I meant just register it in one of the slightly less than half of states that let you do that.

Even if some Karen narcs on you to the tax man unless it's an especially slow day the tax man will say something along the lines of "It's a what? We don't register those"

The registration/tax people aren't in the business of giving a shit about the nuances of the vehicle code. They're in the business of collecting money. It's not like you're dodging meaningful fees on an entire truck fleet. You're dodging what would be a zero to them since they'd never let you register it. What are they gonna do send you one of those "we believe you owe us X, pay up or we'll use the full force of the state to fucking stomp you and ruin your life" letters with X= $0. I'm sure they'll get right on that.

I live outside of Austin TX and have seen one regularly parked outside a house in my neighborhood for 5 years now. Has a license plate. If I had to bet, I’d say it’s registered (taxes paid, has required insurance) because police around here have camera systems in their cars that scan plates looking for unregistered vehicles (found out the hard way one time when I forgot to renew).

My understanding is they generally need to be 25+ years old, but this may vary (or I am out of date?) https://www.kei-trucks.com/blogs/kei-trucks/state-restrictio...

That depends a lot on the state. I hear in Utah it's very easy to register a kei truck/van as street-legal. Here in Nevada it's quite the opposite, at least according to those I've talked to who've attempted it.

> Why do car companies bother at all? Why isn't it a race to the bottom for car crash safety?

More safety, always, is usually a feel-good measure. If people aren’t trading in their old cars for the newer, safer ones, because the latter are too expensive, it’s not actually helping people. Same if the cheapest car someone can get for their commute is bankrupting them.

They did before consumer safety regulations went into affect

most truck owners don't tow; studies show it's < 2 times a year.

the horsepower is for phallic compensation reasons

I was referring to something slightly different namely that price, horsepower, and socioeconomic status are all monotonically increasing functions of each other when you look at any given lineup of cars -- say you're comparing the different company cars owned by a given company, the different cars in the lineup of a given manufacturer, or the cars parked outside the venue when there's a wedding and the extended family has been invited. The cars themselves are all "trivial" variations of each other. I've noticed this more strongly in Germany than in other countries I've lived in (which is a few). You don't get the kind of variety of styles and designs you would get in the U.S. and many cars that are commonplace in the U.S. like a Ford Mustang or a Dodge RAM, when you encounter it in Germany, would instantly read as "someone desparate to get noticed".

But the variation in horsepower is still there. It's not like cars with 300 HP are forbidden in Germany. It's just that they need to fit in the continuum. The 300HP BMW is the CEO's car, and its existence is justified by the fact that the other top managers drive the 200HP version which is otherwise almost the exact same car, which are in turn justified by the fact that the middle managers drive the 120HP version, and if you're a new-hire individual contributor then anything more than 90HP would cause a scandal if word got out. (I'm painting a mental picture here; obviously not making a universal claim).

I think that culture is part of the reason why a $30k electric pickup truck would ruffle feathers so much, and it's a particularly stupid reason, but I think it's real.

The "Kastenwagen" example from above escapes that calculus by clearly being something that stands completely outside of any established continuum of this kind. The rare Ford Mustang or imported Dodge RAM that you sometimes see in Germany is similarly socially/politically acceptable on the grounds that it would either be expensive as hell, or a car buff's hobby. Both of those cases mean the owner has duly paid for their ticket to the high-horsepower social club (either financially, or by having a respectable hobby and putting in the work), whereas a $30k electric pickup that you can just buy would come across as "cheating the system".