Re:Detroit News Vehicle of the Year is a Tesla
by mdeeks on Thursday December 27, 2018 @11:51PM
(#18774950)
The devil is in the details though. Things that can significantly swing prices:
1. Saving $5k by not getting Auto Pilot (The A4 doesn't have it so maybe it wasn't fair for me to include that in the price to begin with)
2. The true MPG the A4 gets on your normal commute (She's in a lot of stop and go traffic. I had to guess on the optimistic side. My gut feel is the A4 would get more like 25mpg, but I'm being optimistic with the Model 3 range of 310 too)
3. The actual costs of maintenance and repairs. It's estimated to be a lot less than the A4 but only time will tell.
4. You live in an area with reasonable power prices off-peak. That can bump the electricity costs in some areas by 50% or more.
5. I've seen people get a home plug installed for 1/3 of what I was charged.
For me, those numbers boiled down to "a Tesla M3 is $10k cheaper than an A4 because it gets $10k of government rebates"
Of course, the argument is that fossil fuel vehicles are the beneficiaries of unaccounted-for negative externalities, and that these rebates rectify that somewhat. But it's interesting that the A4 would otherwise be comparable. It seems that as long as the subsidies exist and it's mostly Tesla benefiting, it's in Tesla's interest to keep the price up at a level where this is the case -- where they're only cheaper due to subsidies.