Rivian CEO issues strong statement about people who purchase gas-powered cars: ‘Sort of like building a horse barn in 1910’::“I don’t think I would have believed it.”
Forgive me, sire; I hadn’t $80,000 to spend on a luxury truck.
You fuck.
If you knew that he was referring to the purchase of a $80k Suburban in 2030 would that change your assessment?
I think you know very well I would never engage with this possibility as a means of self preservation. Good day sir!
So a $77-82k Suburban is good in your eyes then? How come? Why? Oh wait, you didn’t read the quote.
Just because he compared it to a suburban doesn’t mean that the Mitsubishi mirage and used Corollas aren’t a thing.
And sure the Chevy Bolt is 26k, but that’s still 5k more expensive than a new Corolla and has like half the range, and you can fuel the Corolla way faster.
Not with the $7500 federal tax credit, let alone (for CA) residents the tax rebate. It’s not for everyone yet but there’s plenty of people there Bolt is perfect for.
Source: bought one. Is great.
Same. Bolt owner checking in. It’s fucking awesome and was - to me and my family- the obvious choice. It’s not for everyone, but if you can afford it and your lifestyle allows for it, it’s an easy decision.
Slowly but surely EV’s will be the default choice. Prices will continue to fall, infrastructure will improve, and gas will get ridiculously expensive. The tide is changing.
A luxury truck with the ugliest headlights on a car today.
I love the front end of the Rivian.
Whenever I see these razor thin LED headlights on vehicles, my first thought is are those COB chips getting cooled properly?
It just comes across as very sus, a bit like form over function at the expense of headlight longevity
Those aren’t headlights
I’m not even sure what my headlights look like. I never really see them.
And the fucking dangerous high front which is completely unnecessary on an electric car, why is it there. Not even the TESLA FUCKING CYBERTRUCK pulls that shit, say what you will about Tesla, but they understand how the differences between gas and electric cars can be taken advantage of.
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Selling $80k electric cars and making comments like this is sort of like saying ‘let them eat cake’ in 1780
If you read the article you’d see that he said that in the context of buying a Chevy Suburban in 2030. Suburbans start at $77k, so I don’t think his comment is that out of line.
It’s not, of course it’s not.
But we know that legacy Reddit users never even bothered to read the articles anyway. Hurray! I missed-- not.
Yeah but it’s still a fair comment because the cars are too expensive for anyone to buy The battery compared to another car that’s too expensive to buy doesn’t really make any difference.
Because the thing about expensive gas powered cars is there’s also not expensive gas powered cars. So he’s comparing expensive electric cars to variable price gas powered cars.
Wait wait wait, you mean theres more to this story than the title?
Shooketh.
I usually dont bother to read articles, because they are seo garbage. I glance at top comments written by true people to verify info instead
That context is great, but I haven’t seen any articles about the Chevy CEO saying such astoundingly tone deaf shit. 🤔 maybe the price isn’t what’s inflammatory.
Those trucks/SUVs weigh 8500lbs. Since there is no fuel tax being collected, these monsters are destroying the roads and not contributing to their upkeep. My city is passing laws to significantly increase the registration on these vehicles, according to their annual mileage. I’m all for going electric, but an 8500lb truck is not helping the environment
This is true, but fuel taxes are very low. Most states that are charging an EV “road maintenance fee” (with whatever phrasing they select) are charging way more than an ICE vehicle would contribute in fuel taxes. And while it is true that BEVs are heavier than ICE vehicles, all else held equal, and that road wear and tear is strongly dependent on weight… as I recall reading, the overwhelming majority of road wear and tear is the result of freight trucks and similar vehicles.
I’m all for going electric, but an 8500lb truck is not helping the environment.
The issue here isn’t that it’s an EV in this case. It’s that it’s a truck. I’d wager than >95% of people buying trucks in the US would be perfectly served by a four door sedan or comparable sized vehicle. Trucks have largely become expensive vanity items to act as an external signal of a person’s cultural identity. Contractors and similar that actually use a truck for truck purposes still exist, but they’re comically outnumbered by people buying trucks for no good reason.
My conservative neighbor drives an F-150 (~5,500 lbs) and his wife drives a Tahoe (~5,800 lbs). But he had the gall to complain to me last week about the weight of my Model Y (4,400 lbs). It’s amazing what a little bit of oil and gas propaganda has been able to accomplish.
I don’t think it’s propaganda that EVs are heavy as shit for their size. Automakers are really upfront on that fact. You trying to call it propaganda illustrates your bad faith argument. You’re misusing that word and diluting the meaning.
4400 vs 5800 isn’t much of a difference, considering the sizes of the vehicles you listed. You are essentially driving a midsize truck but without the utility of a truck. Your neighbor has two trucks to your one. The top trim Tacoma weighs the same as your lower tier Tesla. Tesla Model X Standard Range comes in at 5,185 pounds.
I think we can both agree your vehicle is extremely heavy for being a small, low/mid tier passenger vehicle. Some Teslas are not eligible for the $7500 tax credit because they weigh so much.
I like how you can’t respond to this. It really hammers home my argument and calling you on your bullshit. Thank you for the votes, because that means I know you read the comment but have no idea how to respond!
My city doesn’t allow big trucks on our roads. The wear and tear of roads is heavily dependent on weight, as you and I both stated. Weighing 3500lbs more (the weight of a Toyota Camry) than even the largest personal vehicle is a problem which I hope they solve soon.
I’m not sure why people think it’s propaganda that EVs weigh 1.5x or more than a standard sedan. It’s a fact, and it’s easy to find information. The tech crowd wants to call anything that hurts their opinion bullshit, but they refuse to look it up. It’s right there on the manufacturers’ websites. I sincerely doubt the owners of Rivian or Tesla are in on some government “propaganda” to lower their own sales.
I appreciate the votes. That proves you read the comment but have no idea how to respond, because you can’t.
It’s important to read the full quote from Rivian’s CEO before complaining about $75k electric trucks:
“I think the reality of buying a combustion-powered vehicle … is sort of like building a horse barn in 1910,” he said. “Imagine buying a Chevy Suburban in 2030 … what are you going to do with that … in 10 years?”
He’s comparing buying a Rivian truck with buying a Suburban, which has a base price of $57k for the lowest tier configuration (LS) and a $76k price on the High Country configuration.
Proof that very few read the article
It’s still a fair complaint though. What about those of us who can’t afford to spend $75,000 on a car?
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Um…does the CEO know that horses are still a thing and that horse barns (aka stables) are still in use? Also, the invention of the automobile didn’t instantly displace the horse. It was well into the 1920s before they became a regular sight.
Also…there’s lots of reasons to buy gas-powered cars these days. For one, not everyone lives in a home where they can install the necessary charger, so you’d always be on the “hunt” for charging stations, and fuel cars are generally cheaper at this time. Once we see the market flooded with EV cars, the prices will come down and fuel cars will no longer be the norm, but we’re likely a decade or more away from that.
I get what the CEO is trying to say, but it’s still incredibly tone-deaf.
Also the recharge times are still a deal breaker for anyone who fancies a road trip every once in a while.
If your road trips are only once in a while, you easily make up for it in saved time not doing weekly fill-ups.
What, you don’t like spending a quarter of your road trip waiting for “fuel”?
I spent under an hour charging on a 8 hour drive. I barely had time to pee or eat before the car was ready. Have you road-tripped an EV?
8 hour drive averaging 50mph(to be conservative and easy math) for 8 hours is 400 miles. What EV can go that far?
Assuming you charged before you left
Charged midway
Charged when you got there
You charged three times for an hour? Even not counting the first charge, you’ll absolutely need the last when you get there. That’s a min 2 hours charging for an 8 hour trip or about 25%.
there’s a couple EVs that can go that far. I rented a Tesla Model Y Long Range, which cannot. I did not leave with a full charge and didn’t arrive with one either. You don’t need to.
I charged 3 times on the way up the coast, for 15, 10, and 20 minutes. The last one was was only longer because I ran into target to get something.
That’s… 9%.
What car takes an hour to charge?? I used to have a Chevy Bolt, the slowest charging EV you can buy. and it didn’t take an hour.
Go play around with A Better Route Planner if you want to see that assuming 3 hours of charging for an eight hour trip is ridiculous.
Edit: 50mph on the highway is laughable, I was going 80-85mph. It’s a bit over a 500mi drive.
That makes sense. I forgot they charge a lot faster when low and assumed a full charge. I’ve only ever driven a Tesla model 3 once on a business trip. Mostly city driving so no long trips.
No, I don’t have 80k to spend on a “maybe I won’t be too worse off”
it was a rental car lol
though you’d be surprised to learn there’s EVs under $80k! not that anyone can afford new cars anyway.
I bought a used Leaf for $11K about 5 years ago. Best car purchase I’ve ever made. I still have a ICE vehicle for road trips, but man do I like the way electric engines produce power!
Used EVs can be a great deal! I’ve had my eyes out for a good deal on a leaf for ages, but not many pop up in my rural area.
I can very much recommend a dacia spring. I think this is one of the most affordable way of transportation. But I live in Switzerland, we have a great charging network and our distances aren’t to far. After paying 5500 CHF upfront, i pay monthly 200 CHF for power and leasing fee (170 + 30). After 3 years I can buy it for 10000 CHF or just give it back. Buying the car directly is about 20000 CHF. Just make sure that you order fast charging as well.
My Chevy Bolt cost less than half that, and that was new with most of the bells and whistles. I drove over 200 miles on a single charge yesterday. Longer road trips are doable with a tiny bit of planning and multitasking. When you’re charging, do all the things you do on a road trip anyway: take a leak, grab a snack, give your mind a quick break.
My car is also the 2nd worst major EV for road trips (after the Nissan Leaf). The Volkswagen ID.4, for example, is a little more than half your $80K number and charges about 2-3x faster than the Bolt.
It’s also pretty awesome to not have to go to gas stations as part of your ~weekly routine because you charge at home and it costs next to nothing.
Agreed, it’s also true that used combustion engine cars can be a great value.
What he actually meant to say was:
“I’ve got my head so far up my ass that I think everybody should be spending $100k+ on a truck regardless of their need or financial circumstances. I’m also incapable of doing my job, which is why my company can’t produce enough units, even though it’s largely a solved supply chain problem. This is how I cope with my shitty existence on this planet.”
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I just looked up the price for a Rivian truck and holy shit is this guy for real? Lmao. Just another out of touch CEO virtue signaling. If he really felt this way he would make them affordable lol
CEO of an electric car company recommends that people drive electric cars.
Doesn’t really seem like much of a headline.
The statement might be more significant if it was a CEO of a car company that made diesel/petrol cars who said it.
It’s more the tone deafness. Most people couldn’t afford either a car or a horse barn in 1910 just like most people (in America anyway) can’t afford an electric car.
How to tell the entire world that you’re rich and entitled.
Have you seen the price of electric cars it’s ridiculous. No way I can afford one.
Also never mind the fact I have no way of charging it because I only have access to on-street parking. If they really wanted to help they should bring down the cost of their massively overpriced vehicles and also invest in distributing charging points around the country.
Isn’t the ultimate plan supposed to be that they’ll be at least one charging point and every highway at least every 8 mi?
It depends where you are and what market segment you’re looking in. In NZ you can buy a fully electric MG ZS EV (7 year warranty) for almost the same price as a base model Toyota Camry.
A new Renault Zoe is about 23 000€, which has a driving range of about 400km. Second hand they go for about 10 000€.
Yeah, there are many luxury EV brands, but those aren’t the only ones existing.
Well maybe if this guy sold an electric car that people could afford, they would buy it
Startup costs need to be softened with a costlier higher margin vehicle. Cannot achieve quality mass production of cars from thin air.
Right but don’t make vulgar statements about how fabulous you are, and how stupid everyone else is but not buying your fabulous expensive car that’s fabulous and expensive, but that’s fine because you’re a startup.
The comment is taken out of context if you’d maybe read the article. It’s a comparison between a Suburban and Rivian who are in the same bracket.
Please pay for my apartment complex to install charger plugs in our garages then.
I’m totally onboard with EV’s, I just can’t have one right now.
If you just have a regular plug in the garage, it works. I thought that I would have to get a special outlet put in, but after plugging in at night for a couple months I realized there was no need. Figure about 5 miles per hour recharge. I have an older used Leaf that was relatively cheap.
I have outdoor parking :/
I don’t have any electrical plugs in my garage. The best I can do is commandeering a 60 watt bulb socket with one of those adapters that turns it into a socket. Also, I don’t think the apartment complex is rigged up to charge tenants for the cost of running that bulb and garage door opening either. So they probably would be pissed if I started charging a full EV in there.
They won’t even notice. Unless you live in an electric supply desert, charging an EV 0-100% is ridiculously cheap.
Yeah, so, how much is one of those Rivian trucks, exactly?
$73,000?
Yeah, fuck off. That’s more than the median annual gross income for American workers. It’s all good and well to tout a slightly more sustainable form of transportation–still not nearly as sustainable as busses or trains!–but when you’re pricing it well outside what most people can rationally afford, you’re not helping the situation.
Average transaction price for a new vehicle in the U.S. is already at $48k. Plenty of electric models are below the average price by now.
The fact is, if you’re considering buying a new car, you’re already on the richer side. So this message is mainly aimed at those richer Americans considering a $73,000 F-150, that they might want to consider a $73,000 Rivian instead.
Even in that instance the Lightning is a better deal.
and it’s only $40,000 to repair a bumper dent! such value!
https://www.thedrive.com/news/rivian-r1t-fender-bender-turns-into-42000-repair-bill
All these products have to come to market in order for prices to eventually come down. People need to see that they have viable options to gasoline cars.
In Norway, more than 80 percent of new cars sold are electric. There are many other options that don’t cost $73,000. Rivian is just one option.
IIRC, Norway also offered substantial tax incentives to people that bought electric cars. IIRC, the fed. gov’t did the same in the US, and car companies responded by raising prices by the amount of the incentive.
Ah, because the only EVs in the market are Rivian ones.
That’s true but you have to consider how much of the car market is made up of used cars. When I was last shopping for cars (4 years ago) there were hardly any EVs in my budget and the ones that were, were 10 year old Priuses. Most people frankly don’t have the income to buy anything more than a gas car. (Market for EVs may have changed since my experience). The way I see it is the CEO is making a good point while also shitting on poor people.
The first response from Google shows me several late model used Nissan Leafs for around $15k. Those didn’t have much range but plenty for most people’s day to day
$15,000 is still substantially more than a 10 year old Prius, though, which hover around $10,000 right now. If your budget is $10,000, you’re probably not getting an all-electric car.
I believe that from his comment (“what are you going to do with that in 10 years”), he was implying buying new cars. I see nothing odd in buying used ICE cars, but I wouldn’t dish out for a new one at this point.
Now if you buy a used car for 10k now, you’ll probably have a harder time getting value out of it in 10 years vs. EV.
I agree that an EV will probably age better, but, at least in the States, you can get a new ICE car a lot cheaper than a new EV, so there’s still a huge price hurdle. There are still a few ICE cars that are available new for as little as $18k. If you want to jump to a EV with comparable range, even used, you’re probably gonna have to spend more than that.
So, there are very real affordability considerations.
Edit: There was a time when you could get an early generation Bolt used for around $17k, but that’s still a hard pill for a lot of people to swallow, paying almost the same for a used, early generation car (many of which were recalled for fire issues) as you could pay for a new car.
Not only the cost, but there’s also the issue of infrastructure. I as well as many others in my city don’t have a garage and park either on the street or on a parking pad in the alley. I wouldn’t imagine a power cord running to a vehicle lasting very long because of the scrap prices of copper. We’ve got a long ways to go.
A giant electric “luxury” truck is still a giant “luxury” truck. Buying one over the other is like buying a cruelty free synthetic beaver cap over a cap made from an actual beaver. Yes it probably is better, but you are still wearing an ass on your head.
It’s 2023, most people live in urbanized areas where a truck is similarly ridiculous, especially the modern “luxury” models. Those that actually use their vehicles for hauling things at a farm want real work trucks and tractors (regardless of engine type) with lower and longer beds.
I buy what my meager wage allows me to afford…
Make an EV that competes on price with a Corolla and I’ll be there.
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Yeah, big words from rivian. Trucks that cost more than a luxury SUV.
Even then. My Corolla cost under $15k brand new off the lot. It’s not the base model either. The base model for the 23 Corolla is almost $22k. Car prices are insane.
The only new car still sold in the US for under $20k is the Mitsubishi Mirage, and even that model will likely be phased out in the next few years. I also wouldn’t recommend buying one, as, speaking from experience, it tends to roll over in a slight breeze.
Weird, I’ve had one for years and it hasn’t flipped over once.
20k is way too much for one, but I bought mine new for 14k. It’s an economy car, not a Mercedes, not a sports car. And they’re 100% better if you get one with a manual transmission.
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still use plenty of fossil fuels from coal plants
This is disingenuous as fuck and you know it. Updates to the grid are by far the most effective means of limiting carbon release. Tying engines to the grid maximizes gains in solar, wind, etc that not doing so does not.
There is no serious plan for climate change mitigation that does not involve EVs.
I own a gasoline car. I was being too flippant. I would point out that our car centric culture is inefficient no matter how you swing it. I agree it’s a part of solving climate change, but cars of any type are still a problem, we need to massively overhaul our urban transit and get away from cars in urban areas.
In the end all transit only accounts for 15% of the overall problem. Our spread out infrastructure caused by car convenience has many other negative externalities though, like the increased need to maintain more roads, electric loss over longer distribution, heating and cooling in large single family homes made possible by cars bringing you to your job while living way out in the suburbs (arguably way more serious than the cars themselves), etc. The suburban experiment was an environmental disaster, and I say this as someone that lives in a large house in the suburbs currently pumping out AC, so I’m not judging.
But plugging in your personal tank isn’t really solving the problem. It’s just ignoring it. Cars are the problem no matter the fuel source, because of the impact they have had on how we spread out and grow our consumption… We need multi use zoning, dozens of train lines in every city, bike infrastructure, work at home, massive reduction in fossil fuel based power plants… A reordering of society around alternatives to spreading out, a massive worldwide effort of urban densification. As well as a massive effort to hold corporations accountable for their energy use as well. That and we need to stop having so many fucking kids, the world can’t support this level of consumption forever.
Not disingenuous. True. Grid power is still dirty so electric cars are still dirty. Probably about a 50% improvement in carbon emissions based on the most common fuel mix in the US for an e car.
Clean transportation by car is a luxury that we do not yet have.
You don’t engineer for what you currently have. You engineer for where you want to be.
Renewable energy is the fastest growing segment of the energy market by a mile, growing exponentially.
I don’t have my numbers at hand, but renewables account for something like 80+% of new energy growth in the US.
Yes. The OP is about how TODAY it is silly to use ICE. Today it is silly to pretend that electric cars are clean. They will be at some point. At that point, I will agree with the obnoxious CEO from the article. Today, he is wrong, very heavy (7-8k lbs) coal powered trucks are not clean.
Make them smaller!
Purchasing EVs sends price signals. Big trucks are in demand, and it’s easier to cater to demand than shape demand when you’re an emerging market.
Seriously the epa doesn’t even bother to rate mpg in vehicles that approach rivian weight. An f250 probably gets a combined 15mpg. It weights 6k lbs vs the rivians 7k. if your only seeing a 50% cut in emissions with the switch to electric. A rivian truck is pretty much the same as an ICE car that gets around 30 combined.
There are a million reasons that drive them to make these monsters. But the climate isn’t one. I don’t care about the market forces. I care about cutting CO2 emissions. These vehicles do not help that mission today. The CEO is wrong. His vehicles don’t make sense TODAY except as a luxury product for rich people to signal their virtue. That’s it.
I don’t care about market forces
Then you are not serious about impacting climate change.
The rivian truck (I call it “froggy”) is actually a pretty small pickup truck, by american standard … have you seen a F150? (including the electric “lightning” version)?
in before, “but I need my enormous vehicle because once every 13 years I haul 3 2x4’s and am too dumb to use a roof rack or rent a truck for the day!”
I win!!!
My enormous eletric vehicle (plug-in Rav4) is powered from my home solar panel system, and I use it to transport my dogs to the park a couple of times a week.
I’m completely guilt free!!!😃
Rivian truck
It’s like buying a small house!
A small house for 74,000? Lol, you’d need at least double that in the Northeast part of America.
I was being facetious
Even a subcompact automobile takes up an entire traffic lane and an entire parking space, and providing such spaces is what ruins cities.
The future is designing our cities for walking, biking and transit, not replacing our disastrous car sewers of gasoline cars with disastrous car sewers of electric cars.
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Man I can haul 3 2x4s in my Camry
Buying any car, electric or otherwise, is 'Sort of like building a horse barn in 1910’.
Real sustainability comes from changing the zoning code to cease outlawing walkability.
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I have absolutely no idea how it would be possible in a rural area or a car centric city. I guess it wouldn’t be, and the people in charge are not willing to change.
I live in a car-centric city, and am relatively civically engaged. Speaking from personal experience, for most of the people in charge, it’s not that they’re unwilling to change; it’s that they’re so indoctrinated from having grown up in American car-centricity that they don’t understand the problem or the alternatives enough to realize that there’s anything to change to. They’re like the people in this thread, who think “infrastructure” means things like adding EV chargers to suburban-sprawl parking lots or trying to get public transit to serve neighborhoods of single-family houses. They have no comprehension of the scope of the problem, which is that the Suburban Experiment is a failure and that the geometry of low-density, car-centric development makes it unsustainable, unaffordable, and unhealthy, regardless of how you power the cars.
Even when they support things like transit-oriented development or abolishing minimum parking requirements, they tend to think it’s the exception to be implemented in certain areas instead of realizing that it needs to be the default way we do things now.
Buying any car, electric or otherwise, is 'Sort of like building a horse barn in 1910’.
Let’s say that it depend on where you live. In a big city maybe a car can be useless (or less usefull), but in a small town like mine a car is basically the only way to move around since public transportation is really limited.
Real sustainability comes from changing the zoning code to cease outlawing walkability.
Even if you remove all the private cars in a city, you will discover that you will substitute almost all of them with small/medium trucks to deliver all the groceries/products you (end everyone else) need in your life. And I say it living in a small town where I can almost do the day by day chores without using a car.
A single delivery truck carries 100-200 packages, if everyone drives to the store instead, you’d have 100+ cars on the road. There is a huge difference.
I am not sure that there would be a so huge difference, especially outside some big cities and especially if you add also the public transportation to the game.
But maybe I am wrong.
It would be quite large. The vehicles per household would decrease to about 1 instead of over 2.
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That would barely scratch the surface, I’m afraid. For quite a lot of America, not owning a car is simply not feasible. I don’t have a large friend/family group, but in 4 cases now, we’ve had to relocate our families a town over because wages aren’t keeping up with cost of living. So we all have long commutes now. There are no buses, trains, etc. We were priced out of housing market. When my landlord sold the property and forced my move 5-6 years ago, I could rent and pay 30% more for a smaller place, I could buy for what I was paying if I wanted to move my family of 5 into a two bed with no yard, etc, or I could move a town or two over pay a bit more, and get a decent size house for my family. Today if I had to buy a house, I couldn’t even come close to affording the place I live in now, especially not at 7-9% interest compared to the 3.5% I got.
Now I guess you could still say fuck me I should have given up my dogs, moved my family into a shoe box and just walked to save the planet, but even then that’s not really feasible. In a town of 60k I moved from, there is only bussing, and even then they don’t run often enough to a wide enough range of places that you’re not building in additional hours of the day to get where you’re going. And they often don’t run past 7pm or before 7am. And that’s most of America. Even in large cities, public transportation is severely lacking compared to the rest of the civilized world.
Biking in the US should also help be a stopgap, but our whole society is so fucking car centric even that’s even not really feasible. Aside from the fact that most of infrastructure rarely has bike lanes or even places to store bikes, its still lacking severely from “I’m just going a few blocks over to the bodega” every few days and is more like “just 5-10 miles to the grocery store.” And this is just looking at my tiny little town where I live that is nowhere near as bad as somewhere like Houston, which is far more populous and also even less dense and less traversable by anything that’s not a car.
In 2023, saying people shouldn’t own cars is either ignorant of the issues around it or just classist. The Rivian CEO saying shit like this, with a starting price of $73k, is just more classist CEO bullshit. We don’t even have the charging infrastructure at the moment to support everyone buying electric, not to mention I’d be willing to bet that 50% or more of this country can’t even afford the starting price on whatever the cheapest electric is.
Real sustainability comes from changing the zoning code to cease outlawing walkability.
Reply:
For quite a lot of America, not owning a car is simply not feasible
WHY IS IT NOT FEASIBLE WHOFEARSTHENIGHT? IS IT BECAUSE OF ZONING? ITS BECAUSE OF ZONING ISNT IT
I hate armchair urbanists so much it’s unreal
