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Who's To Blame For Rules That Block Tesla Sales In Most US States?
cartechboy writes The common assumption among Tesla fans seems to be that state auto-dealer lobbyists are working with Republican legislators to enact laws banning direct sales of Tesla's electric cars to retail buyers. Is it true? The New York Times published an article with some data points that assesses the supposition. While the article mainly focuses on the conflict between Uber and the Republican party, some quotes could be easily applied to Tesla. For instance, Republican National Committee chairman Reince Preibus said, "It should be consumers, not government bureaucrats or legislators, that deicde what companies get our business." The author of the article, Josh Barro, wrote that 22 states permit direct sales of automobiles by Tesla to retail buyers, and of those the majority--14 of them-- voted for President Obama. He suggested that Democratic California, Illinois, and New York "have freer markets in auto retailing than Texas," which is presently Republican. When looking at a five-year-old article by Nate Silver that looked at political donations by car dealers, fully 88 percent of those donations went to Republican candidates, and just 12 percent to Democrats. That possibly suggests a propensity among Republican state legislators to support the interests for car dealers over those of electric-car buyers. Is the small bit of evidence enough to make a case?
Good background on the current system of dealership sinecure can be found in this short 2009 Competition Advocacy Paper from the U.S. Department of Justice, which delves into the history and effects of the dealers-only system which still prevails.
The kind of power-hungry sociopaths who restrict our technology to create artificial scarcity?
When looking at a five-year-old article by Nate Silver that looked at political donations by car dealers, fully 88 percent of those donations went to Republican candidates, and just 12 percent to Democrats. That possibly suggests a propensity among Republican state legislators to support the interests for car dealers over those of electric-car buyers. Is the small bit of evidence enough to make a case?
But we have the best democracy you can fine anywhere. It doesn't matter if our legislators are being bribed indirectly, or get embroiled in obvious conflict of interest matters.
Welcome to the USA!
Ohh wait, let's preach to the world about free markets.
The creation of the FCC came under FDR's watch in 1934. Actually FDR formed a commission to study communication regulation. The study recommended that a Federal agency regulate all communications. FDR pushed for the creation of such a body and 2 DEMOCRATIC Senators introduced a bill to form the FCC. The bill passed both Houses and FDR signed it into law.
Ergo Politicians suck, because they're ALL built on lies. See ANY MEDIA for details.
Fixed that for you. Seeing evil on only one side works for both sides.
In the past the arguments that mandated the franchise structure had at least a little bit of logic in that by there being a local presence, the service that the vehicle needed could be performed by representatives with corporate connections. Back then, cars needed a LOT of service; rockers needed their lash adjusted, points needed changing and distributors needed to be curved, and lot of parts wore out faster. The majority of those maintenance tasks were internal combustion engine related though, with only a few, like brakes, applying to today's modern 100% electric cars. When cars needed that kind of maintenance it was easy to argue that without dealer support, the end consumer would be screwed-over with an unmaintainable vehicle.
As gas-powered cars improved they need less dealer-support for basic service, that already weakens the dealer-franchise argument. The new 100% electric cars require even less service to begin with though, and with the onboard computers' ability to report-back to Tesla when readings get out of normal the car can self-report small problems before they become large ones, assuming that Tesla has done a good job of determining what to monitor. Teslas simply don't need as much maintenance, and most of the simple maintenance (brakes, tires, even HVAC) can probably be performed by existing independent shops that can bill Tesla to do the warranty work.
This is a paradigm shift, and dealers are going to start to feel the pain if they're unwilling to actually add value, and honestly, there's not a lot of value to add when they're mostly unnecessary in this shift.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Republicans, Democrats..... A sellout is a sellout regardless of what political mantra they spew while they rent themselves out to the highest bidder.
by 50 years or more, and reflect the situations surrounding the time in which they were passed. One can hardly expect an existing dealership system to use legal means, especially those existing laws, to protect their interests. This ought to be obvious even if one disagrees with the premise of the laws. And by the way, these laws were passed in all states over decades of time, usually in response to some bad action by the manufacturers (such as forcing dealerships to accept cars they did order, so manufactures could offload dead inventory, or not reimbursing dealerships for warranty repairs).
You cannot simply point at today's lackey Republicans as the source for these laws, nor claim them to be "anti-Tesla" anymore than 50-year-old telecom laws are "anti-Google".
A far better resource than the source in the original posting is
http://faculty.som.yale.edu/Fi...
This is an analysis predating Tesla's trouble by a bit, focusing on the government-sanctioned decimation of dealerships through the TARP process, circa 2010, and includes a nice history of franchise protection laws.
For example:
The regulation of auto franchises arose as a response to car manufacturer he regulation of auto franchises arose as a response to car manufacturer
opportunism early in the twentieth century. According to Surowiecki (2006), in 1920, Henry Ford took advantage of its established dealer network by forcing
dealers to buy inventories of new cars that they were unlikely to sell. The reason that the company could “force” dealers to take the cars was that they had all made important investments in their facilities and reputation. Thus they had sunk costs that could be expropriated. Ford and General Motors used the same strategy again during the Great Depression. These episodes demonstrated to policymakers that the franchisor, with its greater information and financial resources, might exploit investments made by the franchisees. Federal regulation followed these periods.
The starting point for auto franchise regulation is the 1956 federal act generally known as the Automobile Dealer’s Day in Court Act (ADDICA), which
provides that a car dealer may recover damages if its manufacturer fails to act in good faith in complying with the terms of the franchise agreement, including on
issues of allocation of vehicles to dealers, or matters of termination, cancellation, or transfer of the franchise. However, by the time the ADDICA was enacted, 20 states had already passed auto franchise laws. Today, every state has a law governing car manufacturer/dealer auto franchise laws. Today, every state has a law governing car manufacturer/dealer relationships.
All states require that car dealers be licensed. Even 30 years ago, 44 states had such a requirement. This regulation prevents the manufacturer from retailing cars through other means. In particular, this regulation has been a major impediment to the development of Internet distribution of new cars.
The FCC was formed by the Communications Act of 1934 to replace the radio regulation functions of the Federal Radio Commission.
The Communications Act of 1934 is a United States federal law, signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 19, 1934. I believe FDR was a Democrat. The law was passed by the 73rd Congress. Both chambers had a Democratic majority. Dems in the Senate enjoyed a 60-35 majority, while over in the House thing were even rosier with Dems holding about 312 seats to Republicans 115 or so (counts varied slightly over time).
Of course I have only been involved in the automotive industry for 45 years, so maybe you are correct
That's the core of your problem: you're to stuck in your legacy views of the automobile market to spot the trends and changes.
I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are missing.
Yeah, bad form, replying to AC that can't even figure out how to quote right...
Advanced service on cars is harder than it used to be, I will not dispute that. On the other hand, I don't have to have my ignition system or valvetrain or carburetor adjusted every few thousand miles anymore. I have to change the oil and filter regularly, lube the suspension, check the fluid levels for coolant, transmission fluid, brake fluid, power steering fluid, and top-off the windshield washer fluid and possibly change the wiper blades, change the engine air filter, and do a brake job from time to time, and after many years, change the brake fluid, change the transmission fluid and filter, change the differential gear oil, possibly change the power steering fluid, possibly replace the spark plug wires, possibly re-gap or replace the spark plugs, and possibly replace a passenger compartment air filter.
If more service than that is required in the first 80,000 miles then the manufacturer screwed up. There should be no need pull the valve covers, or to take the top-end off of the engine, or to pull the transmission out, or to do any of a bunch of other jobs to a car unless it's been subjected to something abnormal.
Electrics eliminate a lot of that. There's still chassis/suspension maintenance, cabin/passenger compartment stuff, and there could even be new tasks like re-lubricating electric motor bearings to prevent premature wear, but by and large, electrics have a lot less of those kinds of maintenance tasks to perform, and likely a lot of them could be self-service with proper documentation.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Very good points. Two things stick out from the anecdotes of early adopters:
1) Tesla owners who must get service without the benefit of any dealer network have the highest owner satisfaction in survey after survey.
2) Nissan Leaf owners have a wide range of tales about inept and laughable service and support from Leaf certified dealerships. Better yet, not all dealers are "Leaf Certified". So you can buy a Nissan, but cannot just go to any dealership for basic service, which is supposed to be one of the main arguments in favor of the dealership model. Heck, dealerships can lose/drop their certification leaving buyers in the area high and dry (especially in backwater areas with little to no charging infrastructure to make to the next closest dealer). Early tales from people buying compliance cars (Fiat 500e, Chevy Spark EV, etc) are much, much worse.
Yes, the story of the heavily unionized car sales businesses turning the screws on the plucky non-union auto manufacturers certainly rings true to me.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
Career politicians are largely to blame as they will vote which ever way they think will keep them in office. Since campaigning is expensive, the deep pockets essentially run the nation.
As opposed to end-of-term term-limited politicians who will vote which ever way will get them a good job once they leave office? Or as opposed to new term-limited politicians who won't know what the hell they're doing and will vote however their career staff and lobbyists tell them to?
I respect a politician more who wants to die in office, because that means he's never looking for another job. He is having to run for office, and yes, campaigning is expensive and corrupt. Let's fix that instead of ruining the system with term limits.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
If a car has no drain plug for a fluid service that has to be performed several times a year, or can't handle a simple battery replacement without squawking, then the manufacturer is doing something wrong. Either their engineering is terrible or they're assholes.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.