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Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

electrek.co

121–130 of 640 posts

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#121

Good. This could force Tesla's hand to make super cheap EV. Musk and crew know how to make cheap stuff - they've chosen high margin for Tesla however.

Tough part with China is that Tesla could fully replicate all chinese EV businesses and still be more expensive without government subsidies and currency devaluation.

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#122
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently its quite simple to buy a BYD vehicle from Mexico and import it into the US already. https://youtube.com/shorts/IEbl6RIJeDc?si=pNol1UkjxRwML9Dz I suspect the same thing will happen for northern states buying from Canada!

This is entirely incorrect. You cannot permanently import or register a vehicle which has not undergone homologation. None of these vehicles have been certified to meet US safety standards and they cannot be imported permanently.

Simple and legal are different matters. There's a BYD parked in my neighborhood pretty often (Central Texas) with Mexico plates. I have no idea how "permanent" it is, and yet there it is.

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#123
post #23

Good. Carney also remarked our relationship with China is now more predictable with our relationship with the states (wild shade coming from him) just to really make it clear to certain parties why this is happening. Cheaper car options in this country will be nice, and I say this as a certified car hater who's yet to own one despite pushing 40.

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Between the US and China, one is right now making active threats to invade and annex Canada, the other is not. "Who should we forge ties with" seems pretty obvious.

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#124
post #23

Good. Carney also remarked our relationship with China is now more predictable with our relationship with the states (wild shade coming from him) just to really make it clear to certain parties why this is happening. Cheaper car options in this country will be nice, and I say this as a certified car hater who's yet to own one despite pushing 40.

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Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#125
post #82

This new direction of "strategic autonomy", with Donald Trump in the white house just south of the border seems like a difficult hill to occupy. Unfortunately, this is probably what is necessary at this point.

Isn't it somewhat laughable when something like 3/4 of Canadian exports are to the US?

I think that Canada has to de-leverage trade with the US is what the take away should be. Not that this trade deal itself is going to change all the balances -- its that there are other players who can start to trade - reducing dependence on the US. The compounding effects are damaging as are switching costs.

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah thee was never any competing with china, our industry just relies on our market using different values to purchase a car. This is patently false. The US could have competed with China if it had maintained investments spinning up battery manufacturing and downstream systems to build EVs at scale, while subsidizing EVs (fossil fuels are subsidized to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars per year [1]) and…

Chinese autoworker makes what, 5k USD a year? Vs 50k+ for union autoworker in the US? How can you win that battle?

China buys and deploys more robotics for manufacturing than any other country in the world. Automate or die as a business [1] [2]. It's not "cheap China labor" vs "expensive union labor"; it's labor vs automation.

And, to be clear, that does not mean you need to get rid of union US labor. It just means the existing folks can do more with the same number of folks they have today, and the pipeline for new workers can shrink while maintaining productivity (and we're going to need those folks for other jobs automation cannot do; trades, electrical grid and renewables infra, nursing and care, etc). This does require both unions and corporations to partner in good faith and share in the gains from this operating model, versus the traditional "squeeze labor as hard as you can for shareholder gains and management comp." If we get to the point where a just transition is needed (like coal mining and generation), that is a policy problem; make good policy, be humane to the human, package them out appropriately if we scale automation faster than expected.

This is simply smart policy as the world reaches peak working age population and heads towards depopulation over the next century [3] [4]. Labor will only get more expensive over time as demand exceeds supply [5]. The capital is there, simply look at annual legacy auto profits; they choose profits over investing in the business, and that is a choice.

[1] Inside China's 'dark factories' where robots run the production lines [video] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftY-MH5mdbw - December 4th, 2025

[2] Chinese EV makers accelerate robotics drive for ‘game-changing’ edge over US - https://www.scmp.com/business/china-evs/article/3333310/chin... | https://archive.today/sJKKv - November 19th, 2025

[3] The Demographic Future of Humanity: Facts and Consequences - https://www.sas.upenn.edu/~jesusfv/Slides_London.pdf - May 31st, 2025

[4] Mapped: Every Country by Total Fertility Rate - https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/mapped-countries-by-fert... - December 22nd, 2025

[5] HN Search: labor shortages - https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

(TLDR Increase productivity with automation to compete with others who already have, buy robots, not share buybacks)

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the US “do friends?” Does France? Does any country?

Shared values do have meaning and an importance. They used to mean a fair bit especially when you needed to fight an aggressor.

Yeah, that's why we're also leaning into our relationship with Europe. We were fooled by Americans but we clearly do not in fact share values, and they're the aggressor we need to fight off here.

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#128
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Torontonian that last part is honestly what I'm most excited about. Massive American cars simply do not belong in most of our streets in this city, and if this starts the long process of getting them out that's going to be amazing. I've seen Cybertrucks zooming down streets that are about a Cybertruck and a half wide and it's an untenable situation.

Massive trucks are useful for construction. You should get better transit so less people have cars.

Massive trucks are useful for construction when they are used for construction. The ones that are used for leisure are the trucks the poster was likely referring to.

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#129
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Torontonian that last part is honestly what I'm most excited about. Massive American cars simply do not belong in most of our streets in this city, and if this starts the long process of getting them out that's going to be amazing. I've seen Cybertrucks zooming down streets that are about a Cybertruck and a half wide and it's an untenable situation.

Massive trucks are useful for construction. You should get better transit so less people have cars.

Cranes are also useful for construction, doesn’t mean every fourth house on my street should have one

Re: Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

#130
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Torontonian that last part is honestly what I'm most excited about. Massive American cars simply do not belong in most of our streets in this city, and if this starts the long process of getting them out that's going to be amazing. I've seen Cybertrucks zooming down streets that are about a Cybertruck and a half wide and it's an untenable situation.

Massive trucks are useful for construction. You should get better transit so less people have cars.

> Massive trucks are useful for construction.

No, trucks are useful, but a massive modern pickup truck is much less useful in the urban context than a standard pickup truck from 30 years ago. The bed size has remained the same, the outside envelope of the vehicle has ballooned massively.

> You should get better transit so less people have cars.

Toronto has a very high (for north america) transit mode share

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