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Tesla Proves To Be Too Pricey For Germany, Loses Tax Subsidies (reuters.com)
Tesla has been removed from Germany's list of electric cars eligible for subsidies because its Model S sedan is too expensive for the scheme. Tesla customers cannot order the Model S base version without extra features that pushed the car above the 60,000 euro ($71,500) price limit, a spokesman for the German Federal Office for Economic Affairs and Export Controls (BAFA) said on Friday. From the report: Germany last year launched the incentive scheme worth about 1 billion euros, partly financed by the German car industry, to boost electric car usage. A price cap was included to exempt premium models. "This is a completely false accusation. Anyone in Germany can order a Tesla Model S base version without the comfort package, and we have delivered such cars to customers," Tesla said in a statement. The carmaker said the upper price limit was initially set by the German government to exclude Tesla, but later a compromise was reached "that allows Tesla to sell a low option vehicle that qualifies for the incentive and customers can subsequently upgrade if they wish." It said, however, it would investigate whether any car buyers were denied the no-frills version. Under the subsidy scheme, buyers get 4,000 euros off their all-electric vehicle purchase and 3,000 euros off plug-in hybrids.
Several companies make more electric cars than Tesla does. Nissan is one you've heard of, probably. The Nissan Leaf is the most popular. They also make some all-electric vehicles for business use.
Several companies in China make electric cars. In fact China makes more electric cars than the rest of the world combined. BYD is one Chinese company.
> I have only ever heard of Telsa manufacturing them.
Nissan and BYD executives don't announce they're building a tunnel, without permits, for a scientifically questionable vacuum subway from their parking lot to some other city. They just make good cars. Elon Musk is the PT Barnum of our age.
Note I am in no way against the wealthy. I wish them every success.
But they don't need government assistance to buy a luxury vehicle.
It's doubtful that the law would be valid if it outright said "except Tesla" in its language. So they tried to infer it by putting a price cap just under what a Tesla S costs. Then Tesla started offering a trim package that meets the law's price criteria.
What exactly is the problem again? Oh, what it said in the summary: this program is partially paid for by the German auto makers, and the German auto industry doesn't want to have that money going to Tesla. So let's fuck around with sock puppets in the government rather than build a competitive offering. Because clearly someone that was going to buy a Tesla is going to change their mind over this subsidy and get an electric VW Golf instead?
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Volkswagen, Mercedes, BMW... there's a reason Tesla lost its subsidies and even other car manufacturers have a hard time in the EU. Germany runs the EU and they are very protectionist.
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And why, you might ask, did the German govt agree to that weird concession / loophole? Because this entire scheme was illegal under EU trade law, and germany likely would've lost if Tesla sued them over it. It was pure protectionism of local manufacturers, plain and simple. You can claim all you want that it also hits some of the super-high end models of Porsche, ect, but the fact that the cutoff was jjuuuust below the lowest-end Tesla was no coincidence.
If some Tesla salespeople did imply you were force to buy options packages, the company should, and likely would, address that. But as they stated, it was not a fictional model only for show. They sold some, and they have evidence. So they were available if people wanted them.