- cross-posted to:
- technology@beehaw.org
- cross-posted to:
- technology@beehaw.org
Chinese technology companies are paving the way for a world that will be powered by electric motors rather than gas-guzzling engines. It is a decisively 21st-century approach not just to solve its own energy problems, but also to sell batteries and other electric products to everyone else. Canada is its newest buyer of EVs; in a rebuke of Mr. Trump, its prime minister, Mark Carney, lowered tariffs on the cars as part of a new trade deal.
Though Americans have been slow to embrace electric vehicles, Chinese households have learned to love them. In 2025, 54 percent of new cars sold in China were either battery-powered or plug-in hybrids. That is a big reason that the country’s oil consumption is on track to peak in 2027, according to forecasts from the International Energy Agency. And Chinese E.V makers are setting records — whether it’s BYD’s sales (besting Tesla by battery-powered vehicles sold for the first time last year) or Xiaomi’s speed (its cars are setting records at major racetracks like Nürburgring in Germany).
Because Biden said you could? He’s the one that doubled tariffs on Chinese EVs from 50% to 100%. Biden also gave the EV tax credit which was essentially a subsidy to Tesla, which Trump ended.
Note that I’m not defending Trump, but simply noting that the US was heading in his direction. He’s a symptom of advanced disease, but you don’t get to blame him all the shitty things all US presidents ever did. He’s a raging tumor, but the cancer was spreading already.
That is a very fair statement.
Agreed. Not sure what those downvotes are for. I saw this coming 20 years ago. Especially with lobbying as out of control as it has been. If Trump dropped dead now, we’d still have a catastrophe.
Biden increased tariffs…AND invested heavily in battery plants in the US. Trump killed that. Biden’s tariffs were because the Chinese government is dumping in the US to undermine the car industry.
I don’t fault Biden for adding a tariff on Chinese EVs to temporarily protect the American auto manufacturing envornment. We just have too many jobs tied to the domestic production of cars. The immediate loss of those jobs would plunge the USA into deep recession. It looked like this was working too with many American companies adapting and coming out with EVs.
However, most of those American EVs have been scaled back or canceled. Further, with the exception of the Chevy Bolt no domestic maker produced an affordable EV. Since American companies decided they don’t want to play in EVs anymore, I fully support removing the tariff and letting Chinese EVs into the USA. It looks like that will be the only thing that will force American car companies to compete. This situation closely mirrors the 1970s where Japan introduced small, reliable, fuel efficent cars, and affordable cars at a time when gasoline was crazy expensive.
It looks like this time around it will be the Chinese that teach the American auto market to adapt instead.
Because the US is a corporatocracy. Red or Blue, corporate donors win.
Yeah, I liked Jim Crow Joe even less than orange gameshow host. Some of his policies had direct negative effects on my life. Then the election came around and the democrats decided we don’t get a primary at all this time, so we ended up with a choice between an ignorant gameshow host who somehow fancies himself an independent thinker and a cackling hen who puts on no such airs, both of whom are completely loyal to the international billionaire cabal.