this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2026
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[–] itisileclerk@lemmy.world 5 points 23 hours ago

It is not a free market when you ban something. Just saying.

[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago

while you're at it guys, could you force the current administration to release the remaining unredacted Epstein Files?

[–] lemmygarden@lemmy.today 13 points 1 day ago

I want tiny Japanese trucks, byd cars, and every car in the world to be available for purchase in "the land of the free"

[–] ikidd@lemmy.dbzer0.com 32 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Land of the thief, home of the slave.

[–] CarpalTunnelButt@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Grand imperial guard, where the dollar is sacred

[–] KatakiY@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

And power is god.

Banger fucking song

But enough about China.

[–] fyzzlefry@retrolemmy.com 15 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] Quexotic 0 points 18 hours ago

I want a Chinese car that isn't a national security risk.

[–] No_Ones_Slick_Like_Gaston@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Sorry capitalism can't do that. Only the glorious PRC can have electric Chinese cars.

[–] Jiral@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Plenty of capitalist countries can have electric cars, including but not limited to Chinese cars. The problem isn't capitalism here, it is the US.

[–] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

There are several different problems here and banning Chinese cars is possibly the worst solution. And with Trump and magats in charge, a better solution is off the table anyway.

Problem 1: American automakers don't make anything good and it's all expensive.

Problem 2: Americans need jobs, everyone buying their (second) most expensive belonging from abroad transfers manufacturing jobs abroad.

Problem 3: EV transition in the US isn't going as strong as it should be.

Problem 4: China has EV subsidies for cars sold to other countries. This allows for dumping stock at below cost prices, after already having super low production costs (among other things China is the world's battery manufacturer, Chinese EVs get batteries for much cheaper; also Chinese labor costs are at most a quarter of union labor in the US). Usually EV subsidies, if they exist, are on purchasing, not production.

The solution, to me, isn't banning Chinese EVs. It's a further increase of tariffs on cars made in China and then that tariff money should be used to fund an EV purchase subsidy so that all EVs get cheaper for the end user to buy (yes, said subsidies would also apply to Chinese EVs). Now if BYD or whoever wants to sell a ton of cars in the US, they have to manufacture in the US, which means they have similar costs to other manufacturers (minus the batteries of course, nothing to do about that without causing a ton of issues. You can't just increase tariffs on Chinese batteries because non-Chinese manufacturers need them too).

My proposed solution would directly affect #2 and #4 in a positive manner, be better for #3 than outright banning Chinese EVs, but not as good as simply allowing them to dump nearly-free cars on Americans (which would of course increase in price once the competition is dead) and forces the American automakers themselves to sort out #1 because right now much of their competition is the German big 3 and Toyota, all of which are expensive too (shit, I consider Toyota more expensive than the Germans because I look at used cars, I love depreciation)

But what do I know, I'm not American and don't know shit about economics and trade wars and don't even own an EV.

[–] Jiral@lemmy.world 1 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

It is pretty much what the EU is doing. Tariffs on Chinese cars to compensate for their subsidies and brand agnostic subsidies for EVs on the domestic market (also applicable to Chinese cars of course, but equally to everyone else, levelling the playing field).

We have yet to see if the European producers are going to survive but they at least appear to have gotten the memo on at least competing in the sector of not oversized, affordable EVs again. Renault is pretty successful with its R5 and I would think also the new Renault Twingo should sell well for example.

In the US the car industry has pushed itself into a corner it cannot get out anymore, except maybe Tesla, which does know how to build efficient and somewhat affordable cars. It just chooses to go the opposite way because the guy at the top is a lunatic. The rest of the sector doesn't even know how to do it, even if they wanted. They are heading to their Kodak/Nokia end game. Except Nokia found a way out by offloading the damage to a foreign company stupid enough to purchase the doomed branch and consequently refocusing on the other branches that it could secure a future (for Nokia that was mobile communication infrastructure).

Lobbying for walling off the US market while making laws to postpone the death of oversized combustion engine vehicles, will postpone the inevitable but only by so much. At some point the US will be the only underdeveloped country left, still choking in traffic fumes, I don't think it would even get that far before everything collapses among US car producers.

[–] bassgirl09@lemmy.world 18 points 1 day ago (3 children)

How about you people actually make competitive vehicles?

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[–] DarrinBrunner@lemmy.world 35 points 2 days ago (2 children)

If they paid us fairly, then we could afford to buy their expensive cars. Then, the competition from cheap Chinese cars wouldn't be nearly so big a problem for them.

Their greed keeps coming back to bite them in the ass, but they'll do anything at all to avoid sharing the wealth.

[–] DisasterTransport@startrek.website 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

The CEO of Ford drives a Xaomi. He could have any car he wanted, and he chooses a Chinese car. It's ostensibly for market research but he's said he really doesn't want to give it up. So yeah they're cheap, and also I think China might just genuinely make better cars at this point. While China has been investing into manufacturing and consumer tech the big three have been dragging their heels and kicking and screaming because they see engineers as cost centers and that is biting them in the ass as well.

[–] Tollana1234567@lemmy.today 1 points 1 day ago

he wouldnt drive his own companies car, which are likely hazardous on the road.

[–] zbyte64@awful.systems 12 points 1 day ago

And if we had universal healthcare it would actually be cheaper to produce those cars. Canada is proof of this.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 38 points 2 days ago (1 children)

YEAH CAPITALISM - no competition allowed. Protect us from those damn commies ….. and their free market competition

[–] EnsignWashout@startrek.website 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Fucking communists and their free markets and open competition! None of that for us, please.

(Poe's law: This is meant to be taken as absurdist humor.)

[–] Reygle@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago (6 children)

Fuck off, American car makers who no longer make any cars except the mustang and the corvette

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[–] BillCheddar@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I thought that competition was good for capitalism?

OH you meant WE have to compete with each other for resources to survive, but YOU and YOUR PROFITS are guaranteed in the Constitution?

[–] willington@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 day ago

That's exactly what they meant this whole time. We are the rubes.

[–] liking625@lemmy.world 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] Jaysyn@lemmy.world 193 points 2 days ago (4 children)
[–] Insekticus@aussie.zone 73 points 2 days ago

They can push laws rapidly when they want to (i.e., being paid by lobbyists), but when it comes to picking up rubbish, making the water drinkable, or holding pedo billionaires accountable, suddenly the gears of government are slow and need thorough "debate".

Free markets hurt capitalists.

[–] Tyrq@lemmy.dbzer0.com 26 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

The free market is when you jam your invisible hand on the lobbying scale, right?

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[–] Wilco@lemmy.zip 18 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The USA is Capitalistic Communism. Drug Companies do research with taxpayer money then reap profits.

Bailouts and market manipulation like not allowing Chinese cars.

AI is gonna crash hard and the companies already have their hands out.

[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 12 points 2 days ago
[–] Bwaz@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago

Ah yes, competition makes capitalism help everyone!

[–] InnovativeInquirer@lemmy.world 20 points 2 days ago

But this is supposed to be fixed by the free market, anything else is communism.

[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

"The Art of the Deal", chapter 5, "Ban Competition".

[–] Zedstrian@sopuli.xyz 102 points 2 days ago (9 children)

They only want free markets when it benefits them.

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[–] DFX4509B@lemmy.wtf 34 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (5 children)

Big Autos is bribing Congress to kill anything they deem as competition.

-Ftfy

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[–] SoupBrick@pawb.social 71 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (12 children)

It makes sense. The investment in and development of EVs and EV manufacturing has been fully kneecapped by the American auto and oil industries.

If China came in, the American auto industry would be destroyed overnight due to the lack of competitive vehicles.

The propaganda of "Chinese vehicles are cheap and dangerous" only works when people don't have the product in front of them.

https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-ceo-jim-farley-xiaomi-tesla-chinese-ev-2026-4?op=1

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[–] Hakuso@scribe.disroot.org 43 points 2 days ago (1 children)

You know, all the reasons I didn't want a Chinese car are now also present in American cars...

We need to start raiding junkyards for old cars, and working on making electric conversions without corporate cloud connections and integrated spyware more accessible.

[–] blargh513@sh.itjust.works 28 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Or, and hear me out on this, push our useless elected officials to fucking do something for the people instead of the highest bidder.

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[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

Of course they do

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