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Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

economist.com

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Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#471

Post by kensai »

throwayyy479087 wrote: post #114
scatters wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine having a neurological disease or some other disability that means that you can't drive .

These are more common than those that require automobility, but aren't discussed because they don't help the cause. Most common disabilities are eyes, hearing, and mental. None of those can drive.

And as I said, it does not matter if you can drive YOURSELF. These cars get special permits for the relatives to drive the disabled person to the destination.

But other than that, you are wrong again. The most common neurological disabilities actually affect motor and sensitivity. Are people are allowed to drive.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#472

Post by taylodl »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #423
taylodl wrote: post #287

The young are falling out of love with cars because they're unaffordable. It's as simple as that. It's yet another sign the standard of living is declining for the young. The average new car price in the U.S. is now over $47K (Consumer Reports). I make a good living and I'm not going to pay that kind of money for a new car! A young person would be stupid to pay that kind of money for a car. Okay, so what about used c…

> The average new car price in the U.S. is now over $47K (Consumer Reports). I make a good living and I'm not going to pay that kind of money for a new car! A young person would be stupid to pay that kind of money for a car. I think what you mean is that enough Americans are stupid enough with money to pay 47k$ for a car (or worse, a 15mg truck/jeep), plenty of $15-25k cars exist, 45k$ cars just look cheaper with 5-7…

Run through all the numbers I ran through. The only number you're adjust is financing - which is a big number, but my financing number was based on $28K. Financing $20K drops you to $600, which is still expensive. Get much cheaper than $20K and you're starting to drive up your maintenance costs while you drive down your financing costs. Those maintenance costs come with several other ancillary costs (aggravation, paying for transportation while car is being serviced, missing work, etc.)

As I responded in other comments, my calculation didn't even take into account for parking, registration, and vehicle emissions testing costs. Young people are looking at the delta to their monthly expense outlay for getting a car and it's quite considerable.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#473

Post by evanelias »

wffurr wrote: post #10

There's 138 trains per day between Amsterdam and The Hague. It's faster to take the train than to drive on that trip. Driving in either city in an exercise in frustration. Why would anyone in a rich country with a high functioning rail system like The Netherlands want to drive? I don't know how many rich countries that describes, but I lived happily for years in Boston in the USA without a car. I have one now but onl…

> The main benefit of Zipcar to me versus owning is that the car had a parking space that it went back into.

I used to wholeheartedly agree with this. I lived in a very parking-constrained area. Zipcar had cars with dedicated spots on random corners throughout town, which was extremely convenient! At least prior to 2020...

Then the pandemic hit, and the number of package delivery trucks skyrocketed, along with doordash, uber eats, etc. And also just a general decrease in people's willingness to follow parking rules and signs. In the final year of my Zipcar membership before cancellation, literally 100% of my rentals involved dealing with a blocked parking spot when trying to return the car. I just don't think Zipcar's concept is viable anymore.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#474

Post by thesuitonym »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #432
thesuitonym wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guy, nobody thinks the Netherlands is a perfect beacon of transit, but you just can't understand what it's like living in the US. Even if you live in a large metro, unless it's NYC or you live and work in the right parts of Chicago, public transit just isn't even an option--unless an hour and a half commute on a bus is worth it to you. Let's compare your commute to work to a commute in the US: >I have to get up ea…

>In the US, this was actually entire hypothetical. The route just doesn't actually exist. Drag your butt over to Google maps and punch in a route from Lowell, Leominster, Worcester or Taunton Massachusetts (outlying cities in the Boston area people many commute in from) to any portion of the Boston area just inside I95 but not downtown and eyeball the times. The route exists in the US and the times are in line with h…

Oh boy, you found one outlier! That negates my entire argument!

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#475

Post by jjav »

intrasight wrote: post #401
taylodl wrote: post #287

The young are falling out of love with cars because they're unaffordable. It's as simple as that. It's yet another sign the standard of living is declining for the young. The average new car price in the U.S. is now over $47K (Consumer Reports). I make a good living and I'm not going to pay that kind of money for a new car! A young person would be stupid to pay that kind of money for a car. Okay, so what about used c…

As a "Generation X" near the Boomer boundary, I just can't stop being shocked by "average car is $47k". When I was a teen, my parents did rental investing, owned about a dozen properties, and had never paid more than $30k for a property. I'm a well-compensated tech worker, and have no shame in driving my 2004 Volvo that I bought used 16 years ago. Had a second car for a while. A 2005 Camry that I bought for $5000 in…

> As a "Generation X" near the Boomer boundary, I just can't stop being shocked by "average car is $47k".

I don't doubt the average new car price could be 47K, but averages are pushed up by the very expensive ones. And today there are a lots of cars at the very high end over 100K which skews the average.

Regular cars (entry-level Honda/Toyota/Mazda/etc) haven't gone up much, probably about tracking inflation (would be nice to see a graph for e.g. an entry level Mazda 3 (323) MSRP vs. inflation over the years).

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#476

Post by Telluur »

moffkalast wrote: post #257
_dain_ wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those cities have extensive networks of local rail, subway, trams, and buses. So "the other side of town" is easily reachable.

And you again need to figure out and get whatever local card or ticket or app they decided to use to pay for all that, because there is zero standardization, which adds even more financial overhead assuming you're only visiting once, plus figuring out the timetable and route plan so you don't end up on the completely opposite end. Lots of "Oh wait, you were supposed to take the #15 bus, but this is a #15B which doesn…

> because there is zero standardization For the Netherlands, you could not be more wrong. By law, all public transport companies for Trains, Metro, Tram, Bus, Watertaxies are hooked into the exact same NFC payment platform, the OV-chipkaart. Recently, they rolled out debit/credit card payments on these readers nation-wide.

Additionally, all public transportation companies provide standardized service information including live updates (often required by the law). Any journey can be fully planned on 9292.nl.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#477

Post by HardlyCurious »

mcv wrote: post #363
HardlyCurious wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why?

So only one person instead of two has to suffer through a dreadful commute, you need only one car instead of two, one parent works close to where the kids go to school, etc. If you live in the middle, everything is far away for everybody. That doesn't mean it's not viable to live in the middle, but I think these are some pretty good arguments why it's often preferable to live close to at least one partner's workplace…

Would you volunteer to have twice the dreadful commute for the benefit of your partner, or do you see yourself being the beneficiary of this configuration?

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#478

Post by mantas »

Xylakant wrote: post #166
mantas wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

„Take a cab“ is always an option. But at some point, if using it frequently enough, it becomes cheaper and more convenient to just own the damn thing.

If you take into account the current costs for cars, you can do a lot of kilometer per cab every month. I‘ve done the math for me - I could take the cab around 20-30 times a month for an average distance, for the costs associated with a VW Golf size car. There are also options that cover the middle ground: Mixed mode (cab, train, cab) or car sharing. Certainly not available for all of us, but just as certainly availa…

If you MUST lease a brand new car and replace it every few years - probably. But driving a slightly older car is perfectly fine.

There're a lot of other variables. Family/life situation, hobbies, health situation, visual (fuck video ads on public transit) and audio noise tolerance...

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#479

Post by Xylakant »

ghaff wrote: post #399
hunter2_ wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friction for sure. In most cases (other than trying to find parking where that's difficult) having a car means most of the friction (cost, maintenance) is decoupled from each ride. With other options like train, Uber, etc. most of the friction (cost, waiting, planning) is coupled to each ride. We tend to take more rides in the decoupled model, I'd think.

I know a couple in SF who don't own a car and still seem pretty mobile between bike, walking, Uber, Zipcar, rentals, etc. But it takes a certain mental accounting disciple to go "I'm OK with spending $50 in transportation to meet a friend for dinner--and maybe a bit longer--because I'm still coming out ahead on an annual basis."

The thing that helped me most is looking up the costs for owning a car and building that into my budget. I know that as long as the sum of all rides in a month is below that figure, I'm coming out ahead. (plus the added comfort of not actually being the one to drive)

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#480

Post by lotsofpulp »

HPsquared wrote: post #464
throwaway71271 wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

in the netherlands people just bike or take public transport, most of the time its faster than car (up to 12km or so bike is actually much faster) walk is actually fine as well

I don't understand how bike can be faster than car. Does it take a long time to get parked or something?

Yes. If you prioritize the environment for people over vehicles, then vehicles take longer to store and travel at slower speeds.
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