back to article Tesla share crash amid Republican bid to kill off electric car tax break

Tesla's share price took a dive Thursday morning as Republicans in Congress revealed they were planning to kill off a US federal tax credit for electric vehicles. The proposed US House tax bill calls for an immediate repeal of the $7,500-per-vehicle credit: something that would have an immediate knock-on impact for Tesla given …

  1. bruceawilson

    And the beautiful thing is lawmakers are exempt from insider trading restrictions.

    1. Farmlife

      I know and to think Obama had 8 years to fix that and did nothing.

    2. Shanka B

      Because they have to have blind investiment rules set for Congress.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      That ended under bush Jr.

    4. Eddy Ito

      The crash is the result of knee jerk reactions of people who don't understand the credit anyway. Musk probably thinks it's a joke since the tax credit is limited to the first 200,000 units sold in the US for any given manufacturer. At the end of 2016 Tesla was already over the half way point at 110k+ US sales and if the same ratio of US sales to units built was maintained this year Tesla would be scheduled to limit out fairly early in the first quarter of 2018 if not later this year.

      In short Tesla is already nearing the end of when its buyers could claim the credit anyway and if it happens a month earlier than expected it isn't going to change Tesla's situation much. On the upside the dip is now priced in instead of being priced in after they sold number 200,000 in the US which would be in about a month or two. Those of us who were already keyed in on this can now take our Tesla shorts early and move on to the next fully predictable market over-reaction.

  2. ratfox
    Pint

    Because General Motors believes in an all-electric future…

    Wow. Things sure have changed!

    1. Mark 85

      They've been working on electric cars for at least the last 30 years. Back when they started the biggest problem was with weight (batteries) and range. They were looking at the delivery industry as their market (UPS, US Mail, etc.). It wasn't a large program, per se, but they were doing some things outside the box to work through those issues.

      1. Gene Cash Silver badge

        Actually, he's probably referring to the legendary EV-1 fiasco.

        1. Mark 85

          Ah.. I didn't think of that one. Too many disasters floating about.

        2. Faux Science Slayer

          "Green Prince of Darkness" at FauxScienceSlayer > photovoltaic fraud

          "Tesla Burns $16 Million per Day" at ZeroHedge website.... sustainable stupidity....

          Chicken Little science begets Jack-in-the-Beanstalk solutions

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "Green Prince of Darkness" at FauxScienceSlayer > photovoltaic fraud

            Chaps & chapesses might want to peek at the referenced PDF for some pretty devasting proofs, like:

            "Solar radiation strips protons from Nitrogen atoms, creating Carbon-14." -

            "When exposed to sunlight, the Boron atom losses it’s easily excited fifth electron, which travels the Si

            licon matrix using the Phosphorus “hole” to the conducting collection grids on both sides of the photovoltaic cell and permanently exits the cell. ... There is a constant loss of electrons in this system and power production erodes over time until, at twenty years, they are useless."

            and many other PDFs reward the purveyor of extra-strength frog pills:

            "When Alfred Nobel invented Trinitrotoluene (TNT), it was a quantum leap in pound-per-pound energy when compared to previous chemical explosives." [quoth Wikipedia: "TNT was first prepared in 1863 by German chemist Julius Wilbrand and originally used as a yellow dye. Its potential as an explosive was not appreciated for several years, mainly because it was so difficult to detonate and because it was less powerful than alternatives."]

            ...and oil is made from natural radioactive decay, which may also explain the Bermuda Triangle. This is so self-evident that no decay series or quantities are given, as no-one wants the self-evident belaboured...

            "oh...."

        3. MachDiamond Silver badge

          The EV-1 wasn't a fiasco. California had passed a law that mandated that any manufacturer that wanted to sell cars in California would have to sell a certain number of zero emissions vehicles. CA is a big car market and many states in the US tend to follow CA on certain issues. Once the critical number of politicians were paid, the law was repealed and GM took back the leased EV-1's and crushed them so competitors couldn't buy them up cheap and reverse engineer any of the tech. If the law stayed on the books, GM would have been in the leading position. GM was covering it's backside and probably learned a bunch during the process of development that they are using now. With the increase in battery power density and the decrease in cost, an EV is marginally affordable.

          The US can afford to spend the money on incentivizing EV sales. They spend far more to have the military in the Middle East keeping the oil flowing. If there wasn't the need to import massive amounts of crude into the US by eliminating a large chunk if it being used for personal transportation, much or all of the armed forces could be brought back home and the region could jihad itself into oblivion without affecting anybody else. Part of the problem is that a large military means lots of highly paid military equipment suppliers. Those suppliers have big sponsorships of politicians to keep any semblance of rational thinking from happening.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            You gotta be kidding...

            The following statements are part of the rules for this "forum".

            1. We want our comment forums to remain a lively, stimulating and noisy place to hang out.

            2. We publish what we feel is fit for publication.

            3. We try to be broad-minded and consistent – but in the end if we don't want it on our site, it doesn't go up or stay up.

            I guess it goes without saying that an article about anything involving saving our planet, restricting our freedoms, and basically selling out our nation would be found here. Obviously, the gospel of global freezing, sorry, global warming, no, scratch that, global climate change, is bound to rear its mindless head here.

            Do you really believe the only reason we have a large military is to sell cars from the Big Three?

            This may come as a shock, but other countries' peoples come to ours selling their interests. As an example, the freak that just attacked New York a few days ago, not to mention the many attacks thus far committed in the US. Your response really pretty much says we can scale back our defense forces if we didn't help Detroit automakers by ensuring oil is in supply for their profit making, job producing entities. As a matter of fact, if we were to rid our country of our progressive statists, we could actually tap the full assortment of our country's oil, nuclear power, et cetera.

            Consider this: Shut down our filthy, immoral coal industry and see how much electricity you'd have left to power those funny little cube beep beep electric cars. Fact is, right now, with the technology and resources we have, we are being well served. We The People want to drive trucks and SUV's, powerful ones, because we can. Plus, no, our country, our people, cannot afford to use tax payer money to promote Solyndra like scams, of which EV cars is one.

            Please educate yourself properly in these matters.

            Due to the aforementioned rules I listed at the top, I cannot be sure this post will even reach the discussion. TheRegister wants our comments, and for us to have lively informed debate, but as they state, as long it agrees with their ideology.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: You gotta be kidding...

              So this is your first post here. Question is: why bother?

              1. bombastic bob Silver badge
                Meh

                Re: You gotta be kidding...

                well, a lot of it is the venting of frustration against the constant drip, drip, drip of socialism, religious environmentalism, and media bias. Better to do a targeted attack with a smart bomb than to attempt a cluster-bombing from 40,000 feet.

                As for me, I don't want to be taxed in order to pay for some rich guy's Tesla. If someone wants a Tesla car, let him buy it with his own money, and NONE of mine. I'll stick to a dino-burner, thanks. So let the loopholes get shut down, EVERY! ONE! of them. "They" need to stop using the tax code to manipulate people and/or pick 'winners' and 'losers' anyway.

            2. Old_Fart

              Re: You gotta be kidding...

              In order to understand your comment one needs a brain and clear at that. I am afraid that the immense amount of brainwashing in the contemporary "progressive" educational system makes this all but impossible. Sad.

            3. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge
              Coat

              Re: You gotta be kidding...

              @FreedomIsn'tFree

              Obviously, the gospel of global freezing, sorry, global warming, no, scratch that, global climate change, is bound to rear its mindless head here.

              Well, it would help if the US administration could sing from the same hymn sheet on that front:

              "Climate change: US report at odds with some in Trump team"

              http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41868878

              As for middle eastern oil...

              "Trump pitches for $2 trillion Saudi Aramco oil float"

              http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41869135

              "Would very much appreciate Saudi Arabia doing their IPO of Aramco with the New York Stock Exchange. Important to the United States!"

          2. bombastic bob Silver badge
            FAIL

            "The US can afford to spend the money on incentivizing EV sales."

            but why would we WANT to? Gummint subisidizing of any tech just results in the rich getting richer, and the poor paying for all of it through higher taxes and/or more national debt.

            Better to get rid of ALL of the targeted tax breaks. ALL of them. Wealth re-distribution via the tax code is probably the fastest way to a 2-class society, "haves" and "have-nots".

            Besides, gasoline is cheap liquid energy. let's keep using it. With fracking, we don't need Middle East oil any more. FYI the wars over there are against TERRORISTS. Like ISIS. It has nothing to do with "the flow of oil". The USA doesn't need Middle East oil any more. Not since 'fracking'.

          3. Heretick1

            Really? How can the U.S. afford this when we are 20 trillion dollars in debt. The constitution does authorize the federal government to take our hard earned money to provide for defense. Can you please tell me where in the constitution does it authorize congress to take money from me and give it to Elon Musk? or anyone else trying to sell things We the People don't want

          4. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            The US $20,000,000,000,000,000,000+ in debt. We can't afford anything.

          5. mcstamper

            "The US can afford to spend the money on incentivizing EV sales." The $20-trillion-in-debt US can "afford" more handouts to subsidize electric cars? No! Not a penny more! Electric cars are toys for the wealthy. It is absolutely absurd to pay wealthy liberals thousands of dollars so they can explore their electric car fantasies. In an unfettered marketplace, electric cars would never get any bigger than golf carts. Elon Musk is a fake businessman. His entire business model rests on massive taxpayer subsidies. Take away the subsidies, and Musk's business empire would collapse. Gasoline-powered cars are perhaps the most successful and proven mode of transportation ever invented. We should be building more of them, not less. Electric cars have never and WILL NEVER replace gas-powered cars unless government entities intervene to force people to buy them. They failed 100 years ago and will continue to fail.

      2. THETMAXX

        No, Auto makers have been working on electric cars since the late 1800's.

      3. Bill_Sticker

        The last thirty? Try the last hundred. Edison was experimenting with electric cars back in the early 1900's. There was a fad for electric cars in the 1920's and early 1930's, latterly in the late 70's and early 80's. Now in the 2010's. Every single time they've been found impractical for the same reasons, range and refuel times.

        With Tesla's there are issues on build quality and catastrophic suspension failures.

        1. Phukov Andigh Bronze badge

          to be fair

          they had electric cars for over a hundred years, but the Big Three have not carried anything in their sales line or been doing any continuous development until relatively recently.

        2. Trigonoceps occipitalis

          At one time (late 1800s) the absolute world speed record was held by a battery powered car.

      4. Oscarphone

        Battery powered cars are a 180 year-old "technology" that has always been a hassle to operate. Simple as that. Batteries are not as energy dense as oil and not as convenient, that is why battery powered cars have been regulated to golf carts and toy cars. A one hour "fill up" can't win with a 5 minute stop at a gas station without subsidy from government and on top of that it's a subsidy for a 100K car on the backs of the very people who can't afford them. But this is what you get when government selects the winners and losers of a crony capitalist game. If you want to rock the future and hate gasoline, why hang your hat on a losing 180 year-old "technology"? Whatever happened to hydrogen powered cars? A far better way to power a car instead of a wall plug but . . . no government subsidy. If plug-in electrics hadn't been favored by Washington DC idiots who wouldn't know energy density from second base, we'd be driving, or on the verge of driving, hydrogen cars by now and more people could afford them too. No one hour fill-up, no changing out the power plant at 100K no $100,000 car with 50 grand of amenities.

      5. neverendingfightforfreedom

        "They've been working on electric cars for at least the last 30 years."

        Ahh ignorance is soo bliss.

        The FIRST cars EVER designed were in fact ELECTRIC. try adding 100 years +/-

        Go back to your cave

  3. regregular

    4bn divided by 7500 gives me a bit over 530k. There are that many electric vehicles sold in the US per year? Or does the same amount apply to hybrids?

    1. Alistair
      Windows

      I rather sincerely doubt that there are 530,000 green vehicles a year going on the road. There is some other number in there making this up. US legal bills tend to have 6 or 7 (LOUDLY) trumpeted bits and 40 or 50 little one liners that do wunnerful things hidden in them.

      1. Lennart Sorensen

        Maybe someone is assuming Tesla will actually make 300000 model 3s in 2018 and sell them all in the US. Or they expect the Bolt to sell a lot of cars.

      2. Cuddles

        "I rather sincerely doubt that there are 530,000 green vehicles a year going on the road."

        According to the article, Georgia had monthly sales of 1400 before cutting their own tax credit. It would only take 32 states with sales like that to hit the 530k figure. Apparently Georgia is fairly big in terms of population and economy so it may be a bit of an outlier, but given there are 50 states in total it's still not an obviously silly figure.

        However, that also highlights a rather big problem. Georgia had those sales before they cut the tax credit. After they cut it, sales dropped by more than an order of magnitude. Even if we take the figure given as a realistic one, you're not going to rake in billions by cutting tax credits on those sales because those sales won't be there if you cut the tax credit.

        1. Hero Protagonist

          "you're not going to rake in billions by cutting tax credits on those sales because those sales won't be there if you cut the tax credit."

          If you're not issuing credits anymore, then it doesn't matter whether there are any sales or not. Either way, you're avoiding issuing the credits.

          1. Captain Obvious

            Tax Law - I doubt MANY who qualify for the credit can use it.

            "you're not going to rake in billions by cutting tax credits on those sales because those sales won't be there if you cut the tax credit."

            Maybe all of you should ACTUALLY look at how the credit works. If you get a credit, but have NO tax liability or are getting a refund before the credit, you get nothing. I am getting REAL sick and tired of all the news not researching before posting articles. I never read the current news anymore because three days later, the truth tends to finally get out and of course the retractions are ALWAYS buried in small print (true regardless of political affiliation) See below:

            =======================================================

            What does it mean that a $7,500 credit is allowable for vehicle? Why wouldn’t I get the full amount?

            A manufacturer has to certify to the IRS that a particular make, model and model year meets the requirements for the New Plug-in Tax Credit and certify the maximum amount of credit allowable based on that vehicle’s battery capacity. However, although a vehicle qualifies for a certain amount of credit, there is no guarantee the taxpayer will be able to claim the full amount. The New Plug-in Tax Credit is non-refundable so the purchaser can only claim it to the extent he or she has a tax liability that year. For example, if a taxpayer purchases a vehicle for which $7,500 of credit is allowable, but the taxpayer only has a tax liability of $3,000 then he or she won’t be able to use $4,500 of the allowable credit.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Tax Law - I doubt MANY looked at it

              Many tax schemes are like that in Canada, only helps those with high tax bills to pay, or offset, and rarely applies to the majority even though the government says otherwise. Tax cuts have been promised by every government for generations and percentage of total tax due on income and assets for the middle and lower continue to increase each generation.

              Then again in Canada our Prime Minister thinks the average income is well over the 6 figure mark, when it is closer to $40K and almost half of that due in taxes and fees. Our government believes the average Canadian can afford an elect car and a house with a garage in or near a major city so it isn't as though they are lying on purpose and that group has seen percentage taxes decline for generations.

            2. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Tax Law - I doubt MANY who qualify for the credit can use it.

              who's paying for a Model S or Model X who doesn't have an income tax much higher than the tax liability?

              Only someone playing some seriously tricky tax games, or making money thru less than legal means.

              in reality, the vast majority are wealthy earners where such a condition does not apply. a 3K tax liability would be what, making only 20K a year? not getting financed on a Tesla with that. so realistically, your objection is like worrying about dragons being exposed to cold weather.

            3. Tom 13

              Re: Tax Law - I doubt MANY who qualify for the credit can use it.

              Perhaps you made a typo when you put in your screen name. Look to me like your moniker should be Captain ObLIvious.

              Whether or not you are due a refund is a function of how much you've had withheld, not a function of your tax liability. So, if after deductions I have a tax liability of $47,900 single/$56,200 filing jointly (using 2016 tax tables) and I got the $7,500 tax credit I'd still be eligible for the tax credit, assuming the vendor didn't exceed their quota of tax credits. Given a standard deduction of $6,300/$12,600 plus personal exemptions, that puts the gross income at $54,300 single/$68,800 minimum. Given the US Census Bureau puts the median US wage at $56,516 there's a roughly 50/50 chance a random person would qualify for the deduction.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Tax Law - I doubt MANY who qualify for the credit can use it.

                Ah, the median wage fallacy....

                When you take out the people earning $M's per year, you average person is really earning south of $30k

        2. Heermster

          ??

          1400 cars each year in 32 states is only 44,800 cares. That is a far cry from 530k vehicles.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: ??

            Try 1400 cars each month for a year in 32 states:

            1400 * 12 * 32 = 537,600 or 530k for the sake of rounding.

        3. regregular

          >> yAccording to the article, Georgia had monthly sales of 1400 before cutting their own tax credit. It would only take 32 states with sales like that to hit the 530k figure. Apparently Georgia is fairly big in terms of population and economy so it may be a bit of an outlier, but given there are 50 states in total it's still not an obviously silly figure."

          32 states at 1400 does not make it 530k. Still an order of magnitude off.

        4. MagZteel

          You are misunderstanding the situation. This is a tax credit, not a tax.

          The government collects taxes. The government pays tax credits.

          Based on projected sales they are projecting paying 4B in tax credits. Eliminating the credit eliminates the expense. Any sales impact caused by ending the subsidy is irrelevant to this calculation.

        5. scottisatwork

          ga tax

          The Georgia tax credit was seen as a "free car"--which with leasing it was virtually free. Then all of those leases came up, they turned the car in and the resale plummeted. For example, that "free car" was $32k, the residual was $17K. Used leafs are anywhere from $6k-9.5K 2 years old. I bought my '15 for $9,300 with 4800 miles. From some discussions with the Dealer, who had lines of lease turn-ins, most did not buy another EV. Some bough PI Hybrids from other manufacturers but most went back to oil burners.

          To equate the sales in Georgia to be true EV converts would be misguided. There is no demand for the cars and only sell with low lease rates. The $7500 is important, but a bad taxpayer investment in what is now a mature technology that is not being accepted by the market.

          California's mandates will require OEM's to lose money on each car sold to comply. That cost will have to be passed to oil burners to recover the costs.

          The $7500 is insulating OEM's from facing up to the reality they have to make EV's with range, charging times and cost close to the oil burning counterparts and any Fed credit should be moved to technology that needs investment, such as fuel cell cars

      3. Farmlife

        It's the typical liberal lie. Everything they touch has to be fabricated or over valued by soaking the middle class.

    2. Lennart Sorensen

      I believe the requirement is that the electric range has to be larger than the non electric range (this affects the BMW i3 with range extender for example which has an artificial fuel tank limit in the US). Regular hybrids (like a prius and such) does not apply since the electric range is much shorter than the non electric range.

    3. Eddy Ito

      It also applies to plug in hybrids at a lower rate based on the whimsy of bureaucrats but the full $7500 applies only to fully electric vehicles.

      You can see the whole list and the credits here.

      Just as well it's gone. They still use the roads but pay no road tax that is incorporated into gasoline and diesel. It's also just a tax break for those wealthy enough to splash the extra cash and own a home as not many apartments have charging facilities if they even have off street parking. Mostly a tax break for the rich.

      1. Tom Paine

        Yep! Just as well!

        Europe's EV manufacturers will be delighted to see the tech industry's attempt to eat their lunch go up in a puff of Trumpery. How're Apple's shares doing? What about Google?

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "Just as well it's gone. They still use the roads but pay no road tax that is incorporated into gasoline and diesel"

        This is my main annoyance with electric car subsidisation in the UK. Most electric cars will be sold to above average earners, who are being subsidised by everyone who pays taxes, many of whom can't afford an electric car, even with a subsidy. The people who have an electric car then benefit a second time because of the lack of fuel duty on the electricity they use to power their car. It wouldn't matter so much if electric cars were affordable to everyone, but if that were the case, fuel duty would have been replaced by a GPS / ANPR based tax system by now. The fact that no-one in government has even thought about implementing a feasibility study for this means that they don't expect electric cars to become widespread. (Or it could just be that they're too busy dealing with internal party politics to do their jobs...)

        1. Oneman2Many

          That is the case with most of these 'subsides'. Solar panels is another case, you need to be able to invest in panels in the first place which means the people who receive the subside would have done without it in the first place.

          In both case of electric cars, the argument could be that it helps kick start infrastructure changes that will be required before a mass rollout.

        2. Captain Obvious

          Funny.....

          "Just as well it's gone. They still use the roads but pay no road tax that is incorporated into gasoline and diesel"

          How I look at my electric bill heaped with taxes to state and county. It will be made up one way or another. Wouldn't surprise me to see a Fed Tax on the electric bill soon.

        3. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          You're right of course...

          You are absolutely correct in that most people cannnot afford these stupid inefficient cars even with the current tax credit. But the one thing about liberals is, that at no point will they ever be satisfied with you making your own decisions. Consider all the things we can no longer say, otherwise you'll be charged with some criminal offense, or at the very least, lose your job because you like the Redskins' name, or dare you say Muslim terrorist...there is no end. So, I can foresee the day when those who cannot afford the electric car will simply be given one, like they are now with food, housing, healthcare, Obama phones, the list is endless...all by our benefactors, which really means, all of you who pay taxes. Kind of like how the EIC is called a credit, when it is in fact another welfare payment.

      3. GameChanger

        This isn't just a tax-break for the rich. It's an incentive for us to be a cleaner society and lose the heavy dependency we currently have on oil and natural gas. I was really hoping that we could complpete the move to solar and wind by 2020, and as for the point about not having charging stations, this would change if a lot of people got into electric vehicles. If more people demanded the electric vehicles, more and more locations would have the stations.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          No

          No, this isn't because most people believe in climate change, or even that everyone wants an EV...it is the liberal elites jamming it down our throats. Please explain to me where the electric will come from when all those evil coal fired electric plants no longer produce power, what then. Like all Liberals, your logic isn't ever rooted in science. It is your ideology, that the government should rule all things. Period.

      4. Phukov Andigh Bronze badge

        and only electric CARS

        you don't get 7.5K on an electric motorcycle either. which if we really wanted to cut congestion (and lower long term health care expenses lol) we'd allow that large subsidy for EV motorbikes. Organs for everyone! :)

        1. bombastic bob Silver badge
          Unhappy

          Re: and only electric CARS

          about electric motorcycles...

          Motorcycles still don't have catalytic converters on them, as far as I know This means they pollute way more than cars do [and I do ***NOT*** consider CO2 to be "pollution"], by producing the kinds of gasses and particulates that a typical catalyst system would burn up before going out the tail pipe.

          Given THAT factoid, electric motorcycles make WAY more sense than all of that money thrown at electric CARS.

          If the issue is cutting down on traffic jams and also saving on fuel usage [to help keep fuel cost down, let's say], then electric motorcycles make more sense.

          But gummint is *NEVER* about sensible solutions. It's about MANIPULATION and CONTROL of "the masses", power retention, getting re-elected, and "skimming off the top".

          So they do what they've always done: give tax breaks for cars that MOST people cannot afford to buy, that ONLY apply to people who pay a lot of taxes already, but make it SOUND like "they care" and "they feel" and "they want to help". But it's just another lie. They ONLY want their power, control, and money.

      5. scottisatwork

        not so fast

        EV registration fees.road taxes are punitive. In Georgia, it is 3x that of a Corolla and even more than a Hummer

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      4bn divided by 7500 gives me a bit over 530k. There are that many electric vehicles sold in the US per year?

      I asked the same question. The tax credit as it stands now has a per-manufacturer quota of 200,000 units. Once it is reached, the credit is gradually phased out for that manufacturer's products. I guess the (not entirely unreasonable) idea is to help the manufacturer with the startup costs for EV production. Once the NRE is covered, the support stops.

      So 4bn appears to be the lifetime gain, not per year. In the grand scheme of the US finances, that's slightly less than nothing.

    5. maffski

      RE: 4bn divided by 7500 gives me a bit over 530k.

      It's a government run program. There will be $1bn in credits and $3bn in administration.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Unhappy

        Re: RE: 4bn divided by 7500 gives me a bit over 530k.

        "It's a government run program. There will be $1bn in credits and $3bn in administration."

        Fixed: It's a government run program. There will be an indeterminate "few $million" in claimed credits, $3bn in administration, and the rest "just disappears" into the 'establishment black hole' in the forms of kickbacks, money laundering, and various illegal and/or unconstitutional activity.

  4. Rebel Science

    Musk has been living on government welfare all along?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "Musk has been living on government welfare all along?"

      Pretty much. The US has an inverted system - socialism for bankers and CEOs, red in tooth and claw competition for the proles.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        The US has an inverted system

        Particularly for Tesla, up to this point. You have taxpayers helping to foot the bill for cars only the well off can afford.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: The US has an inverted system

          I believe there are also tax breaks for installing solar systems, which I'd guess are mostly built into second homes in remote locations. Again, the wealthy liberals getting tax breaks in the name of the green movement.

          1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: The US has an inverted system

            "Again, the wealthy liberals getting tax breaks in the name of the green movement."

            You mean wealthy conservatives aren't allowed to get them?

            1. Blank Reg

              Re: The US has an inverted system

              The wealthy conservatives are probably running coal powered generators on their remote properties

              1. fdilliard

                Re: The US has an inverted system

                Coal powered generators? Are you seriously that stupid or are you just trying to prove a idiotic point?

              2. bombastic bob Silver badge
                Unhappy

                Re: The US has an inverted system

                "The wealthy conservatives are probably running coal powered generators on their remote properties"

                If I could do it, I would. I'd have a scrubber on the exhaust and sell the byproducts as raw materials for other things [it tends to offset the cost considerably when you do that].

                But to do that I need: a) wealth [higher tax rates on higher incomes "keeps me from getting ahead" aka "keeps me in my place"], b) land [can't afford it, too expensive], the necessary gummint approval, permits, etc. to build the thing and hook it up to the grid [good luck doing that in Cali-fornicate-you with Demo-rats controlling EVERYTHING these days...]

                but yeah, power on the grid is a GOOD thing.

            2. MonkeyCee

              Re: The US has an inverted system

              It's Big John.

              Wealthy conservatives have "earned" that money by correctly either inheriting it, or by allowing us the pleasure of working for them. Their wealth is morally just, and is not at all any sort of socialism, redistribution of wealth or unfair playing field. Their tax breaks are rightly earned, since tax is basically theft.

              Liberals are automatically wrong. Thus their money must have always come from dubious provenance, with not nearly enough exploitation or forelock tugging that adds moral heft to wealth. Since we wouldn't have liberals in any proper capitalist system, they must only exist by having been given unfair benefits. Thus any tax breaks for liberals are a double theft, since they clearly could only have money from government handouts, so they must need a second dose.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: The US has an inverted system

                And of course, Republicans love socialism, just not for the "little people"

                Want to sell more weapons?, decrease your tax obligations? are you a banker wanting to reduce your liabilities, or an oil baron wanting more subsedies, and mineral rights from *our* land? Or a millionaire farmer wanting the same?

                If so, the Republicans are your socialist friends! Just don't expect them to behave fairly to people that don't bribe donate to them!

              2. Shanka B

                Re: The US has an inverted system

                Inheriting from your parents is somehow wrong now?

                This isn't the 15th century. The wealthy aren't the Royal families who get money from the peasants just for existing, you simpleton.

                Try critiques and arguments from the 21st, or at least the 20th century.

              3. MachDiamond Silver badge

                Re: The US has an inverted system

                "Liberals are automatically wrong. Thus their money must have always come from dubious provenance, "

                I find it incredible that many career liberal politicians are multi-millionaires. It goes to show that crime does pay, and pays well.

          2. InNY

            Re: The US has an inverted system

            Your jealousy and envy of the "wealthy liberals" is getting rather tedious and unremarkably predictable. You really are starting to sound like the "looney left" of the seventies and eighties.

        2. Kevin McMurtrie Silver badge

          Re: The US has an inverted system

          What Tesla is doing today will be copied and made cheaper by somebody else next year. That R&D has broad value in the long run. Besides, don't forget the enormous gasoline subsidy in the form of military intervention in areas of oil production.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: The US has an inverted system

            That's not how subsidy works.

          2. werdsmith Silver badge

            Re: The US has an inverted system

            It's true, we are likely to get electric or other non-polluting-at-point-of-use vehicles sooner because of Tesla, so whatever becomes of the business we still have the American tax payer to thank for kick starting the move away from diesel.

          3. This post has been deleted by its author

            1. EnviableOne

              Re: The US has an inverted system

              Tesla have always made their own batteries, its the only way they could get the performance they needed, and why the roadster took a long while to build.

              What do you think they are doing in that gigafactory?

              Tesla have also released all their patents for anyone furthering the technology

              https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you

              the subsidy is not that much compared to the cost of a tesla, you're talking $70k-135k for the model S, $90k-140k for the X which has basically funded the ramp up, so they can now produce the 3 at $35k+

              the $7500 is a drop in the ocean, for the S or X, but as the 3 comes in the range of the normal person, the subsidy is a big percentage of the price.

              1. MachDiamond Silver badge

                Re: The US has an inverted system

                "Tesla have always made their own batteries, its the only way they could get the performance they needed, and why the roadster took a long while to build.

                What do you think they are doing in that gigafactory?"

                Tesla puts cells into battery packs, but Panasonic makes the cells for Tesla with a Tesla brand wrapper. 1/3 of the Gigafactory is leased to Panasonic.

      2. Jtom

        Re: "Musk has been living on government welfare all along?"

        Which is why Trump was elected. The people are looking to overturn the top echelon without resorting to violence. You can easily make the case that Trump isn't the right one for the job, but look at the other choices - Clinton, Bush, Sanders, Biden, Kasich, Christie, Cruz, Romney? All career politicians and supporters of the status quo. Better hope that he succeeds. The average hard-working American is on the verge of doing something drastic.

        And those of you in the UK? What are your choices? A quasi-liberal half-heartedly orchestrating Brexit, and a Marxist. Good luck to you. I fear you are about to engage in a nation-destroying adventure of Socialism. I hope I am wrong. If I'm not, there's a religious sect ready to move in after the collapse (and likely will help it happen).

        1. bombastic bob Silver badge

          Re: "Musk has been living on government welfare all along?"

          " The people are looking to overturn the top echelon without resorting to violence"

          more like...

          "The people are looking to overturn the RULING ELITE without resorting to violence"

          Fixed it for ya! [it's supposed to be a government OF THE PEOPLE, and not a bunch of elitist politicians sticking it TO the people]

    2. JohnG

      "Musk has been living on government welfare all along?"

      Yes - but the same could be said of many defence and aerospace companies.

      1. Jamhawke

        @JohnG - Are you seriously trying to compare tax credits for a novelty consumer product to products of government and national security? Really?

        1. Terrance Brennan

          Are you seriously trying to claim that everything defense contractors do is strictly in the interest of national security? Everything they do is strictly in the interest of their bottom line. Any benefit to the nation, or the poor suckers using their expensive kit, is incidental.

      2. Shanka B

        No it cant. Those industries work FOR the govt , The don't get tax breaks for their own enterprises.

    3. Tom 13

      re: usk has been living on government welfare all along?

      Depends what part of his empire you're talking about and when you're talking about it.

      His original money, no. But pretty much all of his business ventures since then have the strong scent of corporate welfare, even his SpaceX venture which I like (who buys the most space vehicles? Governments and corporations working on government projects or at least what use to be "highly regulated" monopoly-like public services i.e. phone companies).

    4. 404
      Black Helicopters

      Billionaire Wars....

      <gets popcorn>

    5. Guillermo F
    6. This post has been deleted by its author

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    As Woody Allen said ...

    ... take the money and run !

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I bet he's regretting leaving that advisory board now.

  7. Stu 18

    Awesome logic

    Take away the tax break - sales plummit (as per evidence stated in article - 1400 to 100)

    So, lets do that so we can earn a heap of imaginary tax on sales that no longer happen?

    PS - did you not get the memo commentors re "tax breaks for rich" - oil running out, polluting planet to hell, electric is an answer, leading rather than following usually is where the profits are. Anyway, that is the American way isn't it, you despise the poor inside your country, don't you?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Awesome logic

      ... that is the American way isn't it, you despise the poor inside your country, don't you?

      Get off your high horse. We are totally fair, and despise the poor wherever they are.

      1. Shanka B

        Re: Awesome logic

        Democrats love the poor . and want to keep them that way.

        Republicans hate the poor, and want tem to start making their own money.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Awesome logic

      Before the changes 1400 x $7500 worth of tax credits were being handed out every year in Georgia. After the changes 0 x $7500 worth of tax credits will be handed out - the savings aren't dependent on the number of future electric car sales at all.

      You may be right that *sales* tax revenues go down, depending on whether the people affected choose to buy other goods instead of an electric car. But that's the individual state's problem, not a federal one.

    3. Gram Negative

      Re: Awesome logic

      LOL. If they don't buy electric cars will they walk? Come on, they will buy a gas or diesel car. Most are

      very efficient these days. Oil is not running out and natural gas is also abundant.

      And where do you think the electricity is produced....in nuclear, gas and coal generating plants.

      Besides, have you ever seen the ecological disaster a lithium mine is? Check out Chile.

  8. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

    No surprise

    Trump is oil and coal friendly and doesn't believe in pollution or climate change. After he gutted the EPA, it was only a matter of time before this happened.

    I'm fully aware that the tax breaks, on the whole, benefit the better off and are effectively subsidised by everyone, but if you need to kickstart an industry quickly, subsidy seems to be the only way to do it. If you wait for competition to do it or for the resources to reduce, pushing up the prices, it can take many times longer before economies of scale start to kick in and bring the prices down. Not subsidising your local industry so they can tool up and compete globally when much of the rest of the world is doing so puts you at a long term disadvantage.

    1. a_yank_lurker

      Re: No surprise

      As someone who has dealt with the USEPA in professional capacity, I have found them to be remarkably incompetent with little details. Details that are not difficult to get right (like publishing a valid detection limit for a test method) that one should question their competence on larger issues.

      EVs tax cuts were always a boondoggle as most could not afford the price of one. So the benefit was to the wealthy who could afford an EV even without the tax break.

      Also, EVs have had a much longer history than their promoters bother to mention. They were among the first cars made back around 1900 and remained in production until the mid 20's. What killed them off was the long recharging time and their very short range at the time. The range problem is partially solved by bigger and hire capacity batteries but the recharging time is still an issue. So the real question for the promoters, is what really has changed since 1910?

      1. Steve Todd

        Re: No surprise

        What killed the early EVs was the cost of electricity back then. They were much more expensive to run (gasoline was a waste product and cheap to buy) and the electricity infrastructure was much more limited. Charge time was, for the most part, unimportant as they charged in their owners garages over night.

        Henry Ford’s wife owned an EV. Even then they were recognised as cleaner, quieter and more reliable than gas powered vehicles.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: No surprise

          "What killed the early EVs was the cost of electricity back then"

          And batteries. The lead acid cells of the day had a short life and limited discharge rate. As a result electric buggies could compete with horses, which had a very heavy power plant with a limited lifespan and range, but not with the Benz engine which even in those days had a comparatively light power plant and fuel.

          A horse weighs around 3/4 tonne and needs ancillary gear (harness etc.). That weight of batteries in those days represented only around 3.6kWH, (if you wanted a reasonably long life), equivalent to one small horse power for 4 hours but running at 10-12mph, well beyond the range of the horse. Once a car with an engine and transmission weighing 1/4 tonne could do 30mph on 20kg of fuel or so, lead acid buggies were done.

          1. MachDiamond Silver badge

            Re: No surprise

            "Once a car with an engine and transmission weighing 1/4 tonne could do 30mph on 20kg of fuel or so, lead acid buggies were done."

            The electric starter and availability of petrol were major factors too. People had been killed and injured when hand cranking engines and women could never do it by themselves (according to men).

      2. MonkeyCee

        Re: No surprise

        "So the real question for the promoters, is what really has changed since 1910?"

        Well, we don't hand crank our cars anymore. We use an electric motor, powered by a battery.

        There's also been a few advances in battery technology. Here's a paper on energy density increases in batteries:

        http://pubs.rsc.org/en/Content/ArticleLanding/2011/EE/c0ee00777c#!divAbstract

        Roughly a 10 fold increase in battery density over the last 100 years.

        There are also plenty of EVs that have been in use the whole time, that somehow don't count, because they ween't for general road consumption. Used to have my milk delivered by one, and the forklifts at the first warehouse I worked in where all electric. Something about combustion engines suffocating you in an enclosed space or some such.

        Framing this as EV vs combustion is foolish. We'll still need both, hybrid designs are going to more practical for many situations, and it's going to be a while before batteries match the energy density of a hydrocarbon. Commuting could be done with all EVs, but I wouldn't like to try farming or forestry without petrol.

      3. MachDiamond Silver badge

        Re: No surprise

        "The range problem is partially solved by bigger and hire capacity batteries but the recharging time is still an issue. So the real question for the promoters, is what really has changed since 1910?"

        Range for the Teslas and the Chevy Bolt EVs are fully solved if you look at national transportation statistics. Very few people travel over 200 miles in one day with most traveling under 40 miles on an average day. The charging time for the person driving 40ish miles per day is effectively around 30 seconds, the time it takes to plug the car in when they get home. The next morning, the car is once again fully charged and that's on a US 120V socket. With a 240V connection, replenishing 200 miles of range overnight is no problem. DC fast chargers are in many places off of major highways with more being installed all of the time. In the time it takes to visit the restroom, have a meal and stretch (about 30 minutes) many EVs will have been charged up to 80% of capacity. I did a long trip in Sept (in an ICE car, I don't have a Bolt yet) and the least time I spent on a stop was 20 minutes. 30-35 mins was more common. Let's face it, if you are thinking about a trip that is going to take more than 2 stops for charging each way, you are looking at airplane or train schedules, not AA maps.

    2. PrGrPa

      Re: No surprise

      "...the[se] tax breaks, on the whole, benefit the better off and are effectively subsidised by everyone..."

      I agree on the need to jump start challenger industries. It is very hard to compete against an entrenched and effective product choice without both an appealing product and some sweeteners to make the leap.

      The way the USA tax credit works does favour high earners because of their income tax amounts and their ability to consider premium priced vehicles. Though it seems that those high earners are also the biggest contributors to the tax base. Perhaps lower-rate tax payers can console themselves in that their contribution to the choices of the wealthier is modest. http://money.cnn.com/2013/03/12/news/economy/rich-taxes/index.html

      The picture is similar in the UK with the current £4,500 government subsidy on the purchase of new extra low emission vehicles. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/plug-in-car-grant/plug-in-car-grant-eligibility-guidance and the way the tax base is built https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/jan/27/how-many-pay-top-rate-of-income-tax-uk

    3. Gram Negative

      Re: No surprise

      LOL. Who determines what industries should be "kickstarted". Solyndra and other companies (The current governor of Virginia took a load of tax dollars and went bankrupt in a "green company")

      The ethanol industry is an example of a useless industry given cover by government .......and the Trump administration is given it a pass. Enough to make you vomit.

      Picking a choosing winners is absurd. Let the market determine the winners.

  9. fidodogbreath

    Burning coal was good enough for the 19th century, so it should be good enough for us.

    1. Gbigs

      Electric Cars Burn Coal

      Electric cars burn coal. Where do you think the electricity comes from?

      1. Terrance Brennan

        Re: Electric Cars Burn Coal

        natural gas, wind farms, solar farms, hydro-electric plants. The reason Trump was able to take advantage of coal miners is that demand for their product to generate electricity has plummeted in the last decade and will continue to do so.

      2. MachDiamond Silver badge

        Re: Electric Cars Burn Coal

        "Electric cars burn coal. Where do you think the electricity comes from?"

        Crude oil is refined into transportation fuel using electricity to power the refineries. Where do you think that 7.5kWh/gallon comes from?

    2. THETMAXX

      What is cleaner that can provide the amount of kW required to recharge all of the iphones in the USA? And is cleaner that we can ACTUALLY afford. Sadly Coal, Hyrdo and Nuclear is the best we have right now. No one likes nuclear, so that's out, wind and solar are a joke, cannot come near the kw required. You cannot have your cake and eat it too.

      1. labillyboy

        not to mention solar does not produce electricity at night when most people would charge their electric cars in their garage... electric cars are powered by nat gas, coal and oil... inefficiently. It's just a feel good for simpletons who don't see exhaust at the tailpipe and think it's "clean"...

    3. 3d

      What do you think they use to make electricity. Solar alone is not powering our country

  10. This post has been deleted by its author

  11. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Unhappy

    Good new corporations, you get to keep more profit. EV makers, you get to make less profit

    to begin with.

    But this being "The Land of the Fee (TM)" I'm sure Tesla knows a few people who can put their case vigorously before the Con-gresspersons and ensure the right outcome.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Electric grid

    The American infrastructure is so old and knackered it can barely deal with what they do now nevermind putting car charging on it too!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Electric grid

      The American infrastructure is so old and knackered it can barely deal with what they do now nevermind putting car charging on it too!

      Electrical infrastructure is getting very old throughout the developed world. For example, the place where I work in Germany has two separate high-voltage electrical feeds. One comes from a district substation using a transformer intalled in mid-1930s. The backup comes from a transformer installed in mid-1950s. The reason I know is that one of them failed a few years back. It took several months to fix - the parts are no longer available, and had to be manufactured individually.

      All western countries, not just the US, will need to invest in the electrical infrastructure massively in the coming few decades.

      1. wiredrunner

        Re: Electric grid

        Some areas need the distribution to be moved to underground conduits and the entire system needs to be made smart grid ready.

        Wait till we have a carrington event. Society as we know it will completely devolve.

        1. Jamie Jones Silver badge

          Re: Electric grid

          "smart grid ready"

          I shuddered reading that - it made me think of "internet of things" type balonie being applied to the grid...

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    producing just 220 of them against its 1,500 target

    And factory workers are treated poorly...

    I wonder if there's a connection....?

    1. rh587

      Re: producing just 220 of them against its 1,500 target

      And factory workers are treated poorly...

      I wonder if there's a connection....?

      I read more to do with battery assembly issues at the Gigafactory. Allegedly one robotics subcontractor on the Model3 battery line ran into issues but hid them to save face, thinking they could sort them out. It got to a point where they evidently couldn't dig themselves out of the hole and a storm of issues surfaced shortly before they were supposed to be going into production - at which point Tesla (or a new contractor) had to clean-sheet the control software for that section. Along with a couple of other issues, it means the line for Model 3 batteries is under-performing badly. I suspect they can build the cars, they are just being bottlenecked by the batteries.

      1. MachDiamond Silver badge

        Re: producing just 220 of them against its 1,500 target

        Elon wanted to top-down design the most automated vehicle assembly plant in the world. Now he's getting schooled on why nobody else does it that way. If he would have automated some of line in places like spot welding and painting, then added new cells as they were perfected off-line, they would be building at least a few hundred cars a day instead of just 2 or 3. The ramp up might have been slower, but each month the figures would go up as new cells were put into the mix.

  14. Seajay#

    Cui bono

    It looks like the benefit from this subsidy goes to the well-off, who get to buy a Tesla with a tax credit. Outrageous right?

    However, the big benefit here is not owning a cool car but reducing climate change both immediately from the reduction in emissions by the rich person who now doesn't own a range rover and in the longer term as the EV R&D makes its way in to cheaper cars and ultimately all cars.

    That benefit goes mostly to the poor.

    1. 404

      Re: Cui bono

      'reducing climate change'

      Horseshit. Only when they are home - they're still jetting from one climate change conference to another.

      1. Seajay#

        Re: Cui bono

        Well yes, possibly but

        Low emissions from Car + High emissions from flights

        is still better than

        High emissions from Car + High emissions from flights

  15. Spudley

    This will negatively affect Tesla, but probably less than the share price drop implies. because this tax relief change will only affect customers in the US.

    Tesla sells to the world, and the rest of the world are increasing these subsidies and issuing mandates that will force people to switch to EVs. So there is no shortage of buyers for Teslas and other EVs globally. If the domestic market drops off they'll have to export more, but they should still be able to shift their stock.

    A more direct impact of this change will be to discourage other domestic US manufacturers from building EVs. This will be unfortunate, because their international competitors are moving rapidly toward EVs in light of the forementioned mandates, so there is a very real chance that US manufacturers will find themselves behind the curve in years to come.

    1. 404

      Murphy's Law... First major electrical grid failure event will reverse those mandates, just to survive.

    2. MachDiamond Silver badge

      "Tesla sells to the world, and the rest of the world are increasing these subsidies"

      There are now countries that are putting price restrictions in place so the subsidies aren't being paid on luxury cars like a Tesla. If you can consider purchasing a $100k vehicle, a $7,500 tax credit, while nice, isn't going to make or break the purchase. It is a much bigger deal for a Model 3, Bolt or Leaf and will allow more people move to an EV that would benefit the most from the lower operating costs.

  16. PrGrPa

    Tesla share crash - not tax credits but earnings?

    Nice correlation between the timing of the GOP proposal and the fall in the Tesla share price. Unlikely to be causal though given that Tesla is likely to move out of the applicable 200,000 vehicle limit on the tax credit within the next 6 months. A more likely cause of the share value drop is the unexpected results Elon Musk shared with respect to losses per share and Model 3 production.

    This repeal proposal appears to be more typical of GOP traditional lobby support.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Tesla share crash - not tax credits but earnings?

      Earnings and the fact that the Bolt, which is mocked by Tesla supporters, is selling rather well in the US at the moment. Unlike the Model 3, they are being delivered in some volume.

  17. Jamhawke

    It's about time. Tesla's vehicles are aimed at the upscale luxury buyer market. I'm sick of subsidizing wealthy people's feel-good toys. If EVs are so great, then buy one at full price which includes paying full tax on it.

    1. labillyboy

      And pay taxes to use the roads, as most road maintenance is funded by gasoline taxes today. Should be at least $.10 a mile... charged to every electric car owner.

      1. Terrance Brennan

        As a supporter of alternative vehicles I fully agree with you. Any vehicle on the road, regardless of how it is powered, should be paying for the road infrastructure. However, based on the 30mpg I get from my Subaru that would be the equivalent of $3/ gallon of gas, considering gas is currently $2.39/ gallon where I live that is much higher than the current gas tax (at least here in the US). So, $.10/mile would be a punitive rate.

        1. 404

          Henry Ford would disagree with all of you.

          'A Model T in any color you want, as long as it's Black'.

    2. Terrance Brennan

      I dislike wealthy people getting additional tax breaks as much as anyone else. However, in order for the "market" to bother with the necessary infrastructure to allow EVs or any other alternative to become viable there has to be a critical mass.

  18. JackLifton

    Sic transit gloria

    Tesla shares were going up every time that Elon Musk made an announcement about its future production, number of new assembly plants, number of gigabatteryfactories, or his hemorrhoids. The fact that a single PROPOSAL to cut Federal welfare payments (subsidies) causes such chaos may just be a wake up call to the brain-dead "investors" in Musk's pipe dream. The shorts are beginning to have sweaty palms for sure.

  19. Justaguynamedjoe

    Not On My Dime, Mr. Musk!

    If his company cannot exist without suckling at the teat of the American taxpayer then it shouldn't exist at all.

    Besides, why should I help subsidize outlandishly priced vehicles that I could never hope to afford even IF I thought it was a viable means of transportation?

    1. Steve Todd
      Stop

      Re: Not On My Dime, Mr. Musk!

      The American tax payer wants to suffer from more hurricanes, floods, breathing problems etc?

      $35K is an outlandish price for a new car over there? There's no market for used vehicles?

      The object was to kick-start sales of a newer, cleaner technology (it won't sell without the infrastructure, and the infrastructure won't get built without the demand. Catch 22 without some kind of push from the government). Once things reach critical mass then you can withdraw the subsidies and it will be self-sustaining. At that point EVs will drop below the cost of IC and you'll be wondering why anyone wouldn't buy them.

      Your (or to be more precise, your fellow citizens) money is being used for precisely the kind of reason you expect it to be used: To make your country a better place to live. You want to complain about that?

      1. 3d

        Re: Not On My Dime, Mr. Musk!

        Electricity comes from burning coal and gas. The car may not but it still has to happen for them to charge it. That is what erks me, you say its green, but somewhere to produce the electricity they are burning something

        1. Steve Todd

          Re: Not On My Dime, Mr. Musk!

          Firstly check out the mix of power generation in the US currently. Coal is falling dramatically. As the mix improves, so does your EVs impact. If you buy an IC based car then it never gets any better. Even if your power source is mostly coal then it's been calculated that EVs have less impact than IC.

          Secondly large scale, fixed plant can work more efficiently and clean up its emissions better than a mobile IC engine.

          Thirdly the emissions created to power an EV are not dumped in the middle of cities or urban areas.

          No form of transport is completely green, but EVs are substantially better than IC.

  20. Ploitical

    Does that mean that my tax credit for selling my furniture is gone now? What, I never had one, I had to make it on my own? What kind of country is this?

  21. jake_butthole_tapper

    This is what happens when big corporations like Tesla, Google, and Apple are allowed to lobby the government. When someone finally fixes the corruption, the entire system falls apart because not one person involved had enough common sense to stay away. Tax breaks might be ok if the government was actually responsible enough to pay all of its debts, but we all know that Congress is being led by a bunch of sulking rich children who only care about staying in power, and not making America great again.

    Keep corporations out of my Congress!

    1. Steve Todd

      You want to check how much the oil companies get in tax breaks?

    2. 3d

      Wish that were true, they are applying for top security clearance. Google, Facebook and Twitter say if they can have access to top security documents they can better monniter who should be able to have an account with them

  22. VaDave

    Get out of town!

    So the government is subsidizing a guy so he can build space ships? Get out of town!

  23. srd275

    Enough of Supporting tho environmental dogma

    Electric cannot stand on their own merits. Cost, range, even the "environmental" benefit are dubious because the power has to come somewhere and making those lithium batteries is dirty.

    Do you think the bans on ice are "environmental protection".

    It is more about environmental dogma to ban cars that are massively cleaner than 4 decades ago.

    This nonsense is going to end one day on the co2 bs.

    As the old saying goes (despite the press love affair with the pc electric cars), the emperor has no clothes.

  24. jvargas

    Musk smart????

    I have to say that Musk is not at all politically savvy or smart... maybe is a good engineer, perhaps even brilliant, but he can forget about being politically and in effect economically smart. He left the President's business council to protest what Trump allegedly said about the Charleston WV protests... You can believe what you want on either side... but the fact is, Musk had a chance to be in Trump ear regarding the tax break etc... now he had NO voice at all, and in fact I doubt Trump would ever take a call from Musk at this point. For shareholders that was a terrible move... but if you are the politically correct snowflake type... well than maybe you should buy a Tesla! (without the electric car subsidy)... Bottom line, many CEO's said they thought Trump went overboard and did not represent at all what they thought or believed... fine... but they didn't personally diss Trump or make a big production out of it... as did Musk. And one thing about this President - like it or not - he never forgets when you diss him - Never... that tax break is GONE... bye bye.

    1. Terrance Brennan

      Re: Musk smart????

      Not allegedly said, he said those stupid, despicable things. And, the fact that any President can punish a person/industry simply because of a personal grudge is just plain wrong; it may be reality, but, it is just plain wrong. Government is supposed to be working for the common good, not the personal vendetta.

    2. Van

      Re: Musk smart????

      +1

      although iirc Musk left the president's advisory board because Twitter nutcases told him to via constent harrasment.

      One of his early Tweets after a Trump meeting, seemingly wanting to set himself apart from Trump's views, implied he wasn't interested in Politics, yet he was hounded and abused regardless by the types who spend their days screaming 'small hands!' and 'orange baboon' thinking they are onto a winner.

    3. Shanka B

      Re: Musk smart????

      He's not a good engineer , let alone a brilliant one.

      He's been good at lobbying for tax funds and applying them to other people's work

  25. ntevanza

    Death & taxes

    Nothing changes. Here in Germany, you can get a rebate for buying a diesel, as long as you can find an old one to scrap ('old' means up to 2009). And you get a lifetime diesel fuel discount given that diesel is taxed much more lightly than petrol. Since everyone on Germany works for auto manufacturers, or should, it's kind of win-win.

    For the enterpreneurs who export the 'scrapped' cars to north Africa and eastern Europe, it's win-win-win!

    Admittedly, every time you fill up your subsidized diesel, a kitten dies. Most people accept this, until it's their kitten. A dead kitten rebate would go a long way to compensating people for this unavoidable loss.

    On the positive side, finding a charging station is the least of our worries. With all these new cars, there isn't anywhere to park in the first place.

  26. Alan W. Rateliff, II
    Paris Hilton

    Fallacious logic applied to taxation

    "any cuts have to be met with additional tax income."

    This presumes the money spent was the government's money to spend in the first place. The natural tendency of government is to take, whether it be money, rights, liberties, property, freedoms (some of these being inextricably interlinked to each other) or whatever else is naturally owned by an individual.

    But more specifically, cutting the corporate tax rate means businesses will do more business in the United States. Companies which have moved operations or manufacturing out of the country will have more incentive to return or businesses to build anew, which invariably increases revenue by displacing the losses by moving off-shore.

    This does not get into even a little bit of the differences made when government stops taking money from citizens for failed programs, absolutely certain that throwing more and more money at a problem will solve it -- not at all limited to party, either.

    Party notwithstanding, if you truly believe the government has a better idea of what to do with your money than you do, whether as an individual or a community, then you are the one still stuck in "more of the same" which has historically failed over and over and over.

    1. Terrance Brennan

      Re: Fallacious logic applied to taxation

      Not so much that government knows better as that government is supposed to be pooling our individual money for the common good.

  27. THETMAXX

    This is great news. If EV's are financially viable, they should be able to support themselves as far as cost goes. Yes it will hurt the economy a bit. But for years people have been saying "were selling out our grand children" So thank you to all of the senior citizens out there who have sold out your grand children because now the millennial generation you love to hate is paying for all of your freebies and hand outs. As Mark Levin says the younger generations should tell the older generations: "F You, F You very much!"

    1. 3d

      Senior Citizens were not the generation of welfare

      I am in that age group, and I never had a freebie all my life nor did the people I know. we worked hard all our lives and thanks to Obama giving SSI full benefits to every illegal who came across the border , the retirement age keeps getting moved up. I will probably drop over dead before I get to retire and collect the money I paid in my whole life. Blame Obama, the debt doubled under his rule. He is still costing us with all of his trips around the world at tax payers expense. If your hated, maybe it is your give me attitudes and the we cant find a job because old people won't quit so there is a job. LIKE I SAID can't quit they government keeps moving up the age. Each person he let in got full SSI which amounted to 30,000 a year according to an illegal I know. If I retire I will only get 10,000. Just imagine if Obama had not given the money we had paid in to over 11 million people they would not of had to raise the retirement age and we would have been happy to let you have our jobs.. I am still paying for the debt the government has accumulated and that Obama doubled while in office and will drop over dead doing so so F----Y--. Know what you are talking about before you open your mouth. I have spent my whole life working taking care of welfare jerks and people who have a system of working the system.

  28. TOm59

    The one lithium operation in the U.S. leaves us only 95% dependent on imports. Domestic lithium production can't supply our cell phone or laptop addiction, yet alone large batteries in our cars. Ambitious plans to make 50,000 Tesla batteries per year in Nevada amounts to a fraction of one percent of U.S.car sales.  Cobalt for Tesla's batteries cost $59,000/ton and hasn't been mined in the U.S. in 50 years, and that mine became a superfund site. It costs three times more to recycle lithium  from of a battery than to put it into one.  etc...etc....  at least fossil fuels are sustainable(sarc)..

  29. RoeBo

    Tesla real Issue is with out Gov. Money's they're Not viable company. It's said they are trying to relocate to China to capitalize on the Slave Labor.

    They got Gov $Billions, They are Very Rich from Siphoning off those Funds. Now the Bad Parts about the cars, they can't Cross The Country but around Town they're fine! Therefore what good are they. They are only a prestige symbol. The last issue is when Tesla closes it's doors going out of Business you want be able to acquire New Parts and the Schmock Investors it's Take a Bath Time.

    Reminds me the of the Old Song, "Money For Nothing"..!!

    1. donfitness

      Tesla want a viable company even with the subsidies.

    2. Van

      I bet you'll invest in their stock if your rhetoric sends the price lower

  30. johnbigboote

    Maybe Elon Musk should have staid on Trump's advisory council instead of quitting it in protest.

  31. TimothyDNaegele

    Tesla is doomed

    At best, Like the Edsel and DeLorean, Teslas will become collectors' items in the future. Otherwise, the Tesla will be gone.

    In California, they may last a bit longer than other locales.

    See

    https://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2015/11/30/a-34-trillion-swindle-the-shame-of-global-warming/#comment-11095

  32. John 209
    FAIL

    Sales crash

    Not mentioned in the article, April sales of Teslas in Hong Kong fell to zero, from 2,939 in the previous month, when the subsidies for electric vehicles there were cut off.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/teslas-hong-kong-sales-gutted-by-tax-change-1499598003

  33. Gbigs

    Who Buys A Tesla?

    Subsidizing pompous Silicon Valley execs who can afford to pay full freight on their Teslas is wrong. Long overdue time to pull the plug on these guys and on these niche cars.

    1. TimothyDNaegele

      Re: Who Buys A Tesla?

      Well said.

  34. donfitness

    Teslas soon to be seen on Craigslist.

  35. John 209
    Go

    Subsidizing specific technology fails

    This kind of subsidy, of commercial products embodying a specific technology, always fails in that it retards further development. It creates a high barrier to alternative better technology being developed in the research sector, as basic and applied research are by their nature expensive and risky. That is, most modern technology flows from basic and applied research, but with existing technologies being subsidized, the ability to realize a return sufficient to justify the cost and risk of new research is substantially hampered by the subsidies being offered for existing technology products.

    It would be better for the government, in consultation with basic and applied researchers, to offer substantial prizes for substantial improvements in specific areas of technology. The criteria for such "substantial improvement" would have to be well thought out and concise, but researchers are up to that. Winning ideas would be the property of all who wished to implement it, with compensation for the winning effort covered by the size of the prize.

    1. donfitness

      Re: Subsidizing specific technology fails

      Yes X prizes are effective for driving innovation.

    2. psdrake67

      Re: Subsidizing specific technology fails

      But this isn't subsidizing specific technology. This is subsidizing any technology that doesn't emit carbon. Fuel cells, flywheels, highly pressurized gas canisters, high-energy capacitors. They are all zero-emission vehicles.

      Also, lots of people seem to think the fact that some electricity is from coal or NG negates the benefit, but it doesn't. Large plants can have heavy equipment designed to reduce their environmental impact. Cars are much less efficient in that regard. Electrical distribution may cause losses, but so does gasoline distribution.

      And anyone claiming electric vehicles will fail because they sell a lot less unless subsidized is ignoring the difference between a local maximum and a global maximum. Here's a handy real world example. Gasoline in your car engine is useless. It doesn't burn. You inject it and it just sits there. Sure if you add a spark it will burn but that's cheating somehow. You shouldn't have to subsidize it by adding any energy to make it go. Back to EVs, if you want to argue they don't create a path to a global maximum or at least a better local maximum then do that. But lots of experts disagree so prepare to have lots of folks arguing against the idea that cars will still be mostly fossil fuel powered far into the future.

    3. Tbosse

      Re: Subsidizing specific technology fails

      The kind of incentive you speak of is the work of Capital Venture firms. Not the Federal Government. It is called the Free Market for a reason.

    4. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: Subsidizing specific technology fails

      In a "free" society subsidies are the best way to nudge attitudes or technology in a certain direction. The outright banning of things doesn't always work out for the politicians that support the legislation.

      The US Federal Tax credit for purchasing an EV should have had a purchase price limit, but since it does place a limit of 200,000 vehicles per manufacturer, it at least isn't open ended. It should be remembered that Tesla isn't given this money, the purchaser is allowed to take the credit in the tax year that they purchase the car with no carry over. If they don't have $7.500 in Federal Tax due, they lose out on whatever might be left. Tesla or any other manufacturer gets a nominal price advantage if they still have vouchers ready to hand, but the buyer still has to pay the full invoice for the car including finance charges.

      How does a country that professes to be free and democratic reduce the emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases as promised in international accords and treaties? Fine companies that are in heavy industries so they relocate to other parts of the world? Pass laws to restrict citizens from driving over a certain number of miles without an approved permit? No. Policies have to be formulated that make it financially more prudent to replace something that pollutes with something that pollutes less. There aren't enough "greens" to make much of a difference other than in noise levels in public spaces. Money talks, hippies………… well, hippies sing songs and get stoned rather than "Walk" so the saying sort of breaks down. I'll just say that more people are motivated by their wallets than their beliefs.

  36. Brian Allan 1

    If the electric car industry can't make it on its own, too bad! Put them on an even playing field with other vehicles and let them compete for their sales.

  37. donfitness

    If M.R. shows the majority of customers are willing to pay X for a product and there's a subsidy offered of Y, then the best price for the product should be X + Y.

    Marketing 101

  38. labillyboy

    Very few will buy electric cars without the subsidy... even with a $7500 present from fellow taxpayers electrics are a miniscule percentage of overall car sales. The fallacy that electric cars are "green" when the electricity to run them is largely produced by coal, oil and natural gas burned at a distant power plant then inefficiently transmitted to the car moving the exhaust gasses from a tailpipe to a smokestack needs to be slain. And no, solar does not work for electric cars which are charged mostly overnight when the sun does not shine. The technology to make widely appealing electrics does not and may never exist. Throwing tax dollars at the industry won't change that. Another fantastic move by Trump to eliminate this waste of money.

    1. Tbosse

      Additionally the Rare Earth minerals required to make the batteries are detrimental to our environment to mine.

      1. Van

        yet not crucial to powering an electric motor with evolution of materials

    2. Van

      There's a huge market for people who want to buy superior cars though, or even cars that are simply perceived as superior like VW Audi for example.

      Electric cars are a vastly superior ride and have that all important performance factor for a certain buyer. Once the neighbour effect kicks in it wont even matter if they remain a bit more expensive than the ICE equivalent.

      So long as they are no worse polluters than ICE cars, they will still have the edge for a huge amount of buyers.

      Then you've got the noise pollution issue once health departments get onto the science showing the damage the constant abuse of noisy ICE engines do to our ever increasingly denser way of living. Roll on Oxford's ban on ICE cars if not just for the noise.

      1. MachDiamond Silver badge

        "Once the neighbour effect kicks in it wont even matter if they remain a bit more expensive than the ICE equivalent."

        Van, you hit it right on the head. One person on a block gets an EV and answers some questions from curious neighbors. In a few months, somebody else on the block gets an EV and after they had them for 6 months and the owners are still very happy with their purchases, more people will buy in.

        There is so much conflicting information online that people still believe that running out of battery happens twice a week to EV owners and it takes several days to recharge one. Word of mouth will be the way EV sales really take off.

        The Toyota Prius had horrible initial numbers, now you can't throw a brick from an overpass without hitting one.

      2. mshna

        Let's see how that works out without buyer subsidies and manufacturing "innovation" subsidies.

  39. 3d

    People always say go green, they gripe about the coal mines and the pollution they cause. Yet what produces electricity. Thanks to closing all the coal production the law of supply and demand means I pay triple for electricity than I do for gas. It still takes power, they just don't think about where that power comes from. Nobody would pay all that high electric bills without a 7500 dollar kickback to help pay it. Most of our electricity still comes from coal, Solar just doesn't produce enough to run the nations electrical needs. Unless you want big blackouts throughout the country.

  40. JohnCampbell

    This last paragraph leaves out a very important technical note.

    "GM said in a statement following the news: "Tax credits are an important customer benefit that can help accelerate the acceptance of electric vehicles. Because General Motors believes in an all-electric future, we will work with Congress to explore ways to maintain this incentive.""

    What's missing is that in order for GM to get the government bailout, along with other bennies, from the Obama administration it was required to agree to switch over to building and promoting electric cars.

    1. hotdamn
      FAIL

      if GM wants it, I'm against it.

    2. hotdamn

      Ever try to pull a twelve foot trailer loaded with tools with an electric car? You might make it ten miles before your recharge.

      1. MachDiamond Silver badge

        "Ever try to pull a twelve foot trailer loaded with tools with an electric car? You might make it ten miles before your recharge."

        Bjorn Nyland tows a trailer behind his Model X. Likely a lighter load than what you are talking about, but you wouldn't try to tow your trailer with a Honda Accord either. It's not the right vehicle choice if you want to tow, but your full sized truck is not the best vehicle to run the kids to school every morning. Fuso has a couple of ET's, medium duty box trucks that would likely fit your needs and there is a company building a full size EV pickup fitted out for contractor's needs.

  41. Phukov Andigh Bronze badge

    LOL

    anyone able to afford a Tesla spends more than 7.5K on breakfasts and lattes on their work commute in a year or two. Pretending that amount caused serious problems and not the numerous other difficulties, both technical and personnel, is a real stretch bordering on partisan pandering.

    when you're laying out over $60K USD on a *secondary* car, when your mortgage is well over a half million, and your annual vacations are overseas and over a week long, you don't stop a big purchase because of a sale ending-instead your buy SOONER.

    So if there were really a belief that subsidy cuts were happening, people wanting a Tesla would run out and buy earlier, driving sales and value up. If they're not, its because they didn't really want a Tesla anyway and are looking for an excuse to buy something else. If that's the case, the problem is a lot deeper and 100% a Tesla corporate problem.

    1. IT Poser

      Re: LOL

      My expectation is that, if we look at a longer sales period, we should see a peak in sales right before credits end and a valley right after. If I had been in the market for an EV in Georgia as the end of the credit approached, I would have bought sooner so I could still get the credit. I expect most people would do the same. Looking at sales from the months before the credit ends and the months after tells us nothing. What we want to know is how long it takes sales to recover at the new higher price point.

      Unfortunately, when I search for EV sales data for Georgia, all that comes up are articles lamenting the valley in the first months after credits ended. What I'd like to find are sales figures from at least 6 months before and after the credit.

    2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: LOL

      "and your annual vacations are overseas and over a week long,"

      I suppose that must be a cultural difference. A weeks holiday abroad is a perfectly normal thing for UK citizens of most income levels. It's in no way an indication of significant wealth over here.

  42. offroad99

    Elon Musk asked for this

    https://seekingalpha.com/article/4069065-elon-musk-begs-feds-please-end-teslas-tax-subsidy

    Why is everyone complaining? Elon got what he asked for. This man is wealthy because he is the biggest recipient of government handouts in the country. Why should the wealthy (which is the primary demographic who benefits from these cuts) get a tax incentive for buying cars?

    https://seekingalpha.com/article/4069065-elon-musk-begs-feds-please-end-teslas-tax-subsidy

    1. psdrake67

      Re: Elon Musk asked for this

      Correction: Elon Musk isn't wealthy because of government handouts. He was wealthy long before Tesla and SpaceX. SpaceX saves the government money on each and every launch. They will have saved the government an immense amount of money when all is said and done.

      Tesla has received a limited amount of EV subsidies, but more in subsidies for setting up plants in various locations. Subsidies like that are available to anyone setting up a large plant (see Foxconn). The EV subsidies for Tesla haven't gone into corporate profits. They've been directed into more R&D. They don't make a profit but are valued at $50B. If you told any government in the world that if they provided $1.5B in EV subsidies and in return a bunch of investors would have $50B in capital gains then they would say yes. The taxes on the $50B far outweigh the $1.5B, and that's not including business activity, sales and income taxes, and the chance of future business profitability and corporate taxes on income.

      A few commenters posted that Musk quit Trump's council because of Charleston. He didn't. He quit earlier because of the Paris Agreement.

  43. Fred Garvin

    Tesla has been in business since 2003, he's produced 250k cars and has not made money yet. None of his companies are turning much profit. I'm all for helping new companies get started, but sooner or later, you have to cut the cord.

    1. Steve Todd

      Not just building cars

      If you hadn’t noticed then they’ve been spending a lot of money building out the charger infrastructure, factories to mass produce battery packs (cutting their cost dramatically), plus the R&D to produce additional models and cut the entry level price. There has been a lot of capital investment, which is why their balance sheet it still red.

  44. Libtards
    FAIL

    these electric cars are a total farse.

  45. Docdave88

    I have said often and in many venues, as advice to investors - -

    If it requires a government subsidy it is NOT a good investment.

  46. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Let the market find its way!

    A market promoted by the government will never be as strong as one driven by supply, demand, and competition. It won't be resented either.

  47. Tbosse

    Why am I paying $7,500 per Tesla vehicle as a taxpayer? What benefit did I get for this. Good for the Congress for finally doing something that makes sense. They are not supposed to be in the business of picking winners and losers. Let the Free Market decide if we are ready for, and want to pay for, all electric cars. If you want one, pay full price for it just like I did for my car.

    1. Van

      a better quality of life in the long run. If only to see an early ban on Harley davidsons and the rest of the nosie making industry

      1. 404

        Yeah, you'll have to pry my Flowmaster system from my cold, dead hands...

  48. LVTaxman

    Musk is a billionaire only due to the largess of the American Taxpayer. His companies since the PayPal sale have not been profitable. If EVs were so wonderful, people would not need the tax credit bribe to purchase them.

    Considering EVs will be obsolete due to fuel cells technology before we can figure out a safe way to dispose of the batteries, we shouldn't need the tax credits for incentives.

    1. MachDiamond Silver badge

      "Musk is a billionaire only due to the largess of the American Taxpayer. "

      Elon is a billionaire on paper, but that paper is tied to his various business ventures. If he started selling a bunch of stock, those stocks would plummet in value. He has also intertwined his business ventures financially so if one fails, it can drag the others down too leaving him having to ask his friends for some cash loans to feed his kids and make his house payment, again.

  49. RugDog

    Amen!

    It's about time! You can't favor any one business over another with tax incentives. Especially a failing retarded electric car company. Just end all corporate taxes and let the free market decide which cars to buy.

  50. rca.1967@yahoo.com

    Welfare Queen!

    Musk is nothing but a high dollar "Welfare Queen" living off the largesse of taxpayers and utility payers who are keeping his companies in business.

    Tesla and Solar City are losing billion$ and have billion$ in debt, with no end in sight - essentially bankrupt.

    Only the taxpayers and utility payers are preventing their bankruptcy and his ultimate demise.

    It's high time that he get's off the government dole and has to make it on his own - which he can't, because his technologies are not economic and can not compete with conventional technologies at this time, or likely for many years - so long as we're drowning in conventional energy sources, which are much more reliable and much less costly.

    It's time Tesla and Solar City (now part of Tesla) make it on their own (which they can't), or go "belly-up" - al la Solyndra (Obama's other infamous fiasco)!

  51. Shanka B

    What? He's been subsidized by Our Tax Money all this time?

    Why didn't President Obama or Rep. Pelosi stop this when they had full power?

  52. Shanka B

    No wonder these billionaires like Musk and others hate Our President Donald Trump so much.

    1. Gram Negative

      Yes, they want to continue the tax breaks for the rich. I stayed at a fancy Ocean resort for a few days

      last month. They had a Tesla charging station there. I was informed they weren't charging customers

      for using it. I and a few of my colleagues complained about this because it was obvious we were subsidizing their transportation. When I asked the management if they would give me a voucher for gasoline they looked at me as if I were crazy. They just don't get it because for some reason they think

      they are saving the planet even though the electricity they were giving away free was produced at coal and natural gas generating plants. Besides...lithium mining is ecologically very unpleasant.

      NO MORE ELECTRIC CAR SUBSIDIES.

  53. BLM_BlackCrimesMatter
    Thumb Up

    Charge time & Range

    People are not going to buy, in enough numbers, cars with slow charge times and low range of miles per charge. ALSO you're going to need 20+ years to fill every dead spot on the roads with charging stations. Haven't you noticed how close together and easy to find gasoline stations are these days? Well the electric charging stations would need to be just as prolific and priced the same per mile. So if it costs you $30 to fill your gasoline tank now and you get 300 miles this would mean a charging station could not go over an equivalent amount per mile range unit.

    Also WHY don't they just standardize all e-car batteries and have people pull into bays and have automated systems remove your low battery and replace, connect a newly charged battery in under 10 minutes, no wait for charge??????

    And why buy one Tesla when you can buy 2 or even 4 gas guzzlers with high HP?

    1. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: Charge time & Range

      The price for "fuel" is about 1/3 to 1/2 the cost in an EV vs. petrol. In addition, the tech in EV's means that when you put your destination into the satnav for longer trips, it will tell you where you need to stop to recharge. You can accept a closer charger anytime you like if you feel like stoping and there is no requirement that you have to charge to 100% every time. There won't be a need to put a charger at the bottom of every off-ramp.

      The "battery swap" idea has been out there for ages. It doesn't work. No manufacturer wants to be constrained by a standard battery pack size and configuration. Car batteries are very big and heavy modules that would need expensive connectors for power disconnect and cooling lines. Those connections will wear out over time and you don't want to get lumbered with a used battery pack that has barely acceptable capacity when your original pack was nearly new. If you are on a trip and need to recharge the car, chances are you need to visit the restroom and get some food too. Relax, eat your meal slowly chewing eat bite thoroughly and walk around a little to stretch your muscles. In very short order, you have enough charge for another several hours of driving.

  54. Pete20602

    $296?

    If I owned Tesla stock, I would sell at $296 in a heartbeat.. It is not going to get any better.

  55. Gram Negative

    Made by Fiocchi

    It's about time the subsidies to Tesla and the tax credits to Tesla buyers are stopped.

    A rich fellow passes my house in his 6 figure Tesla every day. It is upsetting to know that I am subsidizing

    his transportation. The perks Tesla buyers and Tesla producers get are welfare for the rich.

    Thank God somebody is seeing the light and recommending we stop this nonsense.

  56. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Easy $$ ??

    It shows that the investors were banking on government to force people to buy a product. Their entire belief and faith was in that and not the innovation and marketability of the product itself.

  57. ITsince96

    Coal Powered Vehicles

    Let's all keep in mind that these Tesla cars are coal powered vehicles. The majority of electricity that has to be charged into the battery of a Tesla is still generated via coal powered electric plants. Then there's the case of the toxic 10 year battery the size of a washing machine sitting in a landfill. Gas powered automobile transportation is as good, clean and efficient as it gets and in 100 years it has an amazing history of innovation and performance.

    1. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: Coal Powered Vehicles

      The life of a vehicle battery is now estimated at 20 years before being recylced. 10 years of duty in the car and another 10 years as a residential or business storage battery. They won't be sitting in landfills, the component materials are too valuable.

  58. hotdamn

    Awesome.free market. let them compete on their own merits.

  59. json

    Does not matter..

    Musk just got the green light for a china plant.. and china govt is aggressively pushing for EVs.

  60. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    journalistic malpractice

    this is embarrassing to read. Tesla is the next Enron or MCI and for these imbeciles to try and link their shares FINALLY suffering a bit after their incredibly bad quarterly results to the end of the tax credit is just the height of how incredibly ignorant journalists have been and just printing all of tesla's idiotic press releases instead of looking at all of the easily proven lies.

    The shares tanking had ZERO to do with the tax incentive and everything to do with the abject incompetent ramp up and introduction of the model 3 which is just the latest series of bald faced lies by team tesla. Tesla will be talked about for decades as to how a company was able to burn through billions and billions of dollars of other people's money and do so little with it. Just shaking my head at this article trying to link the shares tanking to the tax credits. Absolutely mind boggling illiteracy.

    An insult to a child's intelligence.

    I'm embarrassed to know such ignorance even exists

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: journalistic malpractice

      Journalist malpractice? Calm down, dear.

  61. Riteaidbob

    Of course Californians all think the power for these electric cars comes from solar panels and wind mills (both of which are massive polluters in a different way from fossil fuels)

  62. Satchel Evans

    SO it amounts to 11 million and change on 1200 cars delivered, the tax break ends at midnight on Xmas....This hickey will not stop dirt-worshipping tree-huggers who want to erase their carbon footprint from hopping on the "I WANT A TESLA' bandwagon. It's chump-change, hold on to your stocks. Musk will recover, after all: He's an alien from the future who wants to take harems of breeders to Mars some day, without fekkin-up the space-time compendium too much.

  63. coyoteeghost

    Elon Musk

    Elon Musk is a visionary. He has a dream, and has been working in a way that will improve life on this planet. In any two weeks he will accomplish more than 99% of the people with something stupid they want to troll him with. Yes his share of stok was trading around 67 times its earnings, but compare that to another visionary Bezos with Amazon which trades at well over two hundred times earnings just because people have to have needless things sold on Amazon. I would work for free for this guy because he is making history, and he is making man reach farther than have since the sixties.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Elon Musk

      You forgot the joke icon.

  64. Guillermo F

    Its About Time

    And I hope that Trump also stops subsidizing the expensive and inefficient energy scams projects involving solar and wind.

  65. we always win

    Good !! If you can afford a $100,000 car then don't ask me to subsidize you.

  66. mshna
    Pint

    Never understood the economic basis for this movement. Just imagine the entire US transportation fleet running on batteries. Just the distribution and conversion reconversion of electricity will consume over 60% of the energy. Then there is the toxicity of the manufacturing process. Two things drive the ev market: pc prestige and government subsidy. The buyer pays a little prestige premium. All taxpayers pay the subsidy. A $ transfer to the guy buying a bmw level car☺

    It flourished in the last 1/2 dozen years when no one in the administration knew how to read a balance sheet or p/l, but everyone was pc. In the current administration, most of them know how to read numbers and are not afraid to walk outside the box. Musk needs a new business model where the numbers add up right. Subsidies cannot last forever and Gucci premiums cannot be for the mass market.

  67. AlexJohnsGab

    GOOD! We should not be subsidising the wealthy.

    Americans should NOT be subsidising automobile purchases by the wealthy who can afford these $40,000+ cars. That is just absurd.

  68. BigDCvx

    Tesla is probably OK

    So the S is supposed to retail below US$40K. Is that with or without the subsidy?? If it is without, then this fab car should sell itself (as the order queue testifies). The bigger problem is that Elon's manufacturing engineers can't get out of each others' way. Perhaps GM should buy Tesla? GM has some credentials in manufacturing (though less in staying solvent).

    Meanwhile, gubmint subsidies in general (ok totally) are a bad idea--distorts markets, costs taxpayers, increases deficits, rewards cronies.

    Oh, and we're gonna have to build a whole bunch of nuclear power plants to fuel all this leccy stuff...

  69. Hotdigittydog

    If you can afford a $100,000 electric automobile you can afford not to get a $7500. tax break. Why should we give you a perk that the average cannot get. Remember that old saying no tax breaks for the rich?

  70. biffula

    Solar, wind and electric powered anything wouldn't exist without tax breaks. That's the dirty little secret. They aren't profitable and wouldn't exist without these defacto government subsidies. Let them make it on their own or die off. We're already in government debt that generations that haven't even been born yet are going to be paying off. Pay your taxes or get gone. And don't ask about businesses or the rich paying their fair share. The top 25% of earners already pay 85% of taxes and U.S. businesses are the highest taxed in the world.

  71. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Coal

    ...but... but... We're supposed to be supporting coal. Make America Great by supporting coal.

    Big-tire diesel pickup trucks don't burn coal. Electric cars do.

    Don't matter to me. I'm looking at used EVs which are not tax credit eligible.

  72. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A lot of interest

    Is it just me or are there an inordinate amount of new profiles saying, basically, the same thing ? Either a feisty subject or I need to grab my tin foil hat..

    1. rmullen0

      Re: A lot of interest

      Yeah, it's all the oil company trolls and paid shills.

  73. rmullen0

    Cut the oil company subsidies

    This just demonstrates that we have criminal oil goons running the country. If there were any justice 90% of Congress would be in prison. Along with the rest of the scumbags, like Scott Priutt heading up organizations like the EPA that they are trying to destroy. Our government is stacked with oil goons and war criminals. It is the biggest criminal government on the planet.

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