Tremendous news, comrades — your electric vehicle ration has been raised from one upcoming Buick model to zero. The Wall Street Journal reported late Tuesday that the Detroit automaker has delayed plans for a new Buick EV and also for a new electric truck factory. Actually, this is the second delay in opening the EV Chevy Silverado line at the company's Orion Assembly plant.
Originally set to start running in 2023, the Silverado EV won't start production until the middle of 2026. "If then" is a fair thing to wonder. The Buick plug-in hybrid has been delayed indefinitely.
I love this part from the WSJ report: "Meanwhile, stout demand for gas-powered vehicles continues to fuel profits for GM and other automakers." If it weren't for the money GM makes on gas and diesel vehicles, they couldn't afford to make or sell electric cars and trucks.
"U.S. electric vehicles continue to grow," the Journal reported, "but the pace has eased and demand has not matched many forecasts. EVs made up about 8% of new vehicles in the second quarter, up from 7.2% a year earlier."
GM shares fell on the news but not because investors balked at backing up on EV manufacturing. Instead, it's because the company said that higher costs and consumer frustration with high prices would impact profits going forward.
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Electric vehicle sales growth has slowed considerably from the days when early adopters and tech-gadget enthusiasts were driving double-digit increases. And, as far as I'm aware from various news reports over the last year or so, Tesla might be the only American, Japanese, or European automaker that makes and sells significant numbers of EVs at a profit.
ASIDE: I visited Buick's website to research this column and the company's old branding — "understated luxury" — had been changed to "nearly indistinguishable CUVs." There isn't a single sedan or coupe to be found in the Buick lineup and nothing I'd call elegant. I'm sure they're fine crossovers — comfortable, nice to drive, and fuel-efficient. But there's little Buick in the looks of today's Buick.
The Communist Chinese market is too opaque to have any real clue what's going on over there.
Would it be rude of me to ask, once again, just how many hundreds of billions of tax dollars the Biden-Harris administration has thrown at a glorious and necessary transition to electric vehicles?
Thankfully, the news is more than just multibillion-dollar frustration, however.
That same Wall Street Journal story says that "strong demand and prices on gas-powered trucks and SUVs" have given GM the chance to raise its profit outlook by, you know, making and selling vehicles that consumers are actually willing to buy.
So give credit to GM for putting the brakes on their EV plans before doing too much more harm to the company's finances. The same goes for Ford.
Profits are what keep a business going, and they can't be willed into existence by government mandates, restrictions, incentives, and outright subsidies. That's true no matter how severe the mandates and restrictions might be or how generous the incentives and subsidies are.
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