I agree that the latest models of American pickup truck not only look preposterous, but are unsafe for pedestrians, especially children. There's some delcious irony in the fact that the Dodge Ram (again, more irony in the name) you picture is actually produced by a European company with the made-up name "Stellantis", because they couldn't fit "Fiat-Chrysler-Peugeot-Citröen-Jeep-Dodge-Opel" onto a busines card; predictably, they have an equally unattractive stock price chart https://www.google.com/finance/quote/STLA:NYSE?window=1Y .
There's a sad situation in the US right now that the only American sedans one can buy are "muscle cars" such as the Ford Mustang or the Dodge Charger, or the Cadillac CT5. That leaves only pickups, 4x4s, and crossovers ("softroaders"), the latter of which in recent years have also become the most popular car models sold in Europe. The station wagon is essentially dead. Oh, you can buy a Tesla as well, although the mood music on those is shifting pretty quickly. Did this situation emerge solely due to consumer preference? Most Americans indeed have rural upbringing in living memory, Jeeps gained iconic status in wartime, and as pickups have been developed and marketed for agriculture and trades since the 1940s, they undeniably have some "reverse snobbery" cachet https://www.walmartmuseum.com/content/walmartmuseum/en_us/timeline/decades/1970/artifact/2580.html . That all said, dig deeper and one discovers that, as the old saying goes, "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions" ... a.k.a. perverse outcomes of overly-ambitious government regulation:
1) A 25% tariff on imported light trucks, known as the Chicken Tax, was introduced in 1964 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax . This made foreign pickups and small utility vehicles less competitive in the U.S., giving domestic manufacturers a significant advantage. U.S. automakers used this protection to dominate the truck and SUV market, investing heavily in their production and marketing. The ways European and Japanese vehicle manufacturers tried to skirt these regulations were clever indeed (import utility vehicles with seats and window glass, which were ripped out and shipped back for the next batch!), but it worked.
2) The Business Expense Deductions (Section 179) of the U.S. tax code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_179_depreciation_deduction allows businesses to deduct the full purchase price of vehicles over a certain weight (initially 6,000 pounds Gross Vehicle Weight Rating) as a business expense. Many SUVs and larger pickups qualified, incentivizing businesses and self-employed individuals to purchase these vehicles. Tax breaks for farmers and rural businesses further encouraged purchases of pickups and utility vehicles.
3) Since their introduction in 1975, Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) Standards https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_economy categorized "light trucks" (a category that includes pickup trucks, SUVs, and vans) separately from passenger cars. Light trucks were subject to less stringent fuel economy requirements, allowing automakers to design and sell larger, less fuel-efficient vehicles without significant regulatory penalties. Automakers capitalized on this distinction by marketing SUVs and pickups as versatile vehicles that straddled the line between personal and utility use, appealing to a broad range of consumers.
4) Trucks and SUVs often had design exemptions that allowed them to meet safety and emissions standards differently than passenger cars. For example, bumper and crash test regulations differed, enabling SUVs and trucks to retain their higher designs. Vehicles classified as "off-road" had more lenient emissions and safety testing requirements, which helped early SUVs gain popularity as dual-purpose vehicles. European cars were rich man's toys which were dumbed-down for the mass market, whilst in the US trucks are mass market utility behicles which were spruced-up for the rich man's market. Americans care a lot less about high performance driving, so a ladder-frame pickup truck not that different from praire schooners https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covered_wagon with big de-tuned V8s developed in the 1950s deliver a just-okay-enough driving experience once loaded with air conditioning, entertainment systems and other amenities. Because the technology is so retrograde, these vehicles are *enormously* profitable for their manufacturers; $10,000 to $17,000 per vehicle (or more for high-end models) versus just $2,000 to $3,000 for small sedans and other unibody cars.
3) and especially 4) go straight to your argument. I completely agree with you on the unsuitability of high-nose pickups; unlike the European Union, which has strict pedestrian safety standards (e.g., requiring designs that minimize pedestrian injuries, such as lower front-end heights and deformable bumpers), U.S. regulations have historically lacked equivalent rules. That said, the American counter-argument is that they'll be able to load them up with enough cameras, lidar, and other sensors to increase pedestrian safety. Hmmm.
However, this also gets to a great unspoken on emissions, and perhaps on American vs. European pragmatism: The only way European car makers had a chance of meeting arbitrarily aggressive EU emissions and fuel economy targets was to cheat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_emissions_scandal . American car makers knew up front that one can't challenge the laws of thermodynamics, shrugged, and gave the people what they wanted ... or at least what they thought they wanted.
So what fixes this? As with previous generations, I believe it will be generational "uncoolness". My grandparents drove big V8 cars that were actively rejected by my parents' and my generations which initially prefered smaller European and Japanese cars as a lifestyle statement. Young people today don't really seem to care much about cars at all, underscored by the rise of ÜberCab and ride-sharing. It will all likely average out to people driving electric and/or hybrid compact crossovers which deliver a sufficiently attractive efficiency, safety, comfort, and cost balance allowing auto makers to make a reasonable profit whilst meeting realistic societal goals on emissions. You wanna know who's doing that already, in size? The Chinese https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BYD_Atto_3 .
Actually, there is a fix. If you watch the Youtube video I link to in the article, you learn that it was US CAFE standards that triggered the rise in SUVs and light trucks in the US because they were exempt from emission standards. and from the US, the SUV craze then jumped to europe and Asia...
It became a two-way street, as the Japanese and German manufacturers also set up US production facilities to capitalize on the loophole to produce heavier passenger vehicles, many of which are now (again, ironically) imported to their domestic markets.
My family uses e-bikes and a Mini around town, but I have a 2016 Land Rover Defender we drive very sparingly as a collector's item and for genuine offroad/farm/towing use. The German road tax is only €148 per year as it's classified as a commercial vehicle, so similar loopholes exist over here. The more egregious pathway in Germany is the rise of "mild hybrids" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mild_hybrid which many people use to avail themselves of a road-tax-exempt "E-plate" for what are de facto SUVs. The whole system needs to be shaken up.
It's to a large extent a matter of unpriced external effects. If accident consequences included a penalty for using a vehicle that is not state of the art, then truck insurance would be expensive.
If there were an eyesore tax, trucks would be more expensive.
If the external effects of emissions...
If parking was cheaper for smaller vehicles...
But actually, just cutting the various regulatory and tax exceptions for large vehicles would deal with this scourge.
...and as coindidence would have it, 14 years ago to the day, I wrote a piece about pedestrian protection for a U.S. audience. Quo magis tempus transit minus mutationes.
Back then, I was shocked at how often the readership's response sounded borderline sociopathic (like, "any pedestrian not paying attention who gets run over deserves it", or "it's all jaywalkers anyway"). That, in combination with widespread climate denialism, killed any sympathy I had for so-called car culture (even though my Nürburgring lap time is still pretty OK).
Trust me,as I write this, the Americans haven't woken up, yet. Hence, the feedback I get in the comments and via email so far have been 100% positive and encouraging.
I guarantee you it will change in the next couple of hours when I get feedback from american readers...
The economist has recently published a fascinating chart relating the weight of cars and their risk of death for their own driver as well as the opposing vehicle. Tells a very clear story of how their is a negative nash equilibrium to drive bigger cars to increase safety while also increasing the risk of death for others. Regulation would put a clear stop to this. https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/09/05/what-to-do-about-americas-killer-cars
I agree that the latest models of American pickup truck not only look preposterous, but are unsafe for pedestrians, especially children. There's some delcious irony in the fact that the Dodge Ram (again, more irony in the name) you picture is actually produced by a European company with the made-up name "Stellantis", because they couldn't fit "Fiat-Chrysler-Peugeot-Citröen-Jeep-Dodge-Opel" onto a busines card; predictably, they have an equally unattractive stock price chart https://www.google.com/finance/quote/STLA:NYSE?window=1Y .
There's a sad situation in the US right now that the only American sedans one can buy are "muscle cars" such as the Ford Mustang or the Dodge Charger, or the Cadillac CT5. That leaves only pickups, 4x4s, and crossovers ("softroaders"), the latter of which in recent years have also become the most popular car models sold in Europe. The station wagon is essentially dead. Oh, you can buy a Tesla as well, although the mood music on those is shifting pretty quickly. Did this situation emerge solely due to consumer preference? Most Americans indeed have rural upbringing in living memory, Jeeps gained iconic status in wartime, and as pickups have been developed and marketed for agriculture and trades since the 1940s, they undeniably have some "reverse snobbery" cachet https://www.walmartmuseum.com/content/walmartmuseum/en_us/timeline/decades/1970/artifact/2580.html . That all said, dig deeper and one discovers that, as the old saying goes, "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions" ... a.k.a. perverse outcomes of overly-ambitious government regulation:
1) A 25% tariff on imported light trucks, known as the Chicken Tax, was introduced in 1964 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax . This made foreign pickups and small utility vehicles less competitive in the U.S., giving domestic manufacturers a significant advantage. U.S. automakers used this protection to dominate the truck and SUV market, investing heavily in their production and marketing. The ways European and Japanese vehicle manufacturers tried to skirt these regulations were clever indeed (import utility vehicles with seats and window glass, which were ripped out and shipped back for the next batch!), but it worked.
2) The Business Expense Deductions (Section 179) of the U.S. tax code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_179_depreciation_deduction allows businesses to deduct the full purchase price of vehicles over a certain weight (initially 6,000 pounds Gross Vehicle Weight Rating) as a business expense. Many SUVs and larger pickups qualified, incentivizing businesses and self-employed individuals to purchase these vehicles. Tax breaks for farmers and rural businesses further encouraged purchases of pickups and utility vehicles.
3) Since their introduction in 1975, Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) Standards https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_economy categorized "light trucks" (a category that includes pickup trucks, SUVs, and vans) separately from passenger cars. Light trucks were subject to less stringent fuel economy requirements, allowing automakers to design and sell larger, less fuel-efficient vehicles without significant regulatory penalties. Automakers capitalized on this distinction by marketing SUVs and pickups as versatile vehicles that straddled the line between personal and utility use, appealing to a broad range of consumers.
4) Trucks and SUVs often had design exemptions that allowed them to meet safety and emissions standards differently than passenger cars. For example, bumper and crash test regulations differed, enabling SUVs and trucks to retain their higher designs. Vehicles classified as "off-road" had more lenient emissions and safety testing requirements, which helped early SUVs gain popularity as dual-purpose vehicles. European cars were rich man's toys which were dumbed-down for the mass market, whilst in the US trucks are mass market utility behicles which were spruced-up for the rich man's market. Americans care a lot less about high performance driving, so a ladder-frame pickup truck not that different from praire schooners https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covered_wagon with big de-tuned V8s developed in the 1950s deliver a just-okay-enough driving experience once loaded with air conditioning, entertainment systems and other amenities. Because the technology is so retrograde, these vehicles are *enormously* profitable for their manufacturers; $10,000 to $17,000 per vehicle (or more for high-end models) versus just $2,000 to $3,000 for small sedans and other unibody cars.
3) and especially 4) go straight to your argument. I completely agree with you on the unsuitability of high-nose pickups; unlike the European Union, which has strict pedestrian safety standards (e.g., requiring designs that minimize pedestrian injuries, such as lower front-end heights and deformable bumpers), U.S. regulations have historically lacked equivalent rules. That said, the American counter-argument is that they'll be able to load them up with enough cameras, lidar, and other sensors to increase pedestrian safety. Hmmm.
However, this also gets to a great unspoken on emissions, and perhaps on American vs. European pragmatism: The only way European car makers had a chance of meeting arbitrarily aggressive EU emissions and fuel economy targets was to cheat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_emissions_scandal . American car makers knew up front that one can't challenge the laws of thermodynamics, shrugged, and gave the people what they wanted ... or at least what they thought they wanted.
So what fixes this? As with previous generations, I believe it will be generational "uncoolness". My grandparents drove big V8 cars that were actively rejected by my parents' and my generations which initially prefered smaller European and Japanese cars as a lifestyle statement. Young people today don't really seem to care much about cars at all, underscored by the rise of ÜberCab and ride-sharing. It will all likely average out to people driving electric and/or hybrid compact crossovers which deliver a sufficiently attractive efficiency, safety, comfort, and cost balance allowing auto makers to make a reasonable profit whilst meeting realistic societal goals on emissions. You wanna know who's doing that already, in size? The Chinese https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BYD_Atto_3 .
Actually, there is a fix. If you watch the Youtube video I link to in the article, you learn that it was US CAFE standards that triggered the rise in SUVs and light trucks in the US because they were exempt from emission standards. and from the US, the SUV craze then jumped to europe and Asia...
It became a two-way street, as the Japanese and German manufacturers also set up US production facilities to capitalize on the loophole to produce heavier passenger vehicles, many of which are now (again, ironically) imported to their domestic markets.
My family uses e-bikes and a Mini around town, but I have a 2016 Land Rover Defender we drive very sparingly as a collector's item and for genuine offroad/farm/towing use. The German road tax is only €148 per year as it's classified as a commercial vehicle, so similar loopholes exist over here. The more egregious pathway in Germany is the rise of "mild hybrids" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mild_hybrid which many people use to avail themselves of a road-tax-exempt "E-plate" for what are de facto SUVs. The whole system needs to be shaken up.
It's to a large extent a matter of unpriced external effects. If accident consequences included a penalty for using a vehicle that is not state of the art, then truck insurance would be expensive.
If there were an eyesore tax, trucks would be more expensive.
If the external effects of emissions...
If parking was cheaper for smaller vehicles...
But actually, just cutting the various regulatory and tax exceptions for large vehicles would deal with this scourge.
"There goes the sociopath who values personal convenience more than the lives of children."
This is true of all motorists, regardless of which model they drive.
Big pick-up and SUV drivers are just more so.
...and as coindidence would have it, 14 years ago to the day, I wrote a piece about pedestrian protection for a U.S. audience. Quo magis tempus transit minus mutationes.
Back then, I was shocked at how often the readership's response sounded borderline sociopathic (like, "any pedestrian not paying attention who gets run over deserves it", or "it's all jaywalkers anyway"). That, in combination with widespread climate denialism, killed any sympathy I had for so-called car culture (even though my Nürburgring lap time is still pretty OK).
https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2007/12/the-truth-about-europes-pedestrian-safety-legislation/
Trust me,as I write this, the Americans haven't woken up, yet. Hence, the feedback I get in the comments and via email so far have been 100% positive and encouraging.
I guarantee you it will change in the next couple of hours when I get feedback from american readers...
No need to worry, most of them cannot write.
😂
It has been said: "If I owned Texas and Hell, I would rent out Texas and live in Hell". For Texas I substitute America.
The economist has recently published a fascinating chart relating the weight of cars and their risk of death for their own driver as well as the opposing vehicle. Tells a very clear story of how their is a negative nash equilibrium to drive bigger cars to increase safety while also increasing the risk of death for others. Regulation would put a clear stop to this. https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/09/05/what-to-do-about-americas-killer-cars