That place decided that free public transportation was a good investment. I think many people here would see it as a waste of their tax money. But those people are not low income. They can afford to buy cars. I occasionally hear my coworkers remark about how they would never ride one of those city busses—YUCK. It kind of grinds my gears.
Living in that place made me feel like the community actually cared about me. It made a big impact on how I think about what is worth spending my taxes on. We already subsidize the middle class (roads ain’t free!) and we subsidize the heck out of corporate America. A small slice of those subsidies would make a big difference for people at the bottom.
Unfortunately there's a fair bit if industry built around charging people who are stretched financially more, but it's possible to avoid that.
Maybe cause I was about to get married but I loved that truck.
"When people wave off Waymo or bus lanes or bike lanes because car culture is fine, they mean it works fine for them."
I doubt the "HN crowd" was about to do anything, but it'd be better if someone saw some sort of market opportunity here. It sounds pretty miserable not being able to get to a well paid job. I personally appreciate all the people who lent me money and sold me cars. It enabled a lot of income for me, over a lifetime.
US automakers have chosen to abandon anything not a $40k-$100k SUV or pickup truck, and purposely minimize production to optimize for profits over volume. You can either leave the country, pay the captive market tax, or import a cheap car when allowed to.
Chinese automakers cannot find enough marine capacity for exports at the moment (currently at a ~12M unit/year export run rate). Imports are allowed eventually imho, it’s just a matter of when (elections and representation turnover rate). Until then, the poor are held hostage for profits (as is tradition in the US).
Never happens on the timescale of the next decade, maybe two. How far is California high speed rail? When did they start?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_High-Speed_Rail
Sure, provide subsidies to move the disadvantaged to major urban cores with public transportation systems, I’d support that.
tech_ken•48m ago
Banger post. My first car was a $1200 Geo Prism that I bought through the mechanic shop at the gas station up the street. It was older than my (younger) brother; got a good 5 years out of it before the transmission literally fell apart on Rt 2.
raddan•29m ago
I am comfortably middle class now. I still buy budget cars because I can’t get past how outrageously expensive most cars are now. But even now I still think, every time I sit in my new (well, three year old) car: wow, this is awesome. I don’t know if my friends think those same thoughts, because I would be honestly a little embarrassed to explain why I feel that way.
cgio•13m ago
hn993302•9m ago