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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

#501

Post by dublinben »

detourdog wrote: post #463
secretsatan wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't owned a car for at least 15 years since I moved to Switzerland, don't miss it at all. I do occasionally need a car, so I'm a member of a car sharing scheme, they always have cars nearby, I pay a low yearly feee and a low rate per time and kms used, easy to book with an app, probably cost me the same for a year as a parking space for a month. For an occasional weekend away I might get a car from a regular hi…

I have an 8-unit apartment building in small New England town. I'm seriously considering getting a car as a building amenity. The car would be reserved and shared amongst the tenants.

You might be able to just partner with one of the existing providers in this space, like Zipcar, and let them handle the logistics: https://www.zipcar.com/business/residential

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

#502

Post by randomdata »

PartiallyTyped wrote: post #59
benjaminwootton wrote: post #20

The young are falling out of love with home ownership, cars, dating, drinking etc. I suspect a lack of money is the common factor.

I don’t think that car ownership is related to poverty or absence of disposable income. In fact, a well off person in a well functioning city has little if any reason to own a car and can get away without one. Subreddits like r/solarpunk, r/fuckcars, r/notjustbikes, along with the push for 15 minute cities are a testament that young people dont want to be in the grip of petrol companies or owning a car as they are no…

> a well off person in a well functioning city has little if any reason to own a car

Even in this small town (~2,000 people) in which I live I have almost no reason for a car. Everything I need is in comfortable walking distance... Other than family and friends who live in other places that I like to visit from time to time.

When I was young there was enough economic hardship around that people had to disperse to make a living, leaving those social ties I established all over the place. With the strong economy we've been living for a number of years one has been comfortably able to stay put; living a great life anywhere they want. Now everyone in your life is able to remain close. If I could walk to their homes, that would certainly remove the last reason I keep a car. The younger people have that option.

I wonder if that's what has changed?

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

#503

Post by dilap »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #483
dilap wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars and healthcare are debatable, but with housing you're literally buying the same houses as the previous generation, just way more expensive. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4518-Rosedale-Ave-Austin-... https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1339-46th-Ave-San-Francis... https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/677-Harmony-Ln-Ashland-OR...

The economic value of a location changes over time, so the land component of the house is not the same. Plus increases in population can dramatically shift supply and demand curves.

Sure, but basically all desirable places to live now are expensive, which wasn't the case before.

I'm not sure about the exact causes, but at some level it has to be supply and demand, I agree. Maybe just growing population. Certainly the bay area is, in my opinion, very over-populated.

It's a magical physical location, and there's too many people that want to live in it, for it to be pleasant.

(Though the horrible government also isn't helping.)

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

#504

Post by scottLobster »

tristor wrote: post #424
scottLobster wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, no one wants to be the person who works the drive through at McDonald's. Back in the day it used to be good money for a high school kid, and maybe it arguably still is, but high school kids, particularly high performing ones, don't have time for part-time jobs that aren't contributing to a college resume. Let alone time to spend any money they make with friends.

I guess I could have expanded on my last sentence more and completed the thought. Of course nobody wants to be the person who works the drive through at McDonald's as their life's ambition. This type of job used to be seen as a stepping stone that provided you some spending money and an opportunity to meet people outside your parents social circle and school, a first taste of the working world, but wasn't a determina…

Well I'll admit hadn't considered that factor, I guess I'll find out in a decade or so when my daughter reaches that age, although hopefully that mentality will have died out once that generation gets a decade of reality under their belt.

That said I kinda get the social media obsession, that was college for me and I was all in on the facebook parasocial queues (not liking someone's post that they KNOW you saw was an offense, and other crazy shit). For me it was ultimately a function of not having anything better to do. High school is supermax prison in terms of options, college is like minimum security prison, it's not really until you hit the realization that your decisions have actual weight in your life and you aren't just going to be pushed along by external forces that you start to grow out of that. High school ends and eventually becomes irrelevant, but good luck explaining that to a teenager.

I'd argue the income question is also part of the problem, the "mail room to executive" pipeline, if it ever really existed, has been completely broken. As you say, it used to be that person working the McDonalds drive through might be something big some day. Nowadays that's 100% assured to not be the case, McDonalds drive through is a dead-end job you do to stay alive until you can trade up to a different career path.

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

#505

Post by yourusername »

cscurmudgeon wrote: post #442
rexpress wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country...On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Anyone visiting a Dutch city can see what a distortion this comment is. The sheer volume of bike traffic on largely safe infrastructure is phenomenal. Imagine if even half of these people took to cars instead, it would be gridlock. Life may be good for Dut…

What fraction of Netherlands lives in a city vs the rural areas?

Even in the most urbanised part of the country most people still drive for most distances over ~5km. If you have to get from one side of Rotterdam to the other side a car is much faster than a bike or public transportation.

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

#506

Post by karim »

bootsmann wrote: post #369
dymk wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there is little to no reason to strap myself with long term responsibilities equity, retirement

Stocks are better for that in every way. If you buy a house you are dependent on political will to arbitrarily keep house prices high while for stocks the political incentives for growth are guaranteed to go in your favour.

Especially given current population trends — there are no guarantees you'll be able to sell your house for much more than you bought it in 30 years.

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

#507

Post by 01100011 »

overthemoon wrote: post #174

I'm an aging millennial, but on a purely personal level, when I lived in a city with good public transit, I was a lot happier, most of the time. I really like stepping off the train and the bus and being on my own two feet, the walking exercise, not being chained to this thing I have to worry about. I hate driving, I hate parking, I hate owning a car--the maintenance, the ongoing cost of fuel and insurance, all of it…

I'm an aging gen x'er. I would feel the same way if American cities were safer, more polite, and more pleasant to live in. I visited Tokyo a few decades ago and was amazed at what life could be like. Unfortunately, the issues of modern American cities compel me to seek life in the suburbs or rural areas, necessitating a single passenger vehicle.

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

#508

Post by jjav »

maxsilver wrote: post #227
overthemoon wrote: post #174

I'm an aging millennial, but on a purely personal level, when I lived in a city with good public transit, I was a lot happier, most of the time. I really like stepping off the train and the bus and being on my own two feet, the walking exercise, not being chained to this thing I have to worry about. I hate driving, I hate parking, I hate owning a car--the maintenance, the ongoing cost of fuel and insurance, all of it…

> but even then, I don't get the emotional association of freedom that previous generations did. I don't know what's different, although I have some guesses. Money, I'm sure, but there's something that's nagging me about it. I'd argue it's a combination of money and aging infrastructure. Money is the big one (cars used to be a lot cheaper, both to buy and to maintain. Incomes for most used to be much higher). Infrast…

> Money is the big one (cars used to be a lot cheaper, both to buy and to maintain.

That's just not true. Maybe for some outlier car models.

For example my parents bought a base model Toyota Corolla in 1998 for 16K. A 2023 Corolla has MSRP $21,550.

16K in 1998 dollars is $29,366 today.

So, the Corolla has actually become substantially cheaper over the years!

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

#509

Post by AmVess »

usrusr wrote: post #343
overthemoon wrote: post #174

I'm an aging millennial, but on a purely personal level, when I lived in a city with good public transit, I was a lot happier, most of the time. I really like stepping off the train and the bus and being on my own two feet, the walking exercise, not being chained to this thing I have to worry about. I hate driving, I hate parking, I hate owning a car--the maintenance, the ongoing cost of fuel and insurance, all of it…

It really is a "the grass is bleaker on the other side" situation. As a public transport person I feel weirdly constrained by the idea that a day's itinerary will inevitably have to see me return to wherever the car is parked, impossible to do spontaneous things like walk a few stops, ride with an acquaintance or something like that that would eventually take me home, but not return to some previous stage. With a car…

And you are at the mercy of the whims of politicians. One city I lived in, they simply ended public transport altogether. Another city, they rerouted the lines in the poor part of town which made life incredible difficult for the older residents there. Their trip to the grocery store went up by two hours.

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

#510

Post by Xylakant »

mantas wrote: post #478
Xylakant wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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...

People upthread ran the numbers and arrived at 600 USD/month for a used car. Seems high to me, but I don't know how the math works out in the US. For Germany, this is a pretty good modeling of the costs https://financer.com/de/blog/was-kostet-ein-auto-im-monat/ and it still arrives at 240 EUR/month for a used car. That's maybe not 20 cab rides, but still a significant number.

Obviously, the math I did for me works out for me. It likely will look different for you. However, I never pretended that the math works out for everyone - it doesn't. But it would work out for a lot of people if they were honest.

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