For real. Every. Damn. Time.

Like if you want privacy or control of your car in the US you have to buy cars slowly becoming antiques or rip and replace a bunch of electronics not built to be maintanced at all. Doesn't matter the country of origin. I think I'd rather EU, Japanese, or South Korean spying at this point but what a hell of a choice...

That's sort of why I want them. America loves to customize cars. We'd take them apart and put them back together again six ways from Sunday.

There'd be YouTube channels dedicated to this and recycling the drivetrains with various levels of creativity. There'd be someone rewinding motors for torque and reflashing anything they could find to see what happens.

It will be a good time

It's worth looking into how much data modern US cars are gathering as well, if you're concerned with that. Frankly, it seems like you're just deciding who gets your data at a certain point.

Yeah... As much as I'd love to ride an EV, i think i need to stick to an older gas car just to avoid all the tracking.

Many countries subsidiese their car brands. In Germany exact numbers are not known, because the government works for the companies I guess, but most experts assume that brands like Volkswagen receive about 1 billion euros (or 1.15 billion US dollars) a year. Source A Source B. I'm no expert for other countries, but a quick research lead to the claim that until 2015 Tesla and the adjacent businesses (SpaceX etc.) had received 4.9 billion US dollars in subsidies Source. I don't think its fair to say that they are cheap just because they receive subsidies, they are just getting what everyone else is.

US automakers have received $85 Billion in taxpayer money since 2008.

So where are the $20,000 cars?

Hey! That's our thing..

We could also subsidize this if we chose to. It's not cheating, they don't have to play by America's made-up rules that they don't follow themselves.

And exponentially more affordable.

Stern says her first reaction to driving the car was “holy crap,” and she “I fell for the SU7 Max inside and out, and now I’m left wanting what I can’t have.” She was impressed with the way its infotainment system integrated with a phone, the between-seat minifridge, the karaoke system, the walkie-talkie system, the driver-assistance system, the range, and the comfort. “I fell in love with all things about this car, including its price tag,” she said, noting that it was a better experience than a similarly priced Tesla. The Xiaomi, she says, is not even in the same universe as American cars. “It’s like if Apple had actually built the long-rumored Apple Car and everything just… worked.” “I will wait for you, Xiaomi,” she concludes. “We shall be together again one day.” One is relieved the Journal took her car away before things between them got too physical.

And if Stern sounds like lovesickness may have compromised her judgment, consider this: the CEO of Ford himself drives one. "I don't like talking about the competition so much,” he admitted to a podcaster, “but I drive the Xiaomi… I don’t want to give it up.” Noting that the car is “fantastic,” he told a company board member that the Chinese auto industry is an “existential threat.”

American manufacturers are terrified of the Chinese auto industry, because Chinese cars are good, and they’re cheap. Their executives admit as much, saying that “the arrival of affordable, high-tech Chinese cars could upend” the industry. So they’re trying to ensure not only that Chinese cars can’t be sold in the U.S., but that Americans will never even be exposed to one. A group of Congressional Democrats recently sent Donald Trump a letter pleading with him to ensure Chinese cars never enter the United States. Supposedly progressive Democratic congressman Ro Khanna has been particularly aggressive in pushing for new rules, claiming the cars “put Americans at risk.” “Chinese cars are a serious threat to America’s national security and Michigan’s economic security,” Senator Elissa Slotkin has said. Astonishingly, even though the Biden administration already “imposed sweeping regulations that effectively ban Chinese automakers from ​selling passenger vehicles in the United States,” lawmakers are now trying to ensure that people can’t even drive Chinese cars across the border to visit the United States. They apparently envision an absurd scenario where agents at the Mexico border inspect every car to ensure it’s not Chinese before it’s even allowed to drive on U.S. soil. One problem is that U.S. manufacturers have focused on (deadly, inefficient) large SUVs and trucks, and the average new car now costs around $50,000. Car prices hit a record last year, and American auto loan debt hit a record $1.68 trillion, leaving many Americans with “more and more of their paychecks eaten by their car payments.” There are almost no new cars for sale under $20,000. But Chinese cars can sell new for as little $8,000 in China itself, and China may well be able to offer cars in the U.S. close to $20,000 new—if it’s allowed to compete. That’s why the industry sees Chinese cars as an existential threat: they worry that consumers will prefer them, and so the power of the government must be used to ensure that consumers are forced against their will to buy more expensive, lower-quality cars, in order to prop up the U.S. automotive industry. (They’ll say that’s about Jobs, of course, but it’s also about profits.)...

But wait! There's more! The article deserves a full read.

At least the Chinese market isn’t going to send Trumps gestapo after me because I said I don’t like fascists.

You realize there are "Chinese police stations" within Canada, right?

Hyundai/Kia have a major problem with the integrated charge control units that they're basically refusing to provide a long-term solution for. If it fails in one car, they just replace it with an identical module and hope it doesn't happen again. But the root cause has not been addressed.

https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-recalls-defects/hyundai-ioniq-kia-iccu-failure-tesla-a3038878758/