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Comment by distant_hat | Hacker News Reader

Car sales are rapidly declining across the world and we may have hit peak car. Consolidation will likely arise in a market like this by itself. Combine this with the threat from companies like Tesla and you can see the old behemoths wanting to combine forces.

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I doubt it. Contrary to the rose-colored projections of analysts, self driving cars are going to massively increase car usage. Self-driving significantly reduces many of the "costs" of driving: time (because you can do other things while driving), frustration, attention, danger, need for a license, et cetera. When costs go down, usage inevitably goes up. Not to mention the spectre of unattended cars circling for parking spaces or rehoming. And since the human driver is by far the biggest cost of deliveries, that is going to spike massively.

Now it's certainly possibly that sharing will reduce the number of cars sold, and electric cars may increase their lifespan. But with massive increases in usage, I don't think it'll make much of a dent.

Will remote work increase over time? I work remotely and often don't drive at all on weekdays. Anecdotally I get more and more remote recruitment emails every year, so I feel like this is becoming more common.

Don't you think self driving car will have added cost due to its technology, so that mostly ride sharing is affordable ?

I think the added cost will not change the affordability of cars. Sure, it'll add a few thousand to the cost, especially at first. But in general people who can afford cars now will still be able to afford cars in the future. It might mean giving up on leather seats, or taking a longer term on the loan, but the cost delta won't be big enough to significantly affect behavior.

What may affect behavior is tech that significantly lowers the cost of sharing, like Uber et al.

I don't think so. If self driving cars are not close in price they can't compete with price with a human driven taxi which are too expensive for daily getting around. Remember car makers sell millions of cars every year, that of cars to spread the cost of re-engineering for a cheaper senor across, so prices will come down if they can.

Ultimately I think most people will still own their own cars: it is nice to know your golf clubs are in the car just in case you can take the afternoon off. It is nice to have a change of clothes in case your kids "has an accident". It is nice to have all your reusable bags in the trunk just in case you decide to stop for groceries after work. I've started taking the bus, even though I never actually need to do those things I miss them.

No, you made that up. There has been no decline.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/200002/international-car...

We’re going to add another 2 billion people and the world is getting richer. What do you think that will do the car sales?

Bloomberg made it up[0]. It's mostly true of the US, though.

[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-02-28/this-is-w...

EDIT: More specifically on car sales, they do mention a decline in China: "IHS sees the biggest impact of mobility services coming in China. Auto sales there plunged 18 percent in January, an unprecedented seventh consecutive monthly decline, as commuters rapidly embraced ride-hailing."

The article also says:

“Researcher IHS Markit predicts the 100 million vehicle milestone will be surpassed in the next decade, but only because of growth in China, India, Russia, and other emerging markets”

China is already a much bigger car market than the US.

They are also experiencing a bit of an economic slowdown, probably cause by the trade war.

https://markets.businessinsider.com/amp/news/china-economic-...

> The world is getting richer. What do you think that will do the car sales?

We will have less cars, but each car will spend more time on the road. Currently most car are idle day and night in parking, being driven around 2 H/day (less for many many cars). Some families now are starting to use 1 car for the family + car sharing for everyone instead of 1 car per family member. If you combine that with self driving cars in around 10 years, the money will be made by the car makers making very reliable / sturdy cars for the driverless taxi companies.

Um, in the link you give, it shows that car sales have not grown in the past 2 years.

Um, in the comment you're replying to, his claim was that car sales are not 'rapidly declining', which is still true if they are plateauing.

I agree with this, plus another factor that I rarely hear discussed is the lifecycle of electric cars. If Elon is to be believed, electric cars should have a useable lifespan about 5 times longer than ICE. Are the traditional automakers prepared for Americans to come in for new cars once every few decades instead of once every few years?

Musk is a huckster. Average car life, depending on what numbers you use, is 12-18 years. There will probably be a 60 year old Tesla when we get there, but there will not be a fleet of them.

Teslas will probably be the shortest life vehicle on the road. I am not commenting on their quality, but instead the likelihood that Tesla will simply EOL the older vehicles at some point.

"It's no longer worth while for us to keep up our original models, so we're turning them all off on January 1, 2021. All owners will receive a $2000 credit toward purchasing a new vehicle....".

That's how it goes when you're buying a service rather than an object (see also: DRM books, etc.).

CERTAINLY there will never be a 60-year-old Tesla. Can't legally maintain it, can't drive it without Tesla's support, and they won't.

I get your point, most people won't be driving a Tesla in 60 years. But there certainly will be someone who maintains an original 2010s-era Tesla.

There are people who still own fully-functional Ford Model T's from ~1910. They are over 100 years old, and they still drive them through the Memorial Day Parade every year.

> CERTAINLY there will never be a 60-year-old Tesla

Yes there will. It will sit in some rich guy's garage, hacked up to function without mothership contact, and specialty publications will publish pictures of it every few years.

That rich guy will just buy the latest luxury car every 4 years.

> "It's no longer worth while for us to keep up our original models, so we're turning them all off on January 1, 2021. All owners will receive a $2000 credit toward purchasing a new vehicle....".

I'm not sure if this is intended to be hyperbole or just extreme pessimism.

If Tesla decided to just "shut off" everyone's car for being too old, they'd be hit with a class-action lawsuit as soon as a lawyer drafted it.

At worst, they could decide to stop manufacturing parts, but even that's unlikely, as parts could still be sold for profit to people that need repairs. I know right now there's long waits for replacement parts, but that's due to production prioritizing building more cars to be delivered, not for providing replacement parts.

That’s Elon talking out of his ass again. ICE vehicles have a lifespan of 15+ years already on the original engine and transmission, while electrics will need their battery replaced outright at some point and at a massive cost. You don’t normally stop driving a car because it’s not working, you sell it way in advance because you want something newer/safer/better.

More importantly, ICE vehicles are generally scrapped not because the engine is wore out, but because the body is. Miles of driving on rough roads shakes all kinds of parts to fatigue. UV degrade the paint and plastic. Ozone degrades the door seals. Road salt eats anything iron. It all adds up to cars being wore out despite having a good engine.

Maybe, but more likely car sales are declining as part of the normal business cycles which has seen ups and downs in car sales for a hundred years or so.

Exactly. Not sure why someone would actually think we've hit peak car. Maybe in certain countries, but for sure not worldwide.

The sales numbers are great from Tesla, but the rest of the car industry sells electric cars too. They are a small vendor is you include all car types.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/666130/global-sales-of-e...

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