Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares gets it – he just doesn’t want to do anything about it. More finely, he is ok with going along with it.
Speaking to a group of journalists in Britain the other day, he said the regulations forcing the manufacture of battery powered devices – EVs – into production (and onto dealer’s lots, there to sit) will “kill” the car industry. He was speaking of the British car industry – which is mostly owned by the Chinese now. But his observation applies generally. The regulatory apparat is out to kill vehicles that aren’t battery powered devices. But most people don’t want – or can’t afford – a battery powered device This is how most people are to be forced out of vehicles. Which is how electric vehicles will kill the car industry.
Does Tavares object? Not really. He’d just like for the killing be done on a less hurried schedule.
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“I think the fact that they’re imposing a ramp-up of [EV sales] makes sense,” he said. “The problem is the magnitude and the positioning of the ZEV mandate vis-à-vis the natural demand of the market.”
Italics added.
This is Mitt Romney Republicanism. Agree with your enemies – and hope that’ll make ’em like you better.
But how does it “make sense” to agree with the people who want to force everyone to drive a battery powered device that most people don’t want because most people like being able to just drive wherever they like, spur of the moment, without having to plan around whether their device has enough charge to get them there? When even if they don’t object to being leashed, they can’t afford to buy the leash?
“I think the fact that they’re imposing a ramp-up of [EV sales] makes sense,” he said. “The problem is the magnitude and the positioning of the ZEV mandate vis-à-vis the natural demand of the market.”
Italics added.
This is Mitt Romney Republicanism. Agree with your enemies – and hope that’ll make ’em like you better.
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But how does it “make sense” to agree with the people who want to force everyone to drive a battery powered device that most people don’t want because most people like being able to just drive wherever they like, spur of the moment, without having to plan around whether their device has enough charge to get them there? When even if they don’t object to being leashed, they can’t afford to buy the leash?
How does it “make sense” to amen-brother those who are forcing Stellantis and every other manufacturer to make devices that are costing them money because they can’t sell them in any numbers at a price that recovers what it cost to make them, plus enough profit to make it worth making them?
Ford just announced it has lost “$132,000 for each of the 10,000 (electric) vehicles it sold in the first three months of the year,” amounting to a loss of $1.3 billion so far this year. There are still nine more months of losses to come. And the bleed is general. It includes Stellantis. Dodge – one of the brands under the Stellantis umbrella – currently has very few new cars available that people want to buy, the popular Charger and Challenger having been taken off the market, but not on account of declining demand. A battery powered simulation (literally) is on deck that looks like and even sounds like the Charger Dodge isn’t selling anymore.
