A tiny, low-priced electric car called the Seagull has American automakers and politicians trembling.
The car, launched last year by Chinese automaker BYD, sells for around $12,000 in China, but drives well and is put together with craftsmanship that rivals U.S.-made electric vehicles that cost three times as much. A shorter-range version costs under $10,000.
Tariffs on imported Chinese vehicles probably will keep the Seagull away from America’s shores for now, and it likely would sell for more than 12 grand if imported.
But the rapid emergence of low-priced EVs from China could shake up the global auto industry in ways not seen since Japanese makers exploded on the scene during the oil crises of the 1970s. BYD, which stands for “Build Your Dreams,” could be a nightmare for the U.S. auto industry.
“Any car company that’s not paying attention to them as a competitor is going to be lost when they hit their market,” said Sam Fiorani, a vice president at AutoForecast Solutions near Philadelphia. “BYD’s entry into the U.S. market isn’t an if. It’s a when.”
It’s easy to build a cheap car when you ignore the human rights of your workers and the environmental damage of your production process.
Lol western nations dint give a fuck about that. They just externalized the environmental costs to China and other poor nations until now and then sold the end result to their customers. The only problem is that that US doesn’t own the company.
Ah yes America, the global leader in human rights and environmental protection.
Or our businesses don’t want this type of competition? An affordable and reliable sub 10k EV? This would hurt our businesses and billionaire class, no?
If I needed a new car, and had a 10k EV as an option, it’d be my first choice to look into.
Por que no los dos, though.
You’d seriously consider buying the cheapest car on the market?
Our businesses can’t compete because we don’t want poison in our air/water, cars made with child labor, or factories that regularly maim or kill employees.
Is that why all the manufacturing of every industry (including most of the parts for the cars assembled in USA) was sent from America to China?
?
It’s okay when we do it because our factories at least looks clean and modern despite all that shit happening anyway.
… are you from the USA?
Yes. As bad as you think we are, China is worse.
You manufacture EVERYTHING in China.
WTF
Translation: I’ve brought into the idea that america is the best and therfore without any evidence I’ll assume that every bad thing that happens is worse in China.
It’s weird that people acknowledge china has made huge investments in modernizing industry while america has not but then act like investing trillions in high tech manifacturing has changed nothing and the country is still just guys in pointy straw hats scratching at the dirt.
Go look at the dji factory, it’s a beautifully elegant engineering masterpiece as or more advanced than any western factory. The design is efficient, robust, and retoolable with workers getting good wages and a range of benefits that rival or exceed similar employment in Europe or the US, most working 9-5 in good safe conditions with adequate breaks.
MiC25 the project to invest in and promote Chinese tech manifacturing is reaching maturity and exactly what was intended and expected is happening. The lesson should be that investing in infrastructure and modernization is a great idea but instead people want to dismiss that and say ‘no surely things are always better here in the west where the only investments we make are bailing out the rich every time they fuck up’
Yes china has a lot of problems like any county, just assuming that everything they do is evil and terrible makes no sense.
I don’t think America is the best either, just less bad than China in most cases.
As of 2023, 40% of the Chinese workforce is engaged in farming, primarily at the small scale. Your racist implications aside, a large portion of the country is still relatively undeveloped.
China executes more than 1000 people every year, sometimes for things which are protected rights in the US like political dissidence (aka free speech). They are the #1 country in numbers of executions. They kill more people than the next 10 countries on the list combined.
China is the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases; the largest source of marine debris; the worst perpetrators of illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing; and the world’s largest consumer of trafficked wildlife and timber products.
The Chinese government regularly spies on its own citizens, censors what their citizens know, and manipulates them with propaganda.
China has 5 times the workforce as the US but 16 times the workplace fatality rate. More than 225 Chinese people die from workplace accidents.
China regularly holds more than 1 million people in internment camps. In these camps many are abused, tortured, raped, or used as slave labor. That is on top of the 1.7 million people in the penal system where torture is regularly used as punishment.
But yeah, they have one or two nice looking factories.
Our businesses can’t compete because we spent the last 30 years outsourcing all of our manufacturing and production to cut cost.
Look at the rivers here and tell me with a straight face that we give a meaningful pity fuck about the environment.
Do you have any idea how bad the rivers used to be? A river outside Cleveland used to catch on fire and a river in Chicago used to bubble due to all the rotting slaughterhouse runoff.
Where is your evidence of these claims
I’ve been online long enough to know a sealion is coming when I see one. Not engaging.
Riiight. Running from providing actual proof isn’t the own you think it is.
I addressed it in another comment
https://lemmy.world/comment/10040038
Problem is, that goes for expensive cars as well.
At some point we need to decide are we in the West are either (a) importing cheap small cars from China, or (b) stopping poor people from driving. Because petrol is on the way out.
That’s why ebikes and scooters are becoming so popular. Small short range mobility vehicles are filling the gap.
I think that’s the key tbh. Most people aren’t going to need a massive car for going about town. Just something that can carry your shopping and get you to work and back will do.
I just wish I didn’t have to choose between a small car and a car that won’t get stuck in the snow. I don’t know why they think small cars must also have a small ground clearance.
Western auto workers weren’t and aren’t anywhere near ethical with their workers. Also Western automakers do have plenty of wiggle room, but they’re not charities.
Agreed on both accounts. Still us manufacturing is nowhere near as bad with workers rights and pollution as China. The smog is often so bad over Beijing that it blocks out the sun.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/beijing-air-pollution-photos_n_5698a1c6e4b0b4eb759e0155
China has a workplace fatality rate of around 10-15 per 100k workers compared to 5-6 for the US.
https://www.arinite.co.uk/the-worlds-most-dangerous-countries-for-workers
But hey, the US is only half as bad as what they call the literal devil
Exactly!
The car still sucks ass, dude. Literally no one is buying cheap Chinese shit that has a million problems. They’re not even close.
They seem pretty popular here in Australia.
I’d never buy one but I’m glad they’ll bring down the prices of proper cars.