Another example: massive growth in Chinese renewables while the US opens up national parks for drilling and cancels solar/wind projects. You occasionally see a heartwarming post: “California adds solar panels over a canal” and it just looks cute and kind of sad compared to the massive, ambitious, and technologically superior build out of Chinese renewables.
This is to say nothing of the CCP and their record on human rights and free expression. But anyone paying attention can quite clearly see that China is winning and the US is sacrificing their global superiority at the altar of fear, ignorance, and religious nationalism.
Right down to the shaky real estate markets.
Japan never surpassed the US in power or industrial output. China is different. They’ve clearly surpassed the US in some key areas.
I’m not sure that’s something that anyone should be concerned about from a geopolitical point of view. Likewise expecting Japan to have ever done the same is… silly.
It's depressing that we can't buy BYD in the USA. It's feeling more and more like being stuck with a Lada in the 1980s.
You can see the political groundwork being laid here.
https://homeland.house.gov/2025/05/21/homeland-republicans-p...
If these concerns are so pressing, why do we allow any electronics at all from China?
It smells like air cover for a de-facto ban on BYD. To force US consumers to buy from politically blessed car makers instead of letting us choose the highest quality car available (at a given price point).
BYD keeps performing well in the rest of the world. If we hold US consumers hostage to prop up companies like Tesla, we risk allowing them to stagnate.
Chinese cars don't exist in the US because of laws specifically designed to prevent their sale here. The tariff for Chinese EVs was increased to 100% a couple of years ago when it was rumored that BYD was going to move to the US market. And currently, there is a bill circulating to ban them entirely.
Whatever the stated reasons are is one thing.
The biggest issue is that a network of BYDs in the US would be a massive intelligence coup.
It will never be permitted unless the intelligence aspect is addressed… if it can be.
Competition is great but it doesn't mean that the cars in America are bad. The lada was a failure of a car compared to other similar cars available elsewhere. That is not the case here.
Back when people used to buy Teslas, the company was notorious for how long it took to get repairs done. Even if BYD was exactly like Tesla theres many ways they could differentiate themselves if they were allowed in the US
You’d never know because you never had a choice in the first place
> massive growth in Chinese renewables while the US opens up national parks for drilling and cancels solar/wind projects
The protectees in this case are fossil fuel interests.
It's quite unfortunate, but I can't say I blame them. From their perspective the tiger is finally showing its stripes.
1. Protecting your interests by building a dynamic strategy. You protect your interests by enhancing your strengths and building on them.
2. Protecting your interests by playing “defense” against your decline.
We all know which country chose which path.
Chinese party leadership is stacked with literal engineers. They’ve prioritized development of industries crucial to their success. For example, they know they’re never going to be a big oil producer and that fighting wars over oil is expensive and futile, so they have developed their path to energy independence with their solar and wind industry along with electrified transit of all types.
Meanwhile, in America, our leadership is stacked with grifters who only have experience in shifting money around. We are all stuck with oil and car dependence that nobody’s willing to address with long-term infrastructure development reforms.
We are trapped fighting wars over oil because $6-7/gallon gasoline in middle America would trigger a major recession. Our government actively incentivizes wasting oil via automotive regulations written by industry lobbyists. That big F-150 parked at the Old Navy that doesn’t need to follow CAFE regulations is totally a “work truck.”
We don’t strive to build the most competitive industries, instead we use sanctions and tariffs to prevent foreign competition from reaching our shores.
And before you talk about China disallowing foreign competition, I’ll note that Chinese citizens can go to the mall in China and buy a Tesla, an iPhone, an Audi, Levi’s jeans, Coach bags, do a web search on Bing, deploy applications on AWS servers in Beijing, etc.
That said, it is indeed disappointing that we can't get their affordable EVs over here. Western legacy automakers really need a kick in the ass (especially since Tesla seems to just be phoning it in now).
I don't count Rivian or Lucid until they actually have even somewhat affordable EVs.
But pretty much everyone else in the US is doing a piss poor job with EVs and just don't seem to care at all. Ford seemed to have lost interest in the F-150 lightning.
I agree that trade needs to be a two way street. But I'm not convinced yet on "affordable" since these might be severely subsidized by the Chinese Gov to undermine domestic car makers across different nations. I say might only because I'm not 100% sure.
It’s cancelled.
So is the Chev Silverado EV.
Seeing the way tech companies behave makes me think they fear Trump the same way. for example, Tim Apple certainly crawls up Trumps arse.
If you have ambitions that are contrary to that of the Party, well, they're going to get what they want, one way or another. It doesn't matter if you don't want to deal your AI to the military or if you'd rather not sell your home so that a highway can be built over the lot.
This was at UCLA which is in LA which is the second biggest city in the US.
Posting the map in case anyone hasn’t seen it.
They say they're worried when the building stops. Even more people will be out of jobs. And when the nation ages all they built will be used and maintained by fewer people
I've never been to china so it's interesting perspective from people with family there and go back 2-3 times a year
In 2008 China had 1,300km of high speed rail. In 2025 they had over 45,000km.
Meanwhile America has zero…. But is bringing back the V8! Ye-haw!
Surely with the cost of fuel skyrocketing we'll pivot to public transit and non-fossil-fuel transport, right? Right?
Right.
Refining already invented things is 'innovation'.
Respondants:
Please, stop lying on the internet. It's not healthy. Stop making things up.
Source:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/innovation
Making cars faster or cheaper isn't an "innovation". Making a flying car is innovation. Inventing the car is invention.
Systematic government-aided intellectual property theft, lax labor laws, low wages and low standards of living aren't innovative.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_in_China
[2]: https://apnews.com/article/china-coal-solar-climate-carbon-e...
> BYD has to me become an icon of US decline vs Chinese expansion
Is this supposed to help virality or something? "US decline"?
Not just on dumping or price, actual product quality, innovation and value. It's impossible to visit a Huawei store in Beijing and not feel it in your bones
How do we have a productive discussion about our feelings on a tech site?
That's how China was able to compete: banning America from contesting the market.
This is literally using fossil fuels to create renewable energy, which is the ultimate sane and responsible way to use the energy from fossil fuels.
Renewables generally aren't capable of a black start, wind turbines in particular use induction generators that require external power.
China picked manufacturing.
US picked datacenters.
If 90% of the factories in the world were hit by a nuclear bomb, you'd find that your standard of living would immediately, and quite observably plummet.
You tell me which is more important.
The amount of internet technocrap we actually need to live comfortably is a tiny fraction of what actually gets built. Most of it is in service of adtech, the surveillance state, or shaving 0.5% off some rentseeker's fat margins (on his side, the savings aren't passed on to us).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_vehicle_e...
> This is to say nothing of the CCP and their record on human rights and free expression.
To be very practical here the lack of rights and freedoms as they exist in China typically has no consequence to the lives of individual people. For example you have no right to protest. But how many of us have exercised that right in the US? Personally I never did. And honestly those protests end up being just parties and parades
My view.
I was looking at a new car. Went into several car shops, VW, Skoda, Toyota and BYD.
And all of them were basically empty and BYD was FULL! Like really really full.
And the sales guy confirmed it, they are selling cars like crazy.
Just curious-- if you did say something about this, what would it be?
Worked with Apple!
China was more than happy to welcome him in, and have him teach them how to build an EV. They simply copied what they could and improved on it.
"The communists will happily sell the capitalists the rope the capitalists hang themselves with"
is there even a screen?
https://www.wsj.com/business/autos/chinese-cars-byd-geely-u-...
Why? Because US Mercedez-Benz dealers were selling their cars at too high a price and a lot of Americans were importing them directly from Germany. So the dealers associations lobbied Congress for a ban.
Country of free markets, by the way.
I'm not in the market for a new car, but anyone who has looked recently what is the draw to BYD? Is it strictly value/price?
*except Elon’s
A bit like wearing Adiboss or Gacci clothes. Nothing wrong with that.
Hopefully BYD will make something original and with style on its own.
But counter example is e.g. new Audi look like Kia.
Funny.
USA boomer car companies run a competition on who can build the biggest crappy SUVs around sold to other boomers who now look aghast at pump prices
Europe boomer car companies can't overrun their nit-pickiness and analysis paralysis and wonder why consumers are picking the car with screens that actually work like a modern device and don't have subscription horns or some other BS like that
For those not paying attention to geopolitics, Taiwan is the real concern here. China wants to control them, and is building a strong military. How the future will play out I don't know, but this should be your concern.
Tesla is doing poorly here. That's almost entirely down to Musk's public image, not because BYD make better cars.
For all the China lovers here it's not a clear sign of Chinese superiority. I saw a video on youtube recently exploring BYD. It's success is due to the fact that the Chinese government as part of their plan to dominate the global car industry gives them massive amounts of money. Which manufacturer can compete with that? European tariffs in the near future looks likely.
Among other things the video explores some of BYD's shadier practices including artificially inflating domestic sales and not paying suppliers for up to 9 months.
I have my doubts whether their success is sustainable.
you can't buy BYD in the USA (thanks to Biden actually, not current admin)
BUT
there's a loophole to have a car from Canada in the USA for a year
so lease them from Canada to USA buyers for a year at a time
BYD UK import tariff is 10%
BYD US import tariff is 100%
Mashimo•55m ago
But worldwide it has been for a while, no? I think total EV cars sold in 2025 BYD was top, if I remember correctly.
testing22321•40m ago