Stubbornness to change is part of Germany's national identity, more often than not towards its own detriment.

But also, Merz is not alone in this, but a lot of Eastern Europe can't afford EVs at current EU prices so the EU has to make some concessions. People in Romania or Bulgaria can't afford to buy a Polestar like people in Netherlands can.

EU leaders needs to account for the massive disparities of purchasing power between places like Nordics and Romania/Bulgaria for example when they make sweeping legislation like that.

Sure it would be nice if all of EU was like Norway with only EVs everywhere, but this way you'd basically be bankrupting and turning against you the people in the poorer countries of the union who are already disproportionately affected by the CoL crisis of the EU, who are effectively paying German energy and grocery prices but at Eastern EU salaries and pensions. This is not sustainable.

Not to mention the disparity in public transportation infrastructure where a car is basically mandatory for commuting outside big cities in place like Romania.

I doubt the average citizen in the Netherlands can afford EVs at current EU prices either.

And at the rate car prices are increasing for no good reason, I doubt the average EU citizen will be able to afford a car in the future.

The EU does need to find a middle ground between mandatory safety features that are unaffordable and free for all pedestrian killing machines.

And protectionism ain't it. It will only increase the prices for domestic cars until the likes of VW have to close up shop because no one can afford what they're peddling any more.

Maybe Europe should allow cheap BYD's to be imported for the poor eastern Europeans them.

Fossil fuels need to be eliminated. Europe is the fastest warming continent.

Yes, lets hand over the one last big industry we have to China and hope for the best, we totally haven't learnt anything from the domestic electronics industry. And let the easterners drive shitty Chinese EVs instead of Skodas so that some elite in Brussels can feel good about themselves. As if East Europeans haven't been through enough yet.

Extending the ban on combustion engines -is- handing the industry to China.

Have you considered that you might be out of touch from your bubble of NL remote SW dev for US corpos?

Like your idea sounds good in principle, especially if you're from a country with no automotive jobs, but then what do you do then with tens of thousands of unemployed people of the auto sector being displaced by the Chinese? Will you agree to pay more income taxes to fund the increased unemployment deficits of the others? How do you think those people will vote? What about maintaining some national sovereignty? Shall we just become a vassal state to China on automotive as well?

You can't throw such oversimplified solutions to such complex issues that have very deep ramifications.

If you haven't noticed, the EU economy and jobs market in general is already bad as it is, it won't be able to absorb tens of thousands of unemployed career switchers into to other domains that aren't hiring right now anyway, or if they are hiring, they're very picky due to the increased supply of talent with domain experience.

Currently, the defense sector is absorbing some of the slack of automotive layoffs on the production/manufacturing side in some countries like Germany, but that won't last forever. If peace happens in Ukraine, that will dry out as well as the glut of orders will be scaled back.

If the only way to stay competitive is to make combustion cars then why do we see new Chinese manufacturers being all electric?

I don’t want those people to lose their jobs, which is one reason why their bosses need to be dragged in to the 21st century.

Mate, I don't think you get it. You can make EVs instead of ICEs if you want, but who will buy them when your EVs are expensive and your consumers currently wage poor? You can't make Chinese priced EVs in Europe and still expect to stay profitable, and auto makers in Europe aren't gonna be forced by the government to change tune here if you expect them to lose money for some utopic greater good when they're accountable to their shareholders to increase profits so then they make whatever the consumers will currently buy, which tends to be quite a lot of ICEs. You can't turn this complex market around overnight.

To get where you want, you need the venn diagram where what the automakers want, aligns with what consumers want, to align with what the government wants, which isn't happening right now, and it's not something the government can force without massive repercussions. China has had 10+ years of focus exclusively on the EV and battery sector domestically, during good economic times to get to where they are.

And Chinese government can subsidize their industry longer than you can stay solvent, as long as they know they'll bankrupt your industry in the long run and then make you dependent on them for manufacturing. Competing with China can't be done on equal footing because they don't play fair and never had.

I think Eastern Europe can afford EVs now. 20,000 euros for the Twingo, 15,000 euros for Dacia Spring. This is cheaper than most petrol cars.

Have you considered that many people in Eastern Europe might not be able to afford a new car at all? Where I live people are keeping their older cars for longer and buying used because everything else is getting more expensive and nobody wants to go in debt for something marginally better than what they already have.

Yes, but that's also the case in Sweden and France and Spain etc. But these new things are obviously competing with other new things.

The average age of a car currently on the road in Romania, Bulgaria and Greece is about 16 years old. How do you think all those people with 16 year old beaters, will suddenly be able to afford the 20k cars?

I don't think they will. I think they'll keep driving these old cars, and that these EVs will eventually become old cars.

The lifecycle of an EV is a lot less than mostly mechanical cars that are possible to independently repair. I drive a 30 year old van and it’s still possible to get replacement parts within a day or two. I doubt you will get service for a 10 year old EV.

The original Nissan Leaf was launched in 2010 and you can still get whole replacement batteries or even just cell replacements for them.

They can also be upgraded to increase their range using after market batteries.

So we’re already at 15 years and counting.

I don't think that's true. I see ICE vehicles as complex, with lots of parts that wear etc. and which are problematic, while I see BEVs as straightforward.

Maybe the batteries will wear out, but what will a replacement battery cost in 10 years? Presumably even less than now.

The comment by Lio beside this one also makes it hard for me to take a view like yours.

No one has to suddenly be able to afford a new car. The phase-out of combustion vehicles is for new vehicles. Old cars can still be driven.

> This is cheaper than most petrol cars.

Still somewhat more expensive than petrol cars in the same category, though.

Not to take away from your argument, but German grocery prices are actually famously low. I know of eastern Europeans in border places who prefer shopping in Germany for that reason.