Disgust at the CEO’s rightwing activism is casting a pall but conservatives are no more likely to buy EVs
US liberals have become so disgusted with Tesla since Elon Musk’s rightward turn that they are now not only far less likely to purchase the car brand but also less willing to buy any type of electric car, new research has found.
The popularity of Tesla among liberal-minded Americans has plummeted since Musk, Tesla’s chief executive and the world’s richest person, allied himself with Donald Trump and helped propel the president to election victory last year.
While liberals reported mostly positive intentions around buying an electric car in August 2023, their overall support for EVs eroded in the wake of a collapse in their opinion of Teslas, according to the new study, which polled Americans on an array of environmental actions.
I would love to have an electric vehicle. But first, I’d need to live somewhere with an appropriate power outlet near a reliable parking space.
I’m an apartment dweller that is lucky to find parking in front of my own home on Friday nights (when there are always more cars than usual.) I can only imagine how many people are in the same situation. Meanwhile, with the housing situation as it is, our ability to move to affordable houses (which could provide such power outlets) dwindles more every day. In this way, creating more affordable housing could lead more people to drive electric vehicles, simply by removing the barriers currently preventing them from doing so.
Hmmm. It’s almost like multiple facets of society… intersect somehow. Like if we were to improve one aspect, it could have a ripple effect that benefits other parts. So weird, right? Who would’a thunk it.
We’re seeing that in England.
There are commercial charging stations here and there in our neighborhood, but most people live in tarraced houses (in US terms, row houses) with unreserved resident’s parking on the streets. Our house is at the end of the row and has a big enough back garden to include a parking space, but that’s an exception. So now the council has offered to cut channels in the sidewalk from each house to the street so that charging cables can be run without impeding pedestrian access.
It still doesn’t solve the problem of being sure you can park in front of the house, but it’s a step in the right direction.