Something else to consider...

So many people lease new cars, including EVs.

If you're comparing a 3 year lease on a EV to a 3 year lease on a gas powered car... really, MX isn't even a consideration.

The only think the gas car needs in the first three years is a few oil changes. Many dealers will include those for free at the time you buy your car if you ask for it.

Likewise, I remember doing oil changes every three months, tranny fluid every year or two, etc.

Today? Oil change about once a year, maybe a bit more often, every 10k miles. GM now puts synthetic oil in by default, engine is now designed for it and will no longer run on normal oil. However the dealers are doing a very fair price, my local GMC dealer charges $30 for the oil change, and that includes them providing a loaner. I don't even have to go in, they drop off a loaner at my home, take my truck in, it comes back washed and clean and they take the loaner back. All for $30.

Spark plugs? GM now puts platinum-tipped spark plugs on at the factory, they are rated to 100k miles. Drive belts and engine cooling system? 150k miles or 10 years, whichever comes first.

Honestly, it isn't maintenance free, but it is so low that it isn't a material amount of money compared to the price of the vehicle.

Gas, by far, is the single biggest expense. However, I also drive a nearly 20 foot long SUV loaded with stuff. EVs are simply not an option. An EV version of the Yukon XL would cost well into 6 figures, even with average range. I'd have to drive a LOT to even dream of making that back.

Now, if you could sell a 200 mile range full size EV SUV for about the same price as the gas version, you might have something. But I think we're a long, long way off from that.

I'd be happy to be wrong.

While that is true, the question is... Is the savings on gas enough to make up for the range issues of an EV?

It might be for a second car, but I have trouble seeing how that becomes the case for a primary car.

Since the primary car is likely to remain gas for some time, it will be a challenge for EVs to become anything other than a small market. Yes, it is true that many homes have two or more cars, but I continue to see this as a solution in search of a problem.

For most people, I think the EV will have to be less expensive than the gas version to attract interest.

I keep seeing people talk about the maintenance required of gas cars. Really, oil changes are hardly a big deal, neither time consuming nor expensive. The gas station takes 5 min and recharges your car to full. Yes, with an EV, your garage is the "gas station", but if you forget to plug in, it takes a whole lot longer than 5 min to "refill".

And that is still useless, since the US public bought 16.5 million cars and light trucks in 2014.

Ahh, statistics can be fun!

$33K buys you a LOT of car these days, with a lot of features, including NO range anxiety!

Even at $33K, none of the electrics in that price range compare, which is why they are less than 1% of total US sales of vehicles.

The fact is, the world isn't beating a path to their door, they cost too much and have too many compromises. Sure, hippies and extreme liberals will buy them, but they won't gain mass acceptance until the price comes down and the drawbacks go away.

I'm curious...

What is your payment, what was your downpayment, and what is the buyout at the end?

That is just the government handing me back my own money, it isn't a savings.

And as I have stated on many occasions, if EV sales ever grow to anything more than a rounding error, that credit will vanish.

What is even worse, is that WITH that tax credit, EV sales are STILL less than 1% of vehicle sales in the US.

People don't want EVs, not as they exist today. The sales figures don't lie.

Yep, that is tiny...

In the US, all EV sales across all companies was 123,049 cars in 2014.

Total light passenger vehicle sales in the US in 2014 was 16.5 million.

So the percentage of EVs sold in the US was 0.7% in 2014.

That is a rounding error, noise, nothing to get excited about.

Oh sure, I imagine it will continue to rise, it might even be 1% this year, or perhaps next. In 5 years, it might even hit the staggering sum of 3% of total vehicle sales.

Those features can all be had in lower priced cars. Heated seats is no longer "special", neither is a heated steering wheel. Those features are tossed in (since they don't actually cost much) to try and justify the crazy price it costs.

For $30k, you can buy a Ford Fusion with AIR-CONDITIONED seats, much less heated seats, along with lane departure warning and a whole bunch of other stuff the Leaf doesn't have.

For $20k, you can buy a Ford Focus with heated seats, camera, leather, etc, and it doesn't come with the range anxiety feature the Leaf does.

That is nice, but that is an anecdote, not data...

The fact that they are popular there and not here means nothing.

What does matter is that the total EV sales is a rounding error. There is a reason it is a rounding error, and even the $7,500 tax credit isn't enough to change that.

If anything other than a tiny, tiny number of people buy that car, those rebates would vanish rather quickly.

The government could increase the rebates to $20k and then your argument would be that the car is a "steal" for only $10k, but how long would that last?

Like what? You might try shopping some new cars, you might be shocked what is standard these days.

It does work out about the same, depending on how far you're willing to tilt your head to make it look the same.

Are there use cases where a Leaf makes sense? Sure. Are they as common as EV fans would have you believe? No.

If it makes sense to you, go ahead and get one. There are two of them in my neighborhood, so someone likes them.

Doing the math, they make no sense for me, and based on the sales numbers, for few other people as well.

No, it isn't... You can buy a similar sized gas car for half the price...

You can buy a MUCH nicer car for the same price...

The Leaf is really, really expensive for the size and utility of what it is...

The United States of America.

Congress has the US Capital Police, one of the few federal police agencies that answers directly to them.

The President has the Secret Service, and of course, he is Commander in Chief of the US Military.

At the end of the day, what the US Marshalls service wants to do isn't the final word. Even the US Capital Police or the Secret Service isn't it.

It always comes down to the military.

Against whom?

Who would arrest them?

The members of government have their own security services, do you honestly think you could arrest the entire government?