I know that's the sales pitch, but does the economics actually work out that way? You mention subsidized ride hailing, for example.

> (personal cars are utilized <5% of the time, while self-driving cars can see >60% utilization)

How much of that 5% is commuting, though? If there are two one-hour long windows in the day where a lot of people want to make the same trip at the same time, the fact that cars are idle in the middle of the night or day doesn't help with that. And that's also going to be peak surge pricing time.

The time economics gets worse in non-suburban areas. In high density urban areas, it's already too congested to not take public transport. In very low density areas, you might hail a ride, but you've got to wait for it to become available and arrive.

> Self-driving is proven technology, see Waymo.

Only in certain locations, and still dependent on occasional remote operator intervention. Tesla have been promising for years and not delivered, and every year they don't deliver makes it less likely that they ever will.

I think there's room in the market for such substitution, but it underestimates how much people love their cars as a form of personal space and personal brand extension.

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tristanj 2 days ago | parent [-]

Your analysis neglects the effect of self-driving vehicles on public transit. Self-driving busses and self-driving vans will vastly expand available public transit routes. Many public transit routes are not profitable (because they require a driver who costs ~$20-30/hour). Self-driving busses and vans will enable these routes, and shift people away from private vehicle long-distance commuting.

This will have a number of benefits, including increasing frequency of public transit, reduced traffic, reduced long-distance transit costs, etc.

Waymo is actually viable in pretty much the entirety of the US, they are able to expand whenever they want, but choose not to, because they're too risk averse.

When was the last time you sat in a self-driving Tesla? Today it's actually really good. It's gotten so much better over the past 5 years. I can see Tesla's self-driving business being viable by 2030.

> underestimates how much people love their cars as a form of personal space and personal brand extension.

This is the most vocal demographic of vehicle owners, but in reality they are not a significant percentage of the population. IMO most people don't like driving, and would rather not drive.

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senordevnyc 2 days ago | parent [-]

When was the last time you sat in a self-driving Tesla? Today it's actually really good. It's gotten so much better over the past 5 years.

Yeah, but people have been saying this exact thing for literally a decade. "Have you tried v18.419.18304, bro? It's so good, another six months and FSD will be solved!"

Lunacy.

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tristanj 2 days ago | parent [-]

It's very relevant. In my experience, I've noticed the majority of FSD critics (either for Teslsa FSD or Waymo) have never actually tried riding in one, or last tried it nearly a decade ago when the technology was immature.

Products change. Apple maps was a terrible product a decade ago, but today it's arguably better than Google maps.

pjc50 never replied to the question, so I'm going to take that as a 'never tried it or haven't tried it recently'.

	▲	senordevnyc 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Yeah, maybe it's different now, but the Tesla stans burned their credibility many years ago. Also, the evidence still suggests that FSD is nowhere near as safe and capable as Waymo, so I find it pretty uninteresting tbh. Tesla seems like just a washed-up former side project of a drug-addled billionaire who has moved on from trying to build things to trying to destroy them. You can spend your money however you want, but I'd rather drive myself than give Musk a penny.