Smaller cars have always been available, but people have shown a preference for bigger cars where they can sit higher up, even though it costs them more.

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mort96 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

I'm not talking about size, I'm talking about range and weight. You can have a huge car or a smaller car, going from a 90kWh battery pack to a 30kWh battery pack is gonna have the same weight saving in both

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andrepd 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Maybe they should be at least charged for the catastrophic externalities that that "preference" results in.

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eldaisfish 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

does "preference" equate to endless, manipulative advertising from car manufacturers? Or, perhaps, the "preference" of higher profit margins from larger cars, pushing manufacturers to entirely abandon reasonably sized cars?

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potato3732842 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

"Everyone who doesn't want what I want them to want has been brainwashed by corporate interests" is not a robust assertion under even the most casual scrutiny.

I hate to break it to you but something like a Rogue or HRV does circles around an Altima or Civic when it comes to daily flexibility and utility for a fairly paltry additional cost. It doesn't take a degree in rocket surgery to figure out why they fly off the shelves. For the average person they're a good combination of attributes.

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eldaisfish 2 days ago | parent [-]

The North American market now only includes a handful of sedans. Meanwhile, Hyundai and Toyota somehow manage to sell “tiny” cars in Korea, Japan and lots of developing countries.

A practical car is a station wagon, not an SUV, many of which have less storage space.

Please, cut the needless snark. People do buy vehicles for edge cases but the lack of smaller, practical vehicles is driven is large part by manufacturer profit.

	▲	potato3732842 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Many of those tiny foreign cars are unfortunately not economically useful to sell in the regulated markets of the rich west, and even when they are they often aren't without the developing nation sales volume to amortize a lot of the fixed costs over. I agree that there's a lot of stupidity going on when it comes to station wagons vs crossovers vs compact SUVs and the OEMs really do SUV-ify a lot of things that ought not to be. The shape of these vehicles is fairly preordained by the nature of the fuel economy regulations and wind resistance and other regulations that apply equally to all of them. You're not gonna find "more space" in something like a Subaru Outback by squashing it on the vertical axis unless you stretch it in another dimension or find somewhere else to find space. Maybe you might be able to eek out a slightly better angle on the hatch or something but it ain't gonna be much. Fuel economy regulations make cars with thicc asses like the big sedans and station wagons of yesterday nonsensical. The snark is not needless. It is tautologically impossible for the overwhelming majority of people do be "doing it wrong" on a matter that is in large part a subjective one of preference. If someone wants to assert that then I will talk down to them. People buy these small SUVs left and right because they're seemingly the best option when it comes to well rounded boring A to B vehicles.
	▲	silverquiet 2 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		I think the crossover is pretty much the modern station wagon. I suppose they get marketed as SUV's but they're basically just a bit longer and taller car vs what I'd consider a "real" SUV; an enclosed truck chassis.

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elyobo 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

also once everybody else is obstructing your view with a bigger car it becomes necessary to have a bigger one, it's a race to the metaphorical bototm