Comment by amerkhalid | Hacker News Reader

Comment by amerkhalid | Hacker News Reader

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I think they should get rid of all deductions at the individual levels. They just cause confusion and hide true cost of things.

For example, I went to buy Jeep. 4xe version was $8000 more. But its battery lasts only 2-3 miles and it would have taken forever to breakeven. But dealership kept insisting that I will get $6000 in tax rebate/deductions so the actual cost is only $2000 more.

They had marked up the car by how much government was going to give rebate on and there was no savings for a taxpayer. I tried to have them issue give me discount now and claim my car on their taxes but, of course, that was not going to work. I ended up buying a cheaper model.

EDIT: Just checked the range, it is actually 21 miles on battery, which would have been enough for my usage. At that time, salesperson informed me that it was 3 miles or so. At 21 miles per charge, I may have bought 4xe. Math still doesn't workout, since I work from home I probably fill the gas tank once every 2-3 months. About $200-300 per year for gas. So it would have taken 7-10 years to breakeven after rebates.

> They had marked up the car by how much government was going to give rebate on and there was no savings for a taxpayer

This is the thing that always gets me. After having seen too many examples of this I soured on these incentivized deductions. The benefit always seems to go to the middle man.

Yep. I learned decades ago to ignore those types of incentives because they don't actually provide much (if any) benefit to me.

All they do is make everything more of a hassle.

The dealer wasn’t really lying just unclear. The car is not designed to stay fully electric until the battery hits zero because the ICE engine is only 150hp. Instead it’s optimized to be a hybrid that’s reserving battery power for acceleration, which lets the engine stay in more efficient and lower RPM ranges for much longer. You can press a button every time you get in to drain the battery but that’s really not the intended use.

Anyway, the subsidy is really designed to setup the used car pipeline. In 20 years someone with significantly less money is probably going to be driving your car and they aren’t going to be thrilled with having ~14mph.

There are two limits on that deduction that are relevant. They can’t be applied to foreign built cars, and there is an income cap.

The Koreans (Kia, Hyundai) found a loophole: The restrictions do not apply to commercial fleets, including vehicles leased to consumers.

So, they offer lease incentives that are structured to give you $7500 off MSRP if you buy the vehicle out of a lease after the first month.

No IRS paperwork required, and no chances of finding some other gotcha when you file your taxes.

If the law hasn’t changed by the time I buy a new EV, I’m going to insist on this, regardless of whether it is domestic made.

>They just cause confusion and hide true cost of things.

Hiding the true cost is the point. Or rather, altering the true cost to incentivize something or other.

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