Also, this is about Germany, where zoning is not the same thing as the US at all, and where most housing does not require a car, because active and public transport options are excellent and there's lots of local amenities.

That would work if the only externalities of ICE vehicles that were not priced in were carbon. But tailpipe emissions and noise are also massively harmful, and should not be ignored.

Then you've just not looked at that many reports. Here's guidelines for covered car parks from the UK government commissioned from Arup, an engineering group. It has a whole section on frequency, and none of the data are from the source you mention; they're from the UK and Norway instead, and focused on vehicles on the road.

https://assets.publishing.serv...

Are you *really* trying to claim that it's just a myth that EVs have lower fire rates than ICE vehicles? Is that truly a hill you're going to die on?

Tiresome stupid bullshit. NCMs still catch fire much less frequently than ICE vehicles, and I'll bet you typed your demand to ban NCMs on a device powered by an NCM. If we're banning things because they're too quick to burn, ban fucking ICE vehicles first.

Insurrection Act, ICE at polling stations, straight up cheating if you’re unscrupulous and dead set on keeping your hands on power, and you have access to large amounts of power and no-one is standing in your way, quite a lot becomes possible.

It will for sure be from the inside-out. I have said for some time that he’s Shitler: full of malice but less competent. But possessed of far more potential power.

I think we’re not actually disagreeing on much here. My figures were based on 1.2 to 1.5tn of domestic spend and 0.22 of international spend, hence 6 to 1.

Sure, international tourism is way, way less important than domestic tourism or inflation. I just don’t think it’s nothing, especially given regional concentrations. And I neither think that the greater marginal impact of international tourism compared to domestic is good nor bad, it just is what it is. It’s a description, rather than a moral judgement. Policy choices that will be affected by that fact can be good or bad, eg “let’s make ourselves attractive or unattractive to the outside world”.

Ha! I’d love to know which parts of this he considers impossible due to an immutable law of nature in Canada, because this is what he responded to, to say “it doesn’t work that way here”:

“Everyone gets to shop and park and charge wherever they like. They may pay a premium for combining those, or they may pay a discount. Depends on how the supermarket and charger companies decide they want to run their businesses.

When I go to see my son in Durham, I have a choice of a hotel with a charger in its car park, a hotel with a charger on the street outside its car park, or other hotels without charging and using chargers en route. I choose the hotel with the parking & charging on the street outside because it’s the best hotel out of a very uninspiring selection. And sometimes I charge at the hotel and sometimes en route. Lots of options, and it doesn’t really matter, the car can manage whichever way I do it.”

Arithmetically kinda sorta true, a 6 to 1 ratio, but economically misleading. Most obviously, international tourists bring new money to the US, it's an export business. Domestic tourism is reallocation of spending that would have largely happened anyway. Domestic tourism is also a stable business and slow-growing, whereas international is much more flighty and prone to disruption. On the margin, it drives more growth or loss in employment and other economic impacts than domestic demand. Put these together and this is why it becomes important: if domestic tourism slumps 10%, the US doesn't lose 120bn, and most of that spending still occurs anyway, but if international tourism slumps 10%, the US really does lose 22bn. And it's actually slumped more than that, and that's not chump change even given the US's giant GDP. Especially given that the spend is geographically concentrated, so particular markets are hit harder.

I am willing to bet quite a lot of money that, for all your fierce opposition to China and concerns about kill switches, you typed all that on a device containing Chinese parts that could equally well have a kill switch in it that you would be completely unable to detect.

Germany EV sales:
2023: 524k
2024: 381k -- this was when the sales drop happened
2025: 545k -- recovery already happened

2026 can be expected to be substantially stronger, given better vehicles and pricing even before the availability of these new subsidies

Lucky I don't live where you live, then

I’ve been driving EVs for the last 10 years. These are things you’re scared of, not me. I’ve never come close to running out of charge in all that time, even back when I had a car that could only do 70 miles in the winter.

Everyone gets to shop and park and charge wherever they like. They may pay a premium for combining those, or they may pay a discount. Depends on how the supermarket and charger companies decide they want to run their businesses.

When I go to see my son in Durham, I have a choice of a hotel with a charger in its car park, a hotel with a charger on the street outside its car park, or other hotels without charging and using chargers en route. I choose the hotel with the parking & charging on the street outside because it’s the best hotel out of a very uninspiring selection. And sometimes I charge at the hotel and sometimes en route. Lots of options, and it doesn’t really matter, the car can manage whichever way I do it.

You don’t have to pay to park, you do have to pay to charge. Just like, ya know, you pay to refuel at a supermarket, they don’t give the fuel away for free. And supermarkets will still not need to install chargers at every parking space in 25 years when the transition is complete, because that will still mean supply massively outstripping demand.

For the UK
- 34m cars
- 30% can’t be charged at the home, so 10m
- Average time between charges is 10 days
- Therefore, 1m public charges a day
- There are several million supermarket parking spaces in the UK, so supply would massively outstrip demand if all were fitted with chargers
- This is all the more so when we account for the many other places where chargers are installed, from lamp-posts to on street to service stations to worksites, etc.

Loads of people around my area have a Taycan or a Macan. A few have an ICE second car, but by and large, the second car of choice appears to be an i3. I personally have always thought it was ugly and impractical and preferred my old Zoe as a small car. But people are brand snobs and prefer BMWs to Renaults if they’ve got the money. No judgement — it applies to me too, I traded up to a Mercedes when I could.