto shop, like NAPA Auto Parts ($15/hr base), he'd have been able to earn $15K in two years working the same part time schedule. He also would have received full state and federal taxes back each year, so it would have been near to gross earnings.
This isn't really uncommon here. Everything costs something, so most people have to work starting from their teens. Insurance, for instance, is expensive for young men, so if he hadn't been paying on his car's current cash value (or at all) to control costs, he may have received nothing on the vehicle after it was totaled, but he wouldn't have owed anything. By 19, he'd already be used to living paycheck to paycheck.
And while there's no limit to what someone can spend on their car, I'm also taking $15K as an embellishment. $8-10K is more normal for moderate aftermarket work, including labor, and some people buy, sell, and trade up often. I'd believe a teenager spending $3-8K on used aftermarket and then telling people it was "worth $15K", estimating it would have cost around that if they'd bought new and had the work done professionally.
On the other hand, you're not wrong about its capabilities. And honestly, if it's just groceries, one could easily go for a used car or hatchback.
If anyone knows of a left hand drive, all wheel drive diesel hatchback, let me know. That's my unicorn car. I'm not even sure something like that exists.
"Ah no but the used truck doesn't have a touchscreen or a radio with bluetooth or builtin GPS" /s
> I think a major culprit is our social-focused society creating this desire to keep up with the Jonses' in your social/work circles.
Society may very well pressure individuals to keep up with the Joneses, but individuals do not have to yield to that pressure. Let's retain some individual agency. Nobody has to put themselves in a lot of debt to appear a certain way to their peers.
You can still buy an old Toyota sedan for $2k.
Agreed, but those outward pressures can be pretty harsh. I left real estate because I was told by my boss I needed to upgrade my car to, at a minimum, 2yr-old Lexus NX or I'd be relegated to internal work rather than meeting with clients. I was driving a 2019 Kia Forte at the time. Some industries just tie your personal life and expenses to your work life way too much.
Yeah, I grant you that is the case in certain occupations. It's funny, because in other lines of work (like accountancy, for example), you're actually discouraged from meeting clients in a flashy car.
I was a real estate in Idaho in the mid 00s and the only people I knew who had the super nice cars were the long-time brokers and the real estate school instructors. People that rarely if ever met with clients. That said, I worked low end stuff. I could see high end stuff very much requiring outward signs of "success" otherwise the clients might think you suck at your job.
I left the field because the incentives and commission structure was so out of whack with what it should be. Selling a house and doing 95%+ of the work got you half of half the commission. 6% total, 1.5% to buyer broker, 1.5% to buyer agent, 1.5% to seller broker, 1.5% to seller agent. The agents (not the brokers) did 95% of the actual work, but the law required a licensed broker to "oversee" the transaction. People only got paid when a house sold, so there was heavy incentive on both sides of the transaction to get the right person into the right house, and as the great Lionel Hutz (Phil Hartman) tells Marge Simpson, "I'm going to let you in on a little secret. The right house is the house that's for sale. And the right person is anyone." I could go on for a long time, but suffice to say it seems absurd to me that the fee to a seller is directly proportional to the value of the house, completely disconnected from the amount of labor involved in the transaction.
to which you should be replying "sure, let me send you the receipt so you can expense it". If it is for work, the employee cannot expect to pay for a required piece of equipment.
I need to buy another used truck, but I'm sort of waiting for the flood of used cars from these people to saturate the market a bit and drive down prices for me when the recession hits.
In today's society, you can completely disregard someone based solely on the car they drive (cough, Prius).
How rude.
No, seriously though, a Prius is pretty underrated. Especially when you put it in sport mode and push your passengers into their seat with the acceleration. And you'll still beat 30mpg.
Heck, I bet it has better power:weight than that F-150...
I have always said, however, that if you're looking a for a good value reliable car you should always take note of what cars taxi drivers buy.
Societal wealth indicator trends are stupid in many ways, and what car you own is just the latest stupidity. I'll happily laugh my way past the gas pumps in my pariahmobile.
He's not the best candidate for an insurance policy...
Not sure about the US market but this could be a factor?
In US its “hey have you seen a car in your life, here have those keys”
Presumably there's some cultural difference between me and folks who buy recent vehicles with 5-digit price tags?
Maybe the cultural difference is an aversion to debt. My parents never got a loan to buy a vehicle, and I haven't either.
Of course new under 35K seems hard too.
You can buy a new base model budget sedan (think Kia Rio, Nissan Versa, etc.) for $20k, or slightly under if you can get a good deal. I myself bought a decent hybrid hatchback for under $30k earlier this year without shopping around too much. It gets over 50mph combined and is quiet and comfortable to drive.
I had a similar experience with the 2001 Honda Accord that I drove for ~7 years before we got the Odyssey.
I would not have expected to be so fortunate with a Ford but with a Honda I would be, not least because Hondas in the UK are synonymous with senior, careful drivers who look after their cars. As a consequence, it's a much sought after brand in the pre-owned market.
Obviously you need to be able to “afford it”, but what that means depends a lot on subjective opinion and risk appetite.
For me, I have bought a handful of new and used vehicles in the last several years. Probably something like $300k total in 5 years? They are fun.
Bragging about spending less is no different than bragging about spending more.
Even if I didn't, vehicles are way down the list of sources of fun I would spend money on, especially if we're talking double-digit percentages of my budget.
Presumably these are a part of the cultural difference between me and people who spend so much on vehicles.
How much "fun" do you think the subjects of the article are getting from their vehicles?
Someone struggling to afford a fancy car is prioritizing their perceived status over financial prudence.
[1] https://hondanews.com/en-US/honda-automobiles/releases/relea...
[2] https://hondanews.com/en-US/honda-automobiles/releases/relea...
Pure anecdote, but that guy left soon after our sale. In his words "I feel dirty facilitating these purchases. It's really screwing people over who are incapable of making sound financial decisions."
I had a college econ professor explain that the best way to save money on a car is not to buy used (everyone's first guess). It's to drive it until "the wheels fall off." Depreciation is the biggest cost of car ownership and it stops at a certain point in a car's life. If the car is maintained well, several hundred thousand miles is even doable. I took that advice to heart.
You're still eating a good amount of it at two years. Five is where the curve flattens out. The objectively best used car to buy is a single owner 5 year old Toyota Corolla with 60,000 miles.
About $15k: https://www.kbb.com/toyota/corolla/2018/le-sedan-4d/?categor...
And I'm not sure what you consider a good deal, but $10k is a lot of money; nearly half the price of the car which has >80% of its useful life left.
:-) This is why everytime I've had to buy a car I think about getting a used one and end up buying new. And honestly, I tend to agree with the overall sentiment of this thread that cars a waste of money. I just don't want to have to think about the damn - I just want to get in and be able to get to where I'm going.
Depends if they did all the 60k service stuff or not. That's the first major service interval that could easily run you $2000 (brakes, battery, all liquid changes, belts, etc.)
Not sure I agree. I've seen people do that and they inevitably end up spending thousands on repair and maintenance the last few years of the cars life. Had they sold 'in time' and bought something used, but slightly newer and more reliable, I'm pretty sure they would have ended up ahead.
If you have the time/skill/equipment to do all your own repairs and maintenance it might be OK, but otherwise keeping an old car on the road gets expensive.
One of ours is a 2006 with just over 230k miles on it (Toyota). The last few trips to the shop for just an oil change and tire rotation has turned into large bills to fix things. I don't think if we sold it earlier we'd come out much ahead but maybe I'm wrong.
We plan to replace this with a similar 2-3 year old model and drive that one into the ground. Our other is a Ford and has not been as reliable. That will be replaced with a Toyota when it's time comes (which sadly may be with a lot less years/mileage than the Toyota).
I recently replaced the water pump in the 2014 and the dealer quoted between $4,500-10,000+ for replacing the pump or replacing the engine if the coolant being where it's not supposed to be broke bearings or anything else. I got a second opinion from a small independent shop and he took it step by step and confirmed no engine damage before I committed to the pump replacement. It was around $3,500 total.
Replacing the vehicle would have cost $20k plus, so the math made sense for me to repair. If I was looking at an engine replacement might have gone the other way.
Keeping up with routine maintenance is the most important thing and even then random things do break.
EDIT: Prior to this car, I had a 2002 Pontiac Grand Am. That was the best car I ever had. Bought it for $2,000 and drove it everyday for 5 years until the engine gave up the ghost. Highly recommended.
There's a macro problem that that cars often are necessary to function in USA cities. With limited public transit, especially in the suburbs/exurbs where below median earners are forced to live, getting to a job requires a car. And cars are expensive, no matter how you slice it. Our city designs make it doubly hard to be poor.
I feel for low income earners - They're least able to afford extra expenses, have the least ability to devote mental/time resources to rate/price shopping, and get hit with the highest rates due to low income / low credit. Even if you want to make a good choice, the finances are stacked against you.
It's expensive to be poor.
A deeply engrained conspicuous consumption culture and normalization of debt for non-essential purchases keep the great beast fed.
Take for instance the Nissan Versa: https://www.nissanusa.com/vehicles/cars/versa-sedan.html. This car starts at $17k new, and is an objectively better vehicle in every single possible way than anything you could have bought 20 years ago short of high end luxury. Cars are one of the few consumer goods that have only gotten cheaper and better over time (particularly when inflation is taken into account). But marketers doing what they do, everyone is now convinced they need a $40,000 luxury vehicle to buy groceries and drive to work. It is entirely a cultural issue combined with predatory lending, not a lack of cheap cars to buy.
https://www.edmunds.com/toyota/corolla/2004/features-specs/
Everything.
Safety: Full curtain airbags, LKAS, pedestrian e-stop, better crumple zones, backup camera, blind spot warning
Economy: 40 MPG highway vs 30, better aerodynamics, longer oil change intervals
Performance: Electronic power steering, traction control, full disc brakes with ABS
Features: Apple carplay, cruise control, push button start, power windows/locks, e-parking brake, LED headlights, keyless entry
You really can't even compare a car today to something 20 years ago, and adjusted for inflation the Versa starts at $5k cheaper than that Corolla did new in 2004.
Car owners falling behind on payments in record numbers could be nothing in terms of the history of the next global economic crisis. Or it could be among the dominoes.