Motors in each wheel eats tires.

Personally, I'd rather see FWD with 1 100HP motor in a 2200-lb 4-seater under $20K US, but that will never happen as the supply is artificially constrained to create high-end cachet.

Agreed, but after this winter my next car has got to be AWD

I assumed it was to target the most motivated, price-insensitive buyers while recouping fixed costs.