Another Rip-Off Electric Yugo
Why does GM continue to throw money at electric cars?
Perhaps because it’s not their money.
It’s yours. And mine.
In the form of apparently endless taxpayer-extorted “help” (via federal taxation) to spur the design and manufacture of vehicles that have to be given away at a loss because – channeling Donald Trump – they are losers.
First the Volt – so few of which were offloaded (“sold” would be an affront to honest English) GM had to idle the plant devoted to their assembly. Then GM doubled-down and ginned up the ELR – a Volt dressed in Cadillac duds that was the ultimate dud. So few of them were offloaded (no surprise, given each one cost twice what a Volt listed for) it made the Volt seem like a bases-loaded homer.
Now comes the Bolt.
Another $30,000 (that’s after the $7,500 federal direct-to-the”buyer” bribe) automotive Turducken that’s inferior in every way function can be measured to a 1984 Yugo.
The Yugo had an eight-gallon fuel tank and averaged 38 MPG – giving it a range of about 304 miles. Its cost when new was about $3,600 in 1984 dollars – the equivalent of about $8,200 today.
The government didn’t have to bribe anyone to buy a Yugo. Punchlines aside, people freely exchanged their money (not other people’s money) for them.
It could be refueled in less than five minutes. Using the heater or the headlights did not gimp the range.
It weighed 1,543 pounds.
Now (30 years later) behold the Bolt.
Its battery pack weighs 960 pounds – more than half what the entire Yugo weighed (with a full tank of gas). GM spokesmen beam that you can put 50 miles of range into those batteries after only 30 minutes of waiting.
A full charge is possible after a mere nine hours.
The car itself, a subcompact, weighs 3,580 pounds – twice (and then some) what a Yugo weighed and about as much as a current mid-sized IC car such as a Honda Accord or Toyota Camry weighs.
It probably goes faster than a Yugo – which had a top speed of about 84 MPH. But – like all electric cars – not for very long.
The post Another Rip-Off Electric Yugo appeared first on LewRockwell.
Leave a Reply