Comment on /c/café daily chat thread for 11 October 2023
dukeGR4@monyet.cc 11 months ago
If we encourage more people to buy EVs, it could actually make traffic worse. To tackle our traffic jam problem & reduce pollution, we should be concentrating on creating a top-notch public transportation system that everyone can rely on.
- Abe Lim on EV
the subsidies are supposed to sway buyers to switch from ICEs to EVs. in other words, it’s not going to put extra wheels on the road and further cause traffic jam issue. Car sales in Malaysia is extremely low on a per capita basis compared to say Australia, Japan and Taiwan actually. Traffic jam issue has a lot to do with town planning + poor driving etiquette + lack of enforcement.
If the gov pumps up the EV industry with subsidies, it might not be a solid plan. Ideally, new ideas should stand on their own two feet in the marketplace. When things rely solely on government support, we can get into hot water. The demand might not last when the support dries up, causing job losses and economic troubles.
let’s just say if i’m an a economics lecturer i would put this question in my exam and ask my students to justify this statement on subsidies with economic principles they have learnt over the past semester.
rakyat@monyet.cc 11 months ago
I’m all for increasing public transport but sometimes people make it seem like cars and public transport have to be either/or and neglecting that decent public transport is very concentrated in the KV and building infrastructure takes massive amounts of time & money.
DerpyPoint@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Why can’t people be car optional even in other cities. Yes the federal govt doubled down on funding the Penang LRT yet RapidKuantan and Terengganu buses are a huge embarrassment.
dukeGR4@monyet.cc 11 months ago
Also, the government tax regular cars so much anyway and removed practically all competitions to protect those AP cronies anyway. what is a bit of subsidies going to hurt the governments coffers in the grand scheme of things.
The subsidies is possibly also a challenge to the status quo (AP cronies), effectively rendering the importation of EVs financially non-viable for consumers and reduce AP cronies’ influence on the automotive market. We have seen how Anwar was willing to waive Tesla’s tax, effectively killing Teslas brought in through the AP system.
Essentially the subsidies would improve competition within the sector which is better for consumers in the long run. She used vague terms like “solid plan” and “hot water” but did not consider that it is very much a political and social issue and is something far greater than an urban-dweller’s first world problem such as traffic jam.