I was in Mexico City two weeks ago and a few uber drivers were driving BYD Dolphins.
I was impressed. At a $14k price point, I can’t imagine better value for money. I got sucked into research and there are no near term plans for expanding to the US market.
It’s too bad. They’re expecting to sell 500,000 units in Mexico this year. With the current (lower) emissions standards, I’m optimistic such affordable EVs will make a big difference to air quality in the coming years.
In China maybe where it's 100k RMB (~roughly $14k). Everywhere else it's the double or at least $25k. It's £26k ($32k) in the UK. It's €32k ($33k) in Germany
"The Seagull went on sale in Mexico as the Dolphin Mini in March 2024. It is available in two variants, dubbed the Dolphin Mini and Dolphin Mini Plus, which are equipped with a 30.88 kWh and 38.88 kWh battery respectively."
Nope... US$120k is most likely the base price (car + taxes). The Certificate of Enrolment (CoE) is market rate, and right now it's an additional SG$85k to SG$111k depending on the vehicle category (on top of the base price).
I read that flyer as the price of the car plus COE. The "Excite Package" Dolphin lists "Guaranteed COE" for $165,888 Singapore dollars ($122,505 USD) all in.
>In Singapore, most people typically purchase new vehicles through dealers. Dealers will collect orders from customers and participate in the COE bidding on behalf of their customers.
>Supply and demand set the price for COE, which regulates demand. When COE prices are high, vehicle prices, as quoted by dealers, will have to increase, reducing demand. When COE prices are lower, dealers can afford to reduce prices if they want to, which will increase demand.
I was just about to comment that a friend of mine owns a BYD and I got to drive his while in Mexico. Can’t remember the model, but it’s a crossover style.
I was ready to hate on it, but for the price and quality inside at least, wild. It also drove like any other car in the low/mid range that I’ve owned, wheel felt confident and had some heft to it (my preference).
I'll admit I don't quite understand how EV demand works in lower income countries like Mexico. One of the major limits I see in the US is that the main appeal of having an EV is reasonably good (i.e. level 2) charging at home, which isn't an available option for many people in the US who don't have private garages with good electrical service. I feel like this limitation would be even more widespread in a country like Mexico, but maybe that's either incorrect or the appeal of EVs outside of the US doesn't rely quite so much on charging at home.
Having just bought an EV, the charging requirements seem to be exaggerated. I'm able to put a bit over 100km range into the car with an overnight charge (9 hours) from a standard power point that can deliver 2.4kW. I'm just using a portable 10A/240V plug-in charger: no fixed infrastructure.
My typical charging regime is: charge to 80%. Drive until the car has done 100km (down to ~50% capacity), then charge back up to 80%. If we go over 100km in a day the car drops below 50%. That can't be topped up in a single night, but it just means the charging accumulates over the next few nights until it's back to 80%. It works as long as the average is less than 100km per day and the peak is less than 300km per day.
Whilst it wouldn't do for a taxi, it's perfectly okay for the driving we do.
I have a Chevy Bolt EUV and charged it on an ordinary US 120V circuit. Because there was nothing else on the circuit, I could tell the Bolt to charge at 12A at home, otherwise it limits itself to 8A anywhere that's not-home. It seemed to be about 3 miles of range per hour at 12A, 2 mph at 8A.
It actually worked pretty well for me. There were a couple of times I ended up "fast" (the Bolt is slow at DC charging) charging but very few in more than a year. The garage didn't have 240V power and we knew we were moving.
At the new house, I have a 240V 60A hardwired circuit for the EV charger so I can charge much faster, probably 25 miles of range per hour, maybe more. I haven't used a fast charger in probably six months.
It is a shock seeing what cold temperatures do to range in the Bolt. We have an Equinox EV and it seems to do better plus it has a longer range to start with.
I've been using a 120V outlet for a few years. I recoup about 50-60mi overnight without an issue. I figured I'd get around to installing a 240V outlet but it just hasn't been necessary.
In the US our regular outlets are more like 1.5kW (110V 15A).
There are also 30A circuits, usually for a dryer or stove. An electrician can set it up for a car, but it's not as easy as running an extension cord to a regular outlet.
You won't find easy access to 240v in most US homes. They're usually put in for very specific appliances like electric laundry dryers or hot tubs. To get your level of charging, most people will need at least some electrical work done.
Your 100km limit is also less than my wife's round trip commute to work, nevermind adding in running errands after or any of the regular travel we do to visit family, though at least some of that would be easy with upgraded charging.
Edit: to be more specific, most US outlets top out at 1.5kw to be safe, though they can usually be temporarily pushed to 1.8 for things like an electric kettle.
That’s essentially _just_ a North America thing (and a couple of countries in South America), tho.
In most countries standard mains outlets are 220-240V, usually 10-15amp depending on country.
> Your 100km limit is also less than my wife's round trip commute to work, nevermind adding in running errands after or any of the regular travel we do to visit family
Even by US standards, that is somewhat unusually high.
Eh, the average US commute is 27 miles according to a recent WSJ article, though this is somewhat recent as it was a bit shorter before COVID.
With that said, ignoring 600 million people, including the single most car-centric cultures, seems a bit silly when talking about EV adoption challenges, no?
Unless your commute is long, charging overnight on a standard outlet is more than sufficient. We have two EVs—one for my daily ~50 mile round trip commute while the other stays in the neighborhood most the time—and we never have to charge outside the home.
Solar is super cheap nowadays - you can have a complete 5kW solar install with an 5kWh battery for around $2000 + labor. I'd argue a similar proportion of people have their own houses.
Additionally, a level 2 charger is just a high amperage wall socket plus some safety equipment.
This is incredibly misleading. The average price per solar install is $3/W so your 5kWh is probably much closer to $15k. Additionally, "+ labor" is actually 66% of the price of solar in the USA (soft costs + balance of system). Could you do the labor yourself? Of course. Do you have the time and tools? Probably not. Is saying "$2000 + labor" false? Technically, no, functionally, yes. All numbers taken from [1]. These do not include batteries in the install.
we're talking about mexico, not the weirdly over-inflated home solar price of the US. For eg australia is around ~ $1/w installed, and they have high labor costs. It doesnt have to be expensive, the US makes it so somehow.
(I would genuinely like an explanation for why it’s so much more expensive in the US. Australia is not cheap for basically anything - high materials and labor cost comparatively. I don’t understand how solar in the US costs so much more. )
Since Trump’s first term, the US has had 25% tariffs on solar panels from China and a few other countries, which certainly wouldn’t be helping.
That said, the Australia price seems particularly cheap; is that before grants and things? In Ireland, say, it’s typically 1.5-2eur/W before grant (grant is .7eur/W up to 2kW, .2eur/W up to 4kW, capped at 1800).
Yeah... I'm sure it's just to protect the market from lack of parts, protect the user's privacy and prevent cars from randomly exploding in the streets. Makes total sense.
There’s a demand aspect; you generally have to produce a version per market. ~No EU-spec cars would be saleable in the US, as they wouldn’t meet safety standards (for instance, very different rules on lights) and vice versa. These standards can often seem trivial, but having two versions of a car is expensive. So “doesn’t meet safety standards” usually means “it is not worth anyone’s time to produce a local version, either for demand or tariff barrier reasons”.
US doesn't have a large demand for EVs so I doubt we'll see BYD in the US. They are building a factory in Mexico that is capable of 300,000 vehicles per year.
"“We’re not planning to come to the US,” Stella Li, executive vice president of BYD and CEO of BYD Americas, told Yahoo Finance Live (video above). “It’s an interesting market, but it is very complicated,” she added, citing growing political pushback on Chinese companies and the slowing rate of growth for EV adoption."
China hit 50% of all new cars sold last summer. Mexico 8.2% of their cars were EVs last year and had 70% growth. US doesn't have an EV market, once the EV credits get pulled, bottom is going to fall out.
“BYD doesn’t want to sell in the US” (I presume due to strong anti-China sentiment which would harm an industry that is closely regulated by the government) is very different from “the US doesn’t have a large market for EVs” especially when the EVs BYD makes are low cost. And with Musk close with the government, BYD would be unlikely to be treated well any time soon. It makes sense that the CEO says “it is very complicated” but that is not the same as “the market is small”.
Are they high? Average price paid in 2024 for a new car was $50k. There are tons of EVs under that price from Tesla model 3/y, For Mach E,Hyundai Ionic, a bunch of KIA models, VW ID4 etc.
In terms of percentage of sales, the US is one of the smaller markets: https://ourworldindata.org/electric-car-sales (see the breakdown under “ Share of new cars sold that are battery-electric and plug-in hybrid, 2010 to 2023”, particularly the battery-electric section)
Now, the US is a big market, but even so, particularly with the US’s tariff barriers and unique consumer preferences (the average car in the US is a lot _bigger_ than elsewhere, and cars made for other markets do not sell well; for instance see the leaf), you can see why car makers would prefer to focus on the EU and China.
I was floored by what they are producing in China. It is a shame that these cars are not reaching more of the world and raising the competitive bar. I get the government subsidy and lower labor costs issues, but the tariffs are retarding competition, propping up prices, and hurting consumers.
Without all the trade restrictions, you could buy a BYD EV for 10k. It's not the greatest car ever, but it would be a cool city car. Naw, better go and pay 40k for a worse American version.
Temu is getting basically banned. It's not enough I pay around 40% of my income on in taxes and healthcare insurance, I now much pay higher prices for the same stuff on Amazon.
Americans are paying a lot for cars not because western manufacturers cannot make cheaper cars.
American cars are expensive because Americans have been convinced buying big SUVs is AMERICAN and patriotic, and even the Americans who aren’t dumb enough to fall for that nonsense have to buy bigger cars because we’re in a car size arms race and it’s outright scary driving a normal hatchback around these massive Trucks masquerading as cars.
This has lowered demand for smaller and cheaper cars, giving auto manufacturers the perfect excuse to stop selling small cars in the U.S. especially since SUVs are just not profitable because they’re unsophisticated and yet super expensive.
> Without all the trade restrictions, you could buy a BYD EV for 10k.
No, you couldn’t. In Switzerland there are no EV trade restrictions and no, we do not have 10k BYDs. They cost roughly same as any other Western manufacturer.
China is very good at mass production. Once they master the art, with the backing of the Chinese government, they can afford to lose money to gain market share. All U.S. car companies, including Tesla, would die if the U.S. allowed Chinese 10k car in.
Hell, Obama didn’t let the auto industry die back in 2008. Can you imagine Trump, who said there would be a "bloodbath" in the auto industry without him—allowing a $10K Chinese car into the U.S. market?
I'd actually be open to a libertarian government if that's what we got.
If before firing thousands upon thousands of government workers, they say eliminated all income taxes on your first 100k, it would do something for the middle class.
I really feel like US taxes are the worst of both worlds. They aren't much lower than in Europe where most(all?) countries have much cheaper if not free healthcare.
A system where getting fired usually cuts off your health insurance sounds like a dystopian novel. Serious health issues have a tendency to stop you from working.
No matter where in the world you go as a US citizen you still owe US taxes.
What does it mean to say you get lower labor cost and government subsidy issues? Are you saying the tariffs are disproportionate to the impact of the subsidies? Temporary price distortions eliminate competition, not encourage it.
The EU might have done a careful calculation with their tarrifs, but the US's tariffs of 100% seems closer to a nice round number they thought sounded good than carefully thought out "proportionate" response to whatever the Chinese governments' subsidies were.
Just an FYI, Kyle (owner of Out of Spec) is a complete narcissistic jerk who treats his girlfriend like complete crap.
It was a pretty bad and uncomfortable pattern to watch unfold online, and many people unfollowed their work because of how awful his (and honestly a few of the others who contribute) attitude(s) are.
They do interesting deep dives and more thorough benchmarks in the EV space, which does stink to not be able to enjoy anymore..I just can’t in good faith support them.
They've also got factories in Europe, South America, and a bunch of other countries. The cars from those factories aren't as inexpensive as the cars from the Chinese factories but they are still pretty low priced for the areas those factories are building for.
They could probably build cars in one of those places that would be economically viable in the US if not for the tariffs, and would satisfy US labor sensibilities.
Are we? Only about 16% of US auto workers are union.
When states started offering incentives like big tax breaks to get auto makers to build factories outside of they often made those breaks contingent on the plants not being unionized. Those states also often had laws designed to make it much harder for unions to organize.
>Intricate, invisible webs, just like this one, link some of the world’s largest food companies and most popular brands to jobs performed by U.S. prisoners nationwide, according to a sweeping two-year AP investigation into prison labor that tied hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of agricultural products to goods sold on the open market.
Why are US EVs 2-3x the cost of BYD EVs? Do US consumers not want cars at that price point, is it regulation, is to labor/material costs, or some combination thereof?
It seems like if there was a $15-$20k EV in the US market, it would be a no-brainer "around town" second car.
Instead we get $30k Model 3/Y's or $80k EV SUV/Vans.
Nissan Leaf now starts at $28k. Chevy Bolt is now $26.5k (was, now discontinued). Given that the dolphin goes for $21k in Mexico, it isn't a huge price diff, definitely not 2-3x. Not sure where you see Model 3 for just $30k, it starts at $40k in the USA. Only in China does a model 3 cost $32k.
> Not sure where you see Model 3 for just $30k, it starts at $40k in the USA
Probably from Tesla.com. It lists the long range RWD cash price as $29920 (in my state) unless you notice the checked checkbox that says "Include est. incentives of $7,500 and 5-year gas savings of $<whatever> for <your_state>" and uncheck it.
This will be interesting to unpack, seeing what happens to Tesla in a marketing theory sense.
I predict that Chinese and us manufacturers will partner or rebadge Mexican or Canadian made Chinese EVs within a decade
Also, I believe the sodium ion battery has yet to impact the EV market. In theory a 200-300 mile car of sodium ion batteries should be 1/2 that of NCM drivetrain or less. That should enable a sub 10k car even in the us
Kinda missing the point that you get 50% more range in the Dolphin, plus a lot of additional niceties / tech stuff that is just not available in the Leaf.
There are more competitive cars at the price point in Europe (the Leaf is kinda long in the tooth now; second-gen is 8 years old), but the US is likely not a priority market for cheap EVs; it's a smaller market for EVs _in general_ than either Europe or China, and it's also not a good market for small cars.
I assume that the 25k EUR id.2 (replacement for the VW eUp, out early next year) will launch in the US, tho, and should be competitive with the Dolphin.
> Kinda missing the point that you get 50% more range in the Dolphin,
Nissan leaf: 240 km (149 miles) for the 40 kWh version and 341 km (212 miles) for the 62 kWh version.
BYD Dolphin: 340 km (211 mi) for the 45 Kwh version, 427 km (265 mi) for the 60kWh version. The cheapest 30 KwH version doesn't have a WLTP range that I can find (I don't think it is being exported outside of China anyways according to wiki).
The Leaf has just been discontinued and Nissan is running out the remaining stock at about 30% discount, making it one of the cheapest EVs in the market where I live. If it's the car you want, now's a good time to buy a Leaf.
Doesn't that have very bad battery degradation due to lack of cooling system for it? That's what my friend said who is really into EVs. Personally I don't have any type of car.
Subsidies. Basically all savers in China that have money in the bank have to pay for development of what the central Government considers a priority, like steel and aluminium production, solar panels or EV vehicles, or chip manufacturing.
Aluminium and steel costs significantly less in China than the rest of the world, but they now face significant problems because of overcapacity. There are so much factories built and so small demand companies can not survive without help from the Government. They were build thanks to cheap loans from the Government.
So the Government made an investment that is not making money, so basically is a transfer of wealth from bank savers account to industry.
This is also applied in the US and EU, let's remember interest rates below inflation, "Quantitative Easing" and other transfers of wealth the central banks do in the West.
> There are so much factories built and so small demand companies can not survive without help from the Government. They were build thanks to cheap loans from the Government.
It feels like this is true for any older Western country like Germany or the UK too. Why exactly have China been successful in reducing costs?
China boasts a complete industrial chain and the best logistics infrastructure. If you want to engage in industrial production, you can find the most suppliers here, who can provide you with the parts you need at the fastest speed and lowest logistics cost.
Not to mention the largest number of educated workers, who won't leave marijuana in the products you send to customers.
These are all factors that can actually reduce costs, which cannot be achieved solely by subsidies.
There are tons of used Leafs online for under 8k USD that still have a range of 60-100 miles. Perfect around town car but the price seems to reflect that no one wants one.
China has heavily subsidized EV production in order to become a leader in that area (particularly battery production). Same thing they did with solar panels.
It seems like if there was a $15-$20k EV in the US market, it would be a no-brainer "around town" second car.
Every few months Electrek publishes a list of EVs that can be leased in the United States for under $200/month. Sometimes they're as cheap as $99 or even $0/month, depending on your state's incentives.
American companies have been using the excuse of “more technology/screens” to justify the higher price points. Then using vague “inflation”/“pandemic”/“supply chain issues” to justify higher prices.
However as we witnessed during the pandemic, manufacturers of goods tend to increase the cost of the goods despite minimal increase in supply chain, cost of materials or labor. It’s all for maximizing profit and they were “testing” the market to reap massive profits.
With no competition, they (collectively as an industry) felt no need to decrease prices or offer cheaper vehicle options.
I also suspect abuse of CAFE exceptions (ie, “light duty trucks”) is the second leading cause of the death of affordable vehicles.
BYD also charges ~double the price in other markets, including Mexico, compared to China. That makes it very close to a base Model 3, for much less car.
One might hope it’ll cause Tesla to drop the price for their “full” self-driving too. $8'000 for a software feature is just bonkers. Especially in Europe, where there’s no subscription option, so you can’t even try it without paying the full price first, and many of the fancier features are not supported here. Even regular auto-pilot is not very reliable for me, it often fails to recognize city limits signs, and fairly often panic brakes because it misinterprets cars driving on the other side of the road as being on collision course.
It’s $8000 because it doesn’t work and it comes with free hardware upgrades until it works (for some definition of ‘works’ but currently it breaks often enough and badly enough that you’d have to be dishonest to say it works without a huge collection of qualifying footnotes attached to the statement)
You can bet that the 100% tariff on BYD cars in the US isn’t going anywhere with Musk so influential in the government. A $14k EV would be a huge threat to Tesla’s market cap.
>Musk opposes US tariffs on Chinese electric cars. "In fact, I was surprised when they were announced. Things that inhibit freedom of exchange or distort the market are not good," Mr Musk said on Thursday. “Tesla competes quite well in the market in China with no tariffs and no deferential support. I’m in favour of no tariffs," he added.
>Tesla TSLA has joined BMW and several Chinese manufacturers in challenging EU tariffs on China-made electric vehicles at the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), per a court filing.
I think rest of world will gobble these up though, especially with retaliatory tariffs or straight up import bans on Teslas on the table from aggrieved trading partners.
OTOH, theoretically, could we produce a decently priced EV with US materials only? If we go all-in on automation, could one factory worker do the job that many do today, thereby reducing costs? If we can head in that direction, I think Elon wants to compete in that kind of market, not bog it down with regulation.
Sure. Price every good from not-USA 1000x and let’s see what happens.
I thought the republicans were in favor of a free market, but it seems more like those with power don’t mind putting some weight on their side of the scale, since they own the scale and the bank.
> I think Elon wants to compete in that kind of market, not bog it down with regulation
Be careful about any phrase that starts with “I think {person} wants to…” especially if person is rich/powerful. Judge people based on their actions, not the facade they put on.
We already know what will happen. The US goods will be priced to match the price of foreign goods with tariffs and zero money will be spent investing in future production capacity in the US.
We know this will happen because it is what always happens when countries impose punitive tariffs on foreign goods. Later, the domestic industry collapses and the tariffs are lifted.
> I think Elon wants to compete in that kind of market, not bog it down with regulation.
Exactly what market is that? Where Tesla has 0 responsibility for any issues / defects / deaths-from-FSD? Sure, that market he wants to play in - it has only upside for him.
The one where he has to compete on price/features/whatever, and he can't make rude comments or cut people off who he doesn't like? Please pass the bong..
To me, tariffs from the orange man are political theater and appeal to his base, and subsequently sell it via media.
What’s to stop manufacturers of goods from shipping it from a country that is not China, laundering it through a different country. Paper work for container says, “imported from {non tariff restricted country}” at the ship yard.
Cheap Chinese goods still flood the market. Orange man gets to say he has been hard on China via tariff war.
Yes, Biden increased by $18 billion the $300 billion tariffs that Trump first put in place.
> The new tariff rates – which range from 100% on electric vehicles, to 50% for solar components, to 25% for all other sectors – will take place over the next two years.
> And I was eating it up until she turned on self-driving and we crashed into a parked car.
I mean, I don't see your problem; she was simply demonstrating that it had the same capability to randomly crash into things as Tesla's solution! That's what people _like_ about the Tesla one; keeps things interesting.
Yeah I drive a BYD Atto 3 and it's a great car but the lane assist and adaptive cruise control lets it down significantly. I won't be getting excited about self driving this decade.
Like the article says, Many Tesla owners are also looking to offload or sell them to avoid any appearance of endorsing Musk or his views or being linked to them in any way.
Many awkward conversations are being had with Tesla owners around Musk and alot of them don't feel comfortable owning the cars anymore.
This BYD feature, while BYD is not a perfect company themselves, will cause further issues for Tesla.
I love FSD. I use it daily. It's replaced a lot of driving for me. This should 100% be available to everyone for free. It will significantly improve safety once edge cases are worked out.
Edge cases like snow and rain? If you live in Southern California it seems like it will replace humans everywhere. If you live anywhere with seasons, you wonder when they’re going to figure out cameras don’t work in heavy rain or with a layer of salt caking the lens.
surprisingly, it works excellent in rain. i was on the highway in florida in a torrential downpour, the kind where everyone turns their flashers on and goes 25mph. many people pulled over to wait it out. FSD handled it perfectly even though i could barely see. it did show a warning that it might be degraded due to weather, but there was no change in performance.
>BYD has deployed three different versions of the “God’s Eye” ADAS across its line-up. All three offer automated parking and lane-keeping features, with the basic version – available on models costing up to 219,800 yuan ($30,078.69) – enabling autonomous driving on highways. The driver must keep their hands on the wheel and take control when necessary.
>Two higher-end versions will be installed on more expensive BYD-branded cars and its premium Denza and Yangwang brands. These will enable a car to drive autonomously — though also under human supervision — in more complex urban traffic.
The base version is self driving as in lane assist. It will not change lanes for you or 'self drive' to your destination.
I agree with BYD that these are great safety features and give them props for not gating safety behind a paywall.
Here's a video of the self driving in action. The commentary is in Korean but you can still see it drives ok in some tricky situations. There was one human intervention in 30 mins driving. Filmed in China. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qjl3r3D2tG4&t=340s
Surely they cannot sell at this price without government subsidies (direct or indirect)?
This possibility paints a frightening picture of the power of government in the global marketplace. The government of any large country can selectively choose to monopolize any specific industry and wipe out all competitors in other countries via subsidies.
It's not a fair playing field for market participants. It makes the whole environment completely unpredictable and dominated by the whims of hundreds of different governments. It promotes government scheming over raw productive capabilities of workers and entrepreneurs; it throws decentralized economic efficiency under the bus in favor of monopolistic, centralized government-oriented strategies.
In such environment, I can understand why tariffs are essential. You can't have a market where participants are playing by different rules of different countries. Also, you can't expect market participants to familiarize themselves with the (possibly secret) policies of hundreds of different governments or be forced to abandon their entire industry in their own country because they happen to be skilled in an industry which is not propped up in their own country as it is in some other foreign country.
Our system is so incredibly asymmetric, right down to the monetary layer. People ought to refuse to participate at all.
BTW, it's not only China which plays these games; you could also say this about US tech/software industry.
Tarrifs don't really help in this situation though. The actions of large governments do not affect just themselves, it's affect other countries too. The affects are much greater than just where to get the cheapest steel. Smart governments can use that to their advantage.
If you look at it from a big picture, one of the major winners of the Ukraine war has been the USA oil and gas industry, as Europe now imports almost 3x the amount of LNG it did before the war from USA [0].
The USA military complex is also doing pretty well, as governments in Europe are allocating more towards defense as Russia seems like a much riskier neighbour than it was 5 years ago.
I'd be interested to know what inference hardware they are using. Some of their cars are so cheap the inference hardware would cost a good percentage of the cost of the car....
I wish America was a free market economy that embraced capitalism. The American consumer is getting screwed over and forced to pay more for an inferior product because the government wants to protect the local auto cartel.
If both China and the US were a free market that didn't subsidize electric car production and construction, neither country would have any electric car manufacturers.
I mean, I suppose it comes down to "define free market". No market is entirely free, but it's totally conceivable that you could have a non-protectionist market which still subsidises market segments seen as desirable. That is generally ~how the US and EU markets writ large have worked for the past few decades, say (though cars are a bit of a special case, and the US in particular has always been quite keen on protectionism there.)
If you bought a car in a big Chinese cities, you might complain about having to win in a lottery (Beijing) or pay in an auction (Shanghai) just to have the right to buy one. And even after that, you aren't allowed to drive your car everyday of the week.
Cars in America are still relatively cheap to buy and operate by world standards. They aren't much cheaper in China (and can become very expensive for non-econo luxury models), and you can face a lot of restrictions on when you can use them.
> Many Chinese cities implement driving restrictions based on the last digit of a car's license plate, but EVs are typically exempt from this rule.
I didn't know that, good point! You would already want to get an EV in Beijing since the license lottery has a separate allotment for them, but even then you might not win a license (not sure what the odds are right now, it depends on what they are selling). I assume SH is the same.
You have it nearly completely backwards. China is screwing over the world by subsidizing their car exports. No car company can compete unless their government also subsidizes.
there's no such thing like a free market economy that embraced capitalism in history
there're only certain stages of economy had advantages in foreign trade so they claim themself as 'free market' and try to force others accept this 'free market'
A bit surprised to learn that their product is called "God's eyes", given that this is a Chinese company - I thought religion was frowned upon in Communist China. Am I missing something?
Mysticism in general is fine, you just can't be a political rival.
Plus, like in English, there are a ton of words people use more for the poetic impressiveness than because they're specifically asserting a supernatural power.
All religions not approved by the party are frowned upon in China.
Also, when a religion refuses to gain approval, the party quite literally hard forks it. Catholic? No, you have the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association; which was only recently tentatively reconciled after about 60 years of schism (though it’s still a very uneasy peace).
I mean for one that religion isn't frowned upon and that it's just a marketing slogan, but also if you want to actually look at it, the Chinese phrase used by BYD is: 天神之眼, what they've in English translated to "God" is, in Chinese "Tian" (Heaven) a very common concept you have in Taoism or Confucianism or pretty much any Chinese mythology. You might have come across the phrase Tianxia (天下) "under heaven". But for an Anglophone audience "God" is probably catchier.
There's a Chinese car called Ora Good Cat or Ora Funky Cat, depending on market (sadly, someone who had at least some vague idea of how marketing worked got involved and it is now called "Ora O3" in Europe). It is generally understood that it is not in fact a cat, good, funky or otherwise.
I see. There’s not much to refute, the country doesn’t really promote so much organized religion. You should go to Beijing though, I definitely saw Christians there, and Chinese culture also has many elements of Taoism embedded even if they’re generally atheist.
you can "refute" this just by going to china. you will see buddhist temples, monks, christian churches and congregations, mosques, muslim people, halal restaurants etc literally all over the place. i don't think there's really anything to "refute" here
Usually, you can tell whether an article has ideological and political biases by looking at its accompanying pictures. Recognizing this helps you critically engage with your sources.
as for your question
> "The ruling Chinese Communist Party promotes atheism and discourages citizens from practicing religion"
communisim is a materialism ideology, so communists should not practice religion, CPC members could be discharge if they do so
there's no limits for non-CPC citizens abt this, "religion freedom should be respected" is written in the constitution
this is not a question for anyone in China or have traveled in China, because if you were there you'll see how many people in temples there at weekends
yes. what you're missing is religion isn't frowned upon in china. nobody cares if you call something "god's eye" and although most people are atheist, there's still a ton of people practicing many different religions right out in the open and its not against the rules
Instead lets have them made in a place that has threatened to take over ~4 sovereign nations in the past three weeks? Yeah I'll take the 1/2 price cars thanks.
Can you in any way separate in your mind the idea of the USA as a nation of 300,000,000 people, who need jobs and who all benefit from having safe and good quality cars, from the trolling actions of a few politicians?
With statements like yours, it feels like the left is rooting for the most catastrophic outcomes possible for that whole country, just to spite Trump. Even though we'd all lose and Trump wouldn't be affected either way.
Well there are another 7.6 billion people on this planet many of whom are already feeling the consequences of the "trolling actions of a few politicians".
I'm not American or a "leftist" for reference. I have no ill will towards the American people, neither the Chinese or any other. Governments on the other hand.... But regardless if I can buy a car for 1/2 the cost from one belligerent major power over another. Yeah - I'll take the half price car.
Pardon my assumption -- if you're not in America, America's tariffs on their imports don't impact availability of cheap Chinese cars (should you want to trust them).
You are assuming that all posters on HN are American? An Australian, for example, doesn't care if their car is made in china or not, they are taking the cheaper car! Many countries don't have local auto producers, and they are just going to take the best deal, and that's going to be Chinese.
> With statements like yours, it feels like the left is rooting for the most catastrophic outcomes possible for that whole country, just to spite Trump. Even though we'd all lose and Trump wouldn't be affected either way.
This only makes sense if the poster is American though right? Otherwise, they are just being pragmatic.
I assumed they were American only because they seemed to have an opinion on the import tax America charges on BYD cars. If they live anywhere else, America's import taxes don't impact them.
I don’t see that anywhere in the comment hierarchy, but that would make sense. However, I think there is a misunderstanding: parent was talking about not wanting to depend on cars made in the USA, they nowhere seem to imply that they are in the USA. If you aren’t in the USA, the USA’s agenda right now (take over a bunch of non-USA territory) is not more appealing than china’s (sell cheap EVs, maybe take Taiwan someday). Trump’s unpopularity abroad doesn’t help matters, I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump threatens them and they respond by signing free trade deals with China.
I asked "would you want all cars to be made in China" (meaning all cars bought in America) because American-built cars built by people who are paid nontrivial wages would not be competitive in America with those built by very low cost Chinese labor if America lets Chinese cars in. None of this impacts anyone else though.
If you really think Trump is going to try to literally take territory though, you've really been trolled. He has said all kinds of ridiculous shit in his 'political career.' That's his one signature thing.
What's your alternative to dominance by China? Dominance by Elon Musk? American industry has been fucking the dog since the 1980's. This is what we deserve.
This attitude is why Trump won. A statement like that sounds like you've stopped trying to make anything better, or to articulate a competing plan and convince voters to support it.
So, in this way, the self-loathing defeatism is partly responsible for people like Trump gaining more power.
Is it the UAW who has forced the automakers to make primarily those high-profit trucks, and to only design terrible EVs?
In my opinion the reason why we're in the dark ages of EVs is that a majority of Americans have range anxiety so our EVs have to weigh a lot and cost a lot to have 250 mile batteries, whereas everywhere else you can buy a car with an 80 mile range for a price poor people can actually afford.
Note - the range anxiety is both because of our car-centric (sub)urban design encouraging lifestyles where you drive 100 miles a day, and because of how a large number of urban dwellers and even suburban non-rich have no garages to do home charging. (And it's objectively far worse to own an EV for anyone who can't charge it at home.) All of this causes people to refuse to buy cars with say, 75-100 miles of range unless they're hybrids.
Most of the pro-CCP ideologues I see these days have a horrifyingly naïve sense of equivalence between China and any given other country (or are just sockpuppets of the CCP but I doubt there are many of those on HN).
The same party that happily ran over peaceful protestors with tanks, and never even so much as apologized for it, is still in power almost 40 years later. They openly put their people in prison just for criticizing the Party.
People compare the CCP to Western countries' misdeeds against their citizens when there's not even a comparison. For instance, when the US illegally wiretapped on the AT&T and Verizon networks to slurp up all the call data they wanted, they didn't actually use that data to imprison citizens for their speech, even ones who said things like "Bush is a war criminal." China both does the privacy invasion itself, and quite openly uses anything they can uncover to persecute anyone they deem a threat to their power.
>>persecute anyone they deem a threat to their power
USA does this as well, its just critique of government by a single person is not a credible threat to the US government. Mind you, all these "freedom fighters" ended up being financed by the USAID, so literally were foreign agents.
Whistleblowers get the whole book thrown at them, Snowden and Assange got nearly killed by CIA, Iraq files whistleblowers get book thrown at them.
USA is just as bad empire as China, and probably even worse, because of the millions of murdered innocent people over the decades of forever wars.
You've cited a small number of people including radicals like Assange who believe basically all information should be public, no matter the possible damage. That doesn't establish a pattern like the many political prisoners China has and continues to imprison.
> millions of murdered innocent people [...] China has no such track record
No, China, since becoming Communist, has specialized more in murdering their own citizens.
Anyway, thanks for providing a great exhibit of exactly what I was talking about: either CCP propaganda, or hopelessly naïve Westerner bent on believing in these two nations' moral equivalency. This is the same level of honest discourse we'll see heavily promoted on TikTok when China invades Taiwan in a few months or years, saying "China and the US are the same, so who cares if they take over a democracy by force."
Japan hit its peak before surveillance capitalism became pervasive. They also categorically fail at developing complex software. The Chinese won't make that mistake.
You can see the effects of the free market in many industries which have been decimated by globalization.
We used to be able to get a manufacturing job which would provide for a family, but decided it was okay to allow big corps to use slave labor on the other side of the planet and just ship everything across the world (not great for carbon emissions). Just look at the rust belt.
It’s not a bad idea to say that we should have the free market stop at our border. Other countries don’t play by the same rules that we do and can even have entire industries propped up by a foreign government in order to take up market share.
We are the richest nation on the planet. The reason the rust belt exists is because we decided it was better to have the most billionaires than to invest and care for our people. It’s entirely possible to help raise other countries out of poverty, which globalism has, and take care of your people. We just didn’t.
I'm not sure what you mean by "care for our own people". I would say that providing an abundance of meaningful work that can feed a family is one of the best ways we can care for our own people. We have unions and high wages, and having good paying jobs for people who don't want to or can't afford to attend University means that people from all walks of life can have some prosperity.
Removing industry from an area brings nothing but misery to the people who live there. Are you suggesting that some sort of communism should have been implemented in the rust belt where we give these people free money or something?
The Chinese market is way larger than the US one, they have everything they need to lift themselves out of poverty by building things for themselves. The US became the richest country in the world by building everything here and reaping the rewards with greatly increased prosperity.
There is no reason to send all our good paying jobs to the other side of the world, and ship all goods across literally the entire planet, the process of which emits and insane amount of C02, just so that the owners of mega corporations can make a few extra dollars per unit.
The "rules based order" is just an American invention to give our government something to talk about besides international law, which the US has basically always ignored.
no, you cannot enforce rules based order on the whole world when it suits you (to force everyone use USD for reserves and global trade, allowing USA to borrow unlimited money for free and export inflation to entire world), but the moment it doesnt suit you - just abandon it.
why would anyone trust usa's word if any agreement/word/promise can be torn unilaterally?
I agree with you, I'm trying to add color to the situation by pointing out that America has benefited from this invention stemming from the conditions of pax americana where the alternative is international law via the UN and ICC and other institutions that are perhaps more independent than the US would like.
> china can't just do whatever and tariff american companies to hell, right?
In general, the US would introduce retaliatory tariffs in that scenario; the game theory of the situation basically requires that.
Despite popular belief, the CCP is also not actually completely immune to public discontent (it often seems to be really quite scared of it), and would likely be willing to kick off a major trade war, as it would cause price increases.
Even if we consider "China is funding the companies to no end" argument... well, frankly, I wish US would do the same. It is pretty damn cool to see incredible technological progress in huge scale.
The various incentives, tax rebates and ZEV credits that Tesla (and other EV manufacturers) benefited and still benefit from are also government funding, so the US already do the same.
This _hasn't_ happened in Europe, which has lower tariff barriers on Chinese cars. BYD has about 15-20% of the EV market, as do VW, Stelantis, Tesla, Hyundai and BMW (unlike the US or China the European market doesn't have one clearly dominant player in EVs); no other Chinese manufacturer really moves the needle (though MG (SAIC) is regionally popular).
What is so special about EV cars?
its just an appliance to move from point A to point B, even the electric motor inside EV is from household appliances like washer/dryer.
the question should be: Should American consumers be allowed to drive green environmentally friendly cars for $10k or should they be forced to shell out $50k (+interest) to billionaire elon musk
Irrespective of what country, and your belief/disbelief in the threat level, you have to see that a highly internet-reliant device that would bring much of the country anywhere (thanks to car-centric infrastructure) would be a perfect target for a hostile nation, no? With one click you cripple the workforce. Again, speaking nothing of which country is or is not hostile.
how would that car get access to Internet, if wireless providers are controlled by the USA ?
Verizon, ATT, Tmobile and their APNs are controlled by the FCC, and any regulation can force vehicle traffic to be isolated if there is credible threat.
but, why would BYD or other nation sabotage its own future profits by bricking cars?? it doesn't make sense.
if I sell you gadget, I would never brick it, cause I am going to lose all future profits
> how would that car get access to Internet, if wireless providers are controlled by the USA ?
> Verizon, ATT, Tmobile and their APNs are controlled by the FCC, and any regulation can force vehicle traffic to be isolated if there is credible threat.
This response would *not* be soon enough. One response from a server, and the car could be bricked forever, explode/short circuit causing a fire, self-drive into the nearest government building, etc. A car is a huge weapon, especially when remotely controlled. This software could be pre-installed from the factory, with commands injected via side channels. I could imagine a hundred ways to do this.
> but, why would BYD or other nation sabotage its own future profits by bricking cars?? it doesn't make sense.
I'm precluding this situation with a background level of hostility between nations... they don't care about maximizing profit, but maximizing damage. It would be a government stepping in forcing this.
its pure paranoia.
first of all, I as a consumer, mature enough to understand risks and carry them myself, I dont need no government to babysit and censor what I am allowed to buy.
second, you assume China will resort to bricking civilian cars, when they have better options like actual weapons. Bricked car can easily be towed away, there is no way China can cause damage.
the best way for China is to keep manufacturing cars and selling them to USA for $$$ - this will ensure the relationships are beneficial to China (mutual trade is better than military conflict)
> its pure paranoia. first of all, I as a consumer, mature enough to understand risks and carry them myself, I dont need no government to babysit and censor what I am allowed to buy.
You have the tools to reverse-engineer every single chip in your car to ensure they aren't backdoored?
> second, you assume China will resort to bricking civilian cars, when they have better options like actual weapons.
Again, my argument has nothing to do with China, I'm simply saying cars would be a great thing to weaponize. Much easier than smuggling a weapon into the US, you just sell a car to a consumer and you have functionally a remote-controllable bomb.
> Bricked car can easily be towed away, there is no way China can cause damage.
Not if it's driven away and used in an attack first. did you read my reply? You still haven't actually responded to my point that internet-connected cars would be an excellent weapon by a hostile nation.
I dont, but there are plenty indie hackers who would be happy to buy cheap $10k car and reverse engineer it.
Any backdoors would be easily detectable and preventable just by .... not connecting the car to the Internet, or folding connection to isolated VPN not accessible from the outside.
all vehicle traffic can be inspected and sinkholed with IoT firewall, if you really want it
Not when cellular or satellite chips are very well hidden... You might not even know about them, let alone have the ability or knowledge on how to stop it from connecting, force it through a VPN/firewall, etc. You already can't do that with desktop PC's thanks to things like Intel ME.
All those telecom companies have also been infiltrated by China RECENTLY, and they don't even know how long or how badly, AIUI.
Good point though. My current cars drive just fine without internet - I would hope future cars would continue to do so, even if GPS doesn't work, can't find a charging station, etc. Otherwise, I'll be stuck with gas cars until the day they take my license..
it's amazing to me when people on hn (supposed champions of meritocracy and innovation and free markets etc) are so scared of actual free trade. like what are you scared of? equilibration in wages? the only reason to be scared of that is because you're afraid of your purchasing power going down but that means of course your current purchasing power comes at the expense of someone else's. and if you don't buy that argument - "it's not a zero-sum game you communist!" - then you have nothing to be scared of (because your purchasing power will remain high) and you should support truly free trade.
> it is weaponized to destroy a nation-state’s industrial output surreptitiously
are we talking about the US or China or Canda or Mexico here? i can't keep track of who the "bad guys" are that are supposedly weaponizing and who the victims are.
On 12/17/24 they hit a 52 week high around $490 per share. Since then, in less than two months, they have lost one third of their value. https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/
Musk has single-handedly alienated his core domestic buying demographic in favor of a group that, when polled, says they would not consider an EV at rates of around 70%.
EU markets in which TSLA was viable but contested are even worse.
This while Tesla's strongest international competitor is passing on units sold, executing better, and underpricing them.
As someone who has followed Tesla since the Model S, previously held Musk in some regard, and test drove a Model 3 I find this such an abject travesty of an outcome for what should have been a great US based global car maker and someone who had the potential to accomplish such good for the world with their incredible wealth and privilege.
To my understanding, the ridiculous stock price and valuation have absolutely nothing to do with the car business. It's basically the potential hopes and dreams of what the leadership can do with direct access to US government.
Yup. And don't buy the line that Elon made Tesla a success. They had the core tech and talent to build an EV (without all the other bullshit he added) before he came along. Given enough time they could have been something on their own too.
This is most definitely not true. Tesla was barely more than an electric powertrain and battery combo when Musk took over. The first production Roadsters even reused the chassis from Porsche 911s (IIRC).
Other US competitors aren't at parity with Tesla or BYD. Nikola went bust. Legacy automakers turned out mediocre EVs. Rivian is the only true competitor, but they are a luxury brand and don't have Tesla's crown jewel (the Supercharger network).
> Tesla was barely more than an electric powertrain and battery combo when Musk took over.
Musk also had zero experience or track record making cars when Musk took over, nor any hardware products of any kind, for that matter, or running a manufacturing org.
Occam's razor would indicate it's very improbably to credit success all to him.
It was a Lotus. I don't see how you can get that so badly wrong (they aren't even remotely similar) and claim to know the state of Tesla at that time very well.
Waymo literally drives around as a Taxi without a driver. Millions of miles and no major accidents.
With Tesla FSD there is another horror story every day
I used Waymo in SF 6 months and it pulled behind a parked car, thinking it is traffic waiting to turn left. Also Waymo drive feels like drive of a 90 year old non confident driver, where as Tesla's FSD is in another level, drives just like a taxi driver.
I took a road trip over Christmas from Massachusetts to Florida and back, and used FSD on my Model Y the entire drive.
The number of times I had to manually disengage because it was doing something stupid / dangerous was... a lot. More than a dozen interventions, maybe two dozen.
You sarcasm detector, is indeed, not working. I saw it as the next logical step and thought of the reaction of the US government. You know, it falls in line with the whole DeepSeek thing. On some level Im glad it was downvoted but seriously?
While I love hearing TSLA getting undercut and ripped apart by competition. I’m honestly curious as to how this company is able to do so - are they cutting quality of materials elsewhere? Safety concerns? Or just plain ole use of ~~slave~~ cheap labor? Or have the EU and US car manufacturers been ripping us off all along?
Perhaps this Chinese EV car is loaded up to the tits with surveillance technology and EV company is going to go behind your back and sell it to the highest bidder to make up the loss in sale of vehicle.
China has better manufacturing prowess than the USA. Their scale is astonishing and they have an incredible ecosystem of components, logistics and labor to make manufacturing hyperefficient. I'm sure the government helps them out too, but one shouldn't discount just how good they are at manufacturing.
Ultra-optimized manufacturing and supply chains, lower labour costs, lower material and transportation costs as everything is available next door; add twenty years of building up an auto industry with strong government support.
A lot of the chinese car brands are using European design expertise. Nio and Zeekr have a full 5-star Euro NCAP lineup, and even the small weird ones like the “Ora Funky Cat” are getting top safety marks.
Besides the US vs. China wage differences, it is easier to source things locally and iterate quickly. At least that is what I read as one of the advantages Chinese car manufacturers have.
I went to an EV drive day here in Australia and drove around 25 models round a track for the day. The BYD Seal came out on top for me and many others.
Interior styling is so much better than Tesla as is fit & finish. The driving dynamics were neck & neck with Tesla and a few other high end cars.
BYD also make great batteries and use CATL I think in some models. I can see BYD being the dominant player in the not too distant future.
Government subsidies. It isn't a fair playing field. You're essentially celebrating that the Chinese government is choosing for their car company to crush rather than the rest of the world's car companies. This isn't an example of being "ripped apart by competition". It's being ripped apart by a government.
The phrase "If the product is free, then you are the product" doesn't preclude a company from selling you something and also making you the product. They are capable of screwing you over twice.
suddenly some foreign company gains control over traffic in your country
think how it works with various Maps and their pathfinding algorithms, how often you see drivers blindly following Maps instructions? how often do you see drivers who are clueless without Maps?
the self driving / remote control will cause even more problems (+ some car manufacturers simply cannot achieve good quality)
You can say the same about Mercedes, Tesla, Nissan and etc. Sure, you can make the "friendly state" argument, but then again, realpolitik is kinda funny nowadays.
