Who Can Afford Electric Cars?
August 8, 2022
By Paul Homewood
Electric cars still remain hopelessly unaffordable for most car buyers:
The Vauxhall Mokka, for instance will knock you back £32685 for the basic model:
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The petrol equivalent costs £22865:
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And if you want one, you will have to wait till next February for it:
The Mokka is only a small SUV. Drivers who need a family sized SUV will need to pay more than £40000. For instance, the Kia Niro will knock you back £42490:
https://www.kia.com/uk/new-cars/offers/retail/pcp/niro-ev/
But the equivalent petrol Kia, the Sportage, costs only £27250:
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The government is expecting millions of EVs to be on the road long before the 2030 deadline.
But how many drivers can afford these sort of prices?
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Who can afford ANY car? I can just about afford to maintain my retro go-faster Claud Butler bike
Claud Butler bikes, the Rolls Royce of bikes 60 years ago.
The government can expect all it likes, sooner or later, reality will strike & we’ll generously be given more time to mend our wicked ways.
Good luck with that as the manufacturers will have stopped making ICEs a year it rwo at least before the deadline.
And of course we are heading for the biggest recession in living memory. I wonder what the future of EVs will look like in 10 years time, or even 5 years.
They will all be in the Used car sections
No, they will all be in the scrap yards because people that normally buy used cars (huge market) will soon realize what it costs to buy replacement batteries. Additionally, since nothing is standard and each year’s model will change drastically there will be shortages of repair parts.
There are many adverse unintended consequences of political and bureaucratic manipulation of markets. One example is the announcements of dates by which new ICE vehicles will be outlawed: No innovation investments; the impossibility of businesses to plan for future sales; consumer rage; & etc.
It’s worse than we thought.
Manufacturing of conventional ICE vehicles is being pushed off shore. All of the support businesses will go with them. So, in 2030, your economy will have been substantially contracted, and many fewer still will be able to afford an EV.
‘the 2030 deadline’
I think they are being literal. The end of the auto industry will be catastrophic.
Agreed, the total ICE industry in USA and Europe, together with the second and third tier suppliers will be destroyed, putting millions out of work. Creating “green” jobs refining lithium, making batteries, a well as EV motors is not going to happen, China controls all the raw materials,,,,,,,we are dead in the water! All self inflicted,
No Truer Words could be said . . . Dead economy ? . . . Then, who can afford anything green ??
Of course if you can get an EV as a company car then you will pay virtually no tax .
More free money for rich people!
Great article – the whole EV idea is a joke. The latest Honda all electric is £38,000. It looks like a fairground dodgem. The interior screams of cheap plastic panels and cheap seats. How Honda can seriously market this cramped go cart is hard to understand.
Also note that the spread between EV prices and ICE cars is growing quickly. It has nearly doubled in 5 years.
Beyond ALL this ‘Freaking Out’ about prices . . .
Electric Vehicles . . . Back where Electricity is Produced . . . INCREASES energy consumption . . . 31% . . . OHM’s Law . . . Plus ALL the New Pollution that gets swept under The Big Green Rug . . .
https://www.allaboutenergy.net/350-energy/today/electric-vehicles-and-batteries/3257-electric-cars-increase-energy-demand-31-percent-over-gas-cars?highlight=WyJqaW0iLCJsZSIsIm1haXN0cmUiLCJqaW0gbGUiLCJqaW0gbGUgbWFpc3RyZSIsImxlIG1haXN0cmUiXQ==
Even MORE stuff to prove that EV’s are just Hyperbole from Zealots with nothing to lose by Lying to the World . . . Lithium Mines . . .
https://www.euronews.com/green/2022/02/01/south-america-s-lithium-fields-reveal-the-dark-side-of-our-electric-future
Truth, Science, Fact, Common Sense . . . NOT hyperbole. Dogma, Zealotry and Propaganda from ‘The Big Green Propaganda Machine’ . . .
Blind unquestioning adherence to the ideological extremism of climate change fanatics is at the root of this. Who in their right mind would throw all their eggs
( vegan alternatives are available…somewhere) in the EV basket?
Electricity prices are forecast to spike (sorry) rendering EVs even less affordable.
Stupidity doesn’t cover it.
The second hand market of EV’s will be all but non existent.
We could end up like Cuba keeping all ICE cars running on scrap yard parts.
In Cuba some of the big old US cars have things like Trabant engines and can hardly get up to 30 mph.
I wonder what the leasing deals use to determine value at turn-in time. The used EV market could (will?) be dicey.
True, Beagle. Cuban cars are viewed as well maintained antiques.
You Brits might want to start hoarding key parts for your cars. Think, “What is going to break on this thing in the next 25 years?”
The big problem is that the politicians who are mainly climate change believers will just keep pricing up road tax on IC engined cars until they too are unaffordable.
EVs are death traps, one burst into flames on the M60 last week, fortunately the driver got out but not before being badly burned.
I booked a ferry crossing to France yesterday and I’m pleased to seen that the ferry company asks if your car is electric. Presumably so that it can be stowed away from the other types.
Fancy going through the Channel Tunnel next to a battery car?
Perhaps they put the battery cars at the back by the door so they could open it and push them out if required.
The date for EV ‘handover’ will quietly be pushed back a couple of years “Covid, you understand”. Then a few years more “The recession, you understand”. Then it’ll quietly fade into obscurity, as will the gas boiler ban, and then 2050 itself.
That’s the way British politicians have historically dealt with their blunders. Move onto the next blunder.
But that won’t work. The ICE factories will be closed/run down well ahead of the deadline. All the investment is now into EVs – look at all the ads.
Ads are one thing but they are not translating into sales. To keep solvent the manufacturers have to continue to make what sells.
Also remaining oil refiners will pull out, so fuel will be imported.
According to the IEA there were c. 16m EVs in the world at the end of 2021. By 2030 they expect this may grow to 200 – 250m.
A report for the EU estimated there would be between 140 – 220m EVs in the EU by 2050.
Producing anywhere near these numbers of EVs will require massive increases in lithium, nickel and cobalt mining. The IEA themselves say it takes a new mine around 16 years to reach full production.
There are currently over 1.4 billion ICE vehicles in the world. The idea that everyone will be using EVs by 2050 is ludicrous and politicians will soon have to wake up to this fact.
I presum Ed Miliband and “Lord Deben ” had costly educations, but simple arithmetic was not on the curriicululum.
Or are they just corrupt.?
All this is in the WEF elites plan for the future, impoverish all of us by increasing costs of everything, we will live in window less apartments with district heating, eating bugs and yeast based sausages, cycling to work (what work? No manufacturing anywhere in USA and Europe)….having to learn our new language, Chinese. If only the idiots at XR would realise what they are actually campaigning for.
Such optimistism, GeoffB!
You will be dead.
Their leaders do know. Ireland showed us the blueprint in 2019:
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/06/20/ireland-ban-cars-climate-mass-migration/
“Drivers will be forced off the roads in Ireland and the population packed into “higher density” cities under a long-awaited climate plan which will ‘revolutionise’ people’s lifestyle and behaviours, according to local media.
“Nudge” policies such as huge tax hikes, as well as bans and red tape outlined in the plan, will pave the way to a “vibrant” Ireland of zero carbon emissions by 2050 according to the government, which last year committed to boost the country’s 4.7 million-strong population by a further million with mass migration.
In order to avert a “climate apocalypse”, the government plans to force people “out of private cars because they are the biggest offenders for emissions”, according to transport minister Shane Ross whose proposals — which include banning fossil fuel vehicles from towns and cities nationwide — are posed to cripple ordinary motorists, local media reports.
Launching the plan in Dublin, leader Leo Varadkar outlined his vision for an Ireland of ‘higher density’ cities consisting of populations whose lifestyles and behaviours have been totally transformed by ‘carrot and stick’ policies outlined in the climate plan.
“Our approach will be to nudge people and businesses to change behaviour and adapt new technologies through incentives, disincentives, regulations and information,” the globalist prime minister said.
“We are going to change how electricity is produced and consumed, how our homes and workplaces are heated; the way we travel; the types of vehicles we purchase; and how food is produced.”
Also what food you must eat, I suppose.
And reintroducing wolves, bears and wild boar to encourage people to move to cities. We won’t need EVs at that point, I suppose.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/greens-call-for-wolves-to-be-reintroduced-to-ireland-1.4036692
When will the sheeple wake up? I’m not holding my breath!
“When will the sheeple wake up?”
The original of the idea of ‘the sheeple’ was perhaps in the writings of Rabelais – it did not end well for the sheeple OR the despicable owner of them.
Pantagruel suffers a trick from a dishonest farmer. Later he meets the farmer again near a river when the farmer has a flock of sheep with him. Pantagruel pretends not to remember the earlier transaction and buys a single sheep, at a steep price. He immediately flings the animal he now owns into the water. The rest of the farmer’s sheep blindly follow one by one and drown. Halfway through this fiasco the farmer despairingly takes hold of a running sheep and the farmer is also dragged in and drowned.
Even if you could afford an EV, they are simply not practical for most people. Ridiculously low range and long charging times. And the relatively few normal size ones which are even more expensive than the overpriced city runaaouts have the same problems.
How many people are going to pay all that money and the vehicle is still not theirs at the end of 36 or 48 months?
Jit’s Cliscep article is more than a year old now, but remains highly relevant IMO:
So if we asked for this, we don’t need to be forced. If we need to be forced, we clearly don’t want it.
So how is this right? How did we get a government determined to change such a fundamental part of our lives against our wishes?
Because we are not a functioning democracy as although we vote – well many do – there is no power in that vote.
Why is it that European politicians hate their own populations so much? Look at it: bans and/or extortionate taxes on what the market needs and wants.
What’s the point? Our roadways all over Europe have a huge mass of twelve wheel artics delivering what our civilization cannot do without. Are they to be run on batteries? Gibbergibberhahaha! Can’t think of words to convey the stupidity.
blame this idiot for starting UK down this road – On 16 October 2008 Ed Miliband, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, announced that the Act would mandate an 80% cut overall in six greenhouse gases by 2050.
So, what’s the latest on electricity blackouts?
Government can multitask, demanding EVs while screwing over E generation.
Even a normal car is extremely expensive when new. Too much fancy techie stuff being built into them which is unfathomable when it goes wrong. It is also taking away the art of good driving; speed limiters are the next whizzy thing to be installed. Car manufacturing is being hampered by a shortage of chips; so stop building so many into the vehicles in the first place then!
As most of the chips are made in Taiwan, there is a distinct possibility that China may well cause a further reduction etc.
EVs must reach 30-50 thousand miles to reach “greenness”
Yes . . . If we ignore OHM’s Law . . . Resistance . . .
15% of the electricity produced is lost as HEAT . . . In the Power Grid . . .
16% more is lost exciting the Electrons inside the battery during Charging . . .
31 % . . . of the Electricity PRODUCED . . . is lost before you EVER put your foot on the accelerator . . .
That information is NOT included in the 30-50k mentioned above . . .
FACT . . . EV’s cause More Fossil Fuels to be burned Globally, than ANY gas car of a similar size . . .
https://www.allaboutenergy.net/350-energy/today/electric-vehicles-and-batteries/3257-electric-cars-increase-energy-demand-31-percent-over-gas-cars?highlight=WyJqaW0iLCJsZSIsIm1haXN0cmUiLCJqaW0gbGUiLCJqaW0gbGUgbWFpc3RyZSIsImxlIG1haXN0cmUiXQ==
https://www.allaboutenergy.net/350-energy/today/electric-vehicles-and-batteries/3206-co2-added-to-the-environment-electric-car-versus-gasoline-car?highlight=WyJqaW0iLCJsZSIsIm1haXN0cmUiLCJqaW0gbGUiLCJqaW0gbGUgbWFpc3RyZSIsImxlIG1haXN0cmUiXQ==
If we are forced down the Cuba route then a parts supply industry will spring up to meet the demand. I happened across a pair of lovely restored Austin Healeys at the weekend and in chatting to the owners they said that spares supply was better now than when they were being sold as new models.
Sincse these politician- bandits spend OUR money on their harebrained schemes, we must demand a say before, as here, they completely waste it.
SEAT made their popular city car all-electric. And then scrapped it when they realised there’s no profit in it. We’re doomed to buy ludicrously expensive “SUVs” too big for your garage, or driveway, and making every terraced street or multi-story car park impossible to navigate. A pretend premium product just to cover the cost of those batteries.
SUVs (always used to be called estates or station wagons) and other normal size vehicles are what people need and want. City runabouts are a niche and those who have them often have a normal size vehicle as well.
Interestingly the IEA had this to say about SUVs in a Commentary on EVs (30.1.22)”
“”EVs helped avoid oil consumption and C02 emissions in 2021, though these benefits were cancelled out by a parallel increase in sales of SUVs”
Wait till they start going wrong – they are already less reliable than an ICE vehicles, and whatever you do don’t try to repair it at home for apart from the cost spares you will get a hefty shock.
Lots of common sense comments here, but will probably be as far as it gets.
Prince Charles & his ilk / investors in planting 20 year subsidy generating wind farms on the Royal Crown Ests. owned seabed around the British Isles appear to have the real say & guaranteed income for decades.
Look how Nigel & Tice were rapidly closed down when they wanted to start organising a referendum on net zero.
If people still keep voting for the potato heads in the Red Party then Blue party nothing will ever change. Our way of life is stuffed.
Poll tax riots anyone ?
Another thing to consider: who is going to maintain the electric vehicles?
Batteries, high-voltage, and electric motors are a different skill set than ICE cars. Some retraining can occur, but there are limits.
Why doesn’t anybody discuss the enormous international fleets of twelve wheel articulated lorries that maintain our civilization? Diesels all. Run on batteries? Gibbergibbergibberhohogibber – I haven’t the words to express my scorn and hatred for these ignorant lefty greenies with their lefty sociology degrees. What’s the point of a few EVs? CO2 doesn’t drive the weather anyway.
If there were anything actually better than diesel, all the lorries would have _already_ been using it. Same goes for petrol and diesel in other types of vehicles. The only thing that comes anywhere close to the same practicality is LPG.