All these copium defend the market takes, you telling me Tesla, a failed venture living off government subsidies, is worth 16x more than the hundred year old Ford that actually makes a profit without fraud?
Are you referring to the consumer incentives to buy electric? Not only are these ending, but they’re some of the least hinky government subsidies of business in the economy, because they go direct to the consumer. Have you seen what our government does for corn farmers and big oil? Oh right, corn and oil: those other “failed ventures” LOL
Tesla, a failed venture living off government subsidies
It's not a failed venture precisely because it lives off government money. Show me a Fortune 500 company and I'll show you a large stream of public sector receipts.
Tesla stock prices in the expectation that they'll have robotaxi services and general purpose robots in the near future. And also that they will be leaders in these fields, ahead of the competition.
How likely/unlikely that is to happen is debatable, but that's why some people are valuing the company so high right now.
"Debatable" is a heavy stretch for someone with a 0% track record when it comes to promised tech while repeating "we can do it NOW and it will be available NEXT YEAR!" for a literal decade. Robo taxies were supposed to be EVERYWHERE 4 years ago. Same with SpaceX, we were supposed to be sending the first people to mars this year, yet all Elon has managed was burn 3 bilion tax payer dollars for literal fireworks, as not a single "starship" managed to reach high orbit. Even the cybertruck is a cheap knockoff of what was promised. Not to mention the countless people that have died because he's allowed to beta test his death machines in public. Can't forget his starlink shenanigans in Ukraine, fucking warlord wannabe... Elon is the greatest scam artist in modern history, and it's absolutely disgraceful that he isn't behind bars, let alone valued at all.
Yeah, because the market went from having the opinion of "I'm 80% sure that Tesla is going to do this robo taxi, automaton thing" to " I'm 65% sure that Tesla is going to do this robotaxi, automaton thing". Things are rarely all or nothing with the market.
Ford are up to their eyeballs in debt, and they completely gave up on making affordable cars, which is the market segment that made Ford what they are in the first place.
Tesla actually makes vehicles normal people can afford to buy and run, so yes, they are worth more than Ford.
TL;DR of this response is that a Tesla is not more affordable for most normal people because what they can purchase is influenced by initial buy in costs/their own budgets at purchase:
Many “normal people” have less than 5K in savings. A model 3 is baseline around $40K plus the infrastructure of chargers you will probably need installed to charge it.
A Ford Bronco Sport or Escape start at 29K and I used them as an example because most Americans are buying SUVs or trucks, not sedans or compacts. No infrastructure needed.
Even with high credit scores, you’re talking at least ~$500 monthly payments even with something like 7K down. I know this because I purchased a new Subaru for about 30K within the past 6 months and my credit score was 815 at the time of purchase and I shopped around for the best APR financing I could get.
You have to remember that long term affordability doesn’t matter. Up front costs are influencing most “normal people” purchases because what you can afford NOW is what you can afford.
As an example of this in action - There’s a reason subscription services see monthly or quarterly as their biggest buy-ins because cheaper up front costs mean more to the consumer who has to invest in the NOW despite the long term being a better deal. I was in marketing for a subscription service and guess what we always sold the most of? If you guessed monthly - have a cookie.
I see. So you don’t live in America. I still stand by what I said because I’m pretty sure that many manufacturers that sell vehicles in your area are cheaper than a Tesla.
Also, why are you getting angry for me pointing out what’s true? You compared Tesla and Ford without specifying where you live and/or availability. If you can’t get a Ford there at all then of course it’s less affordable than a Tesla because it’s not even an option.
If that’s the point then it begs to ask the question of why you even compared the two for your edge case and used a generality of affordability to most “normal people”.
Ford has right hand drive escapes in Australia. Your callout about specific vehicle models is one, not entirely correct, and two, not relevant to the point of the parent comment.
Reality, in which the ford f series is the most sold vehicle for the past 42 years
Pick one
Ford is moving its prices upwards because people want and pay for what they're offering, very clearly given the statistics we have. Also to say that tesla is the brand regular people can afford when both brands have ev trucks and one has a starting msrp almost 30k more than the other is kinda hilarious.
Lastly, ford has a vehicle with an msrp of 23,920 while the lowest priced tesla vehicle is 38,890 dollars. Even taking gas savings over 5 years into account, ($4,223 if you happen to live near my area and drive about 10k miles per year) the tesla is significantly more expensive. Clearly, tesla is not the company concerned with the common man. To make that point even more clear though, one needs only to compare tesla to the Korean and Chinese EVs that are being offered at significantly lower prices.
Talking about affordable cars, and then going on about F series trucks, is pretty out of touch.
And I'm not sure what vehicles they sell where you live, but they've stopped selling the Mondeo, focus, and Fiesta, the smallest brand new Ford you can buy near me is a mustang.
According to the American consumer, they are affordable, or else they wouldn't be the most popular new car.
Also, you were the one that brought up affordability.
I drive a 90s volvo and you can pry it from my cold dead hands. I have no intention of buying a new vehicle any time soon. It has nothing to do with me being out of touch and everything to do with statistics concerning vehicle sales.
The American consumer is swimming in debt. What new cars they buy is not indictive of affordable. Look at the loan lengths from 10 years ago to today. 72 month loans are now normal, and 84/96 is becoming more normal than they should.