this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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I'm less surprised. Down around Wellington, there are Teslas everywhere. But also, there are shiny clean $80,000 utes everywhere too.
I think it's important to understand that the point of the rebate is not to subsidise the less fortunate to buy new cars. The point is that when someone who was already going to buy a new car looks at the options, they find EVs to be at a comparable price point to the petrol equivalent. It's to incentivise new cars to be electric, because new cars become the second hand cars of tomorrow. No one buying a new car needs a subsidy, but if it's not there then people are more likely to choose petrol options.
There was another scheme planned aimed at making EV use affordable for low income drivers (social leasing scheme), but this was canned at the time Jacinda stepped down and the govt did a reset of projects.