Classic Vehicle Channel
Published 15 May 2020A lovely documentary telling the story of the development of the London transport system from 1914 to 1939 — The heyday of London Transport. This film features awesome archive footage of buses, trams and London street scenes from the time. It’s one of a number of episodes this one featuring London’s transport system.
I’ve cut out the LWT adverts but I have left two in that I think you’ll love!
This film was broadcast by London Weekend Television in 1984 and later by CH4.
Written, Directed & Narrated by Gavin Weightman
October 29, 2025
The Making Of Modern London – The Heyday of London Transport 1914 – 1939
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October 17, 2025
Stellantis took the bribe, left Canada anyway
The former American Motors plant in Brampton, now owned by Stellantis, was supposed to be the manufacturing site for a new Jeep vehicle. The federal government under Justin Trudeau handed about $15 billion to Stellantis to build an EV battery complex in Windsor, Ontario. It was apparently just assumed that this meant that Stellantis would keep the Brampton facility open and operating, but that assumption was faulty:
Stellantis has announced they’re leaving Brampton. That’s it. End of story.
Three thousand workers. Gone. A manufacturing base gutted. A city thrown into economic chaos. And a federal government left holding a $15 billion bag it handed over like a drunk tourist at a rigged poker table.
The Jeep Compass — the very vehicle they promised would anchor Ontario’s role in the so-called “EV transition” — will no longer be built in Canada. Production is moving to Belvidere, Illinois. The same company that cashed billions of your tax dollars under the banner of “green jobs” and “economic transformation” has slammed the door and walked out. And no, this isn’t a surprise. This was baked into the cake from day one.
Let’s rewind.
In April 2023, under Justin Trudeau’s government, Chrystia Freeland — then Finance Minister — and François-Philippe Champagne, the Industry Minister, announced what they called a “historic” agreement: a multi-billion-dollar subsidy package to Stellantis and LG Energy Solution to build an EV battery plant in Windsor, Ontario.
It was sold as a turning point. The future. A Green Revolution. Thousands of jobs. A new industrial strategy for Canada. But in reality? It was a Hail Mary pass by a government that had already crippled Canada’s energy sector and needed a shiny new narrative heading into an election cycle.
And here’s what they didn’t tell you: the deal had no enforceable commitment to keep auto production in Brampton. There were performance-based incentives — yes — but only for the battery plant. Not for the Brampton assembly line. Not for the existing workforce. And certainly not for ensuring the long-term health of Canada’s domestic auto industry.
They tied this country’s future to a globalist fantasy. A fantasy that assumed the United States would remain under the control of climate-obsessed technocrats like Joe Biden. A fantasy that required a compliant America pushing carbon neutrality, electric vehicle mandates, and billions in matching subsidies for green infrastructure.
But in November 2024, Americans said no.
Donald Trump was elected president. And just as he promised, he tore Biden’s green agenda to shreds. He pulled out of the Paris Climate Accord — again. He dismantled the EV mandates. He unleashed American oil and gas. But he didn’t stop there. Trump imposed a sweeping America First manufacturing policy, pairing 25% tariffs on imported goods with aggressive incentives to bring factories, jobs, and supply chains back onto U.S. soil.
And, as Conservative deputy leader Melissa Lantsman points out, it’s just the beginning:
You probably heard the news by now: Stellantis is cancelling its opening of a Jeep factory planned in Brampton, taking over 3,000 jobs and USD $600 million of investment out of Canada and moving it to the U.S.
This is the latest development in the growing trend of companies scaling back their operations in our country and choosing instead to grow in the US. Whisky maker Diageo found its name in the headlines last month when they announced they’d move their Crown Royal bottling facility south. GM laid off or cut down shifts for 750 autoworkers in Oshawa and 900 in Ingersoll while sending $4 billion to the U.S. Those are the ones that drew the headlines.
Why is this happening? Well – the reason on everyone’s mind right now is tariffs. And it’s true – tariffs are having a big impact on the Canadian economy and on our trading relationships. But there are other, deeper reasons at play, too.
Companies don’t just make decisions on a whim – especially those related to long-run production and fixed investments totalling hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars. Those decisions are made as part of detailed, multi-year analyses that take into account predicted economic conditions, market forces, and many other factors. A massive move of your production facility isn’t a temporary, six-month decision to be trifled over – it’s a permanent thing and that means they aren’t coming back.
The objective is to decrease uncertainty, cut costs, increase production, etc. etc. all to work in favour of any company’s ultimate goal, which is, of course, to make money.
So let me translate what all these investment and job cuts really mean: they’re not a knee-jerk reaction to the tariffs, although those play a part. They’re a statement about the long-term trajectory of the Canadian economy and the kind of climate that a decade of Liberal government has built for businesses in this country.
If these companies thought the U.S. tariffs would be transitory, a six-month blip, an economic fad – then they’d have no reason to cancel factories that will be producing goods for 20 or 30 years. That wouldn’t make financial sense.
[…]
If things get worse, the government might resort to its favourite strategy of just offering more hand-outs for businesses to try and entice them to stay here, but that only works for so long. That Stellantis plant in Brampton? The one that’s moving to the U.S.? The Ontario government promised them over $500 million just a few years ago – and the feds followed.
Turns out, you can promise to cut somebody a giant cheque and it’s still unprofitable for them to do business here.
As I mentioned, the continued trade uncertainty doesn’t help our situation, and the Prime Minister’s failure to get a deal is costing us big-time – especially as he promises to drive a trillion dollars of investment southbound at the expense of our workers here.
But as long as the Liberals keep the same old approach towards economics and business in this country, as long as the Liberals keep the taxes high, the productivity low, and the red tape piled up high — expect to see more headlines like the one about Stellantis, not fewer.
How many more job losses will it take for our leaders to realize that?
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September 13, 2025
“It was about control before green policy became popular, and it is about control now”
In the National Post, Carson Jerema identifies the common thread among all of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s efforts since becoming Liberal party leader:
Then-Governor of the Bank of Canada Mark Carney at the 2012 Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
WEF photo via Wikimedia Commons.
Prime Minister Mark Carney may not be as obnoxiously progressive as Justin Trudeau, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t stubbornly left wing in his own right, though he has managed to convince many critics otherwise.
Over the past decade, the Liberals were particularly self-righteous over climate policy, so much so that the deviations made by Carney since assuming office have been met with praise — or, on the left, with scorn — that he is somehow pro-business and represents the return of the centre-right Liberals. Some even think he’s a conservative. Others have suggested that Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is now entirely redundant.
This narrative is just more proof of how utterly captured the media is in this country by the Liberal party. It is true that Carney gives the appearance that he is abandoning many of the government’s environmental policies. He set the carbon tax rate to zero, paused the EV mandate and, on Thursday, he refused to endorse his government’s own carbon-emissions targets.
None of this, however, should be taken as evidence that Carney represents some sort of rightward or pro-business shift in the Liberal party. He is not proposing to let markets determine what infrastructure projects get built. Nor is he proposing to minimize regulations to attract investment.
Instead, Carney wants to command the economy by himself, laying bare the reality that what attracts left-wing politicians to climate policy is not saving the planet from carbon, but using environmental objectives to manage the economy. It was about control before green policy became popular, and it is about control now. For Carney specifically, before he entered politics, “decarbonizing” markets was quite remunerative in his various banking roles.
Noticeably absent from the five infrastructure projects that the prime minister said on Thursday would be fast-tracked under the Major Projects Office was an oil and gas pipeline. Also noticeable was the fact that all five of the projects had already been approved, but the government tried to pass them off as something new anyway.
Even if the projects had been all brand new, the lack of a pipeline would still be of no surprise, as what private investor would be willing to back a pipeline when the Liberals’ Impact Assessment Act, tanker ban and emissions cap all exist to conspire against energy projects of any kind?
One thing that became incredibly obvious early in Justin Trudeau’s premiership was that the prime minister — and his ministers in general — really did seem to believe that talking about doing something was as effective in solving problems as actually doing the thing. Many had hoped that Mark Carney would be different … but as Dan Knight points out, he may actually be worse:
From there, [Poilievre] broadened the attack. He spoke of an entire generation priced out of homeownership, of immigration growing “three times faster than housing and jobs”, of crime rising, and of what he called “the worst economy in the G7”. And then he turned squarely on Carney: “Mr. Carney is actually more irresponsible than even Justin Trudeau was“, citing an 8% increase in government spending, 37% more for consultants, and 62 billion dollars in lost investment — the largest outflow in Canadian history, according to the National Bank.
The message was simple: Liberals talk, Conservatives build. Poilievre painted Carney as a man of speeches and promises, not results. “The mistake the media is making is they’re judging him by his words rather than his deeds“, he said.
It was an opening statement designed less to introduce policy — those details came later — and more to frame the battle. For Poilievre, Carney isn’t just Trudeau’s replacement. He’s Trudeau’s sequel, and in some ways worse.
[…]
Pierre Poilievre didn’t hold back when asked about Mark Carney’s record. His words: “Mr. Carney is actually more irresponsible than even Justin Trudeau was“. That’s not a throwaway line, he backed it with numbers.
According to Poilievre, Carney inherited what he called a “morbidly obese government” from Trudeau and made it worse: 8% bigger overall, 37% more for consultants, and 6% more bureaucracy. He says Carney’s deficit is set to be even larger than Trudeau’s.
Then the jobs number: 86,000 more unemployed people under Carney than under Trudeau. That, Poilievre argued, is the real measure, not the polished speeches Carney gives. His line: “The mistake the media is making is they’re judging him by his words rather than his deeds“.
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September 4, 2025
Net Zero targets and Britain’s ever-declining car industry
At the Foundation for Economic Education, Jake Scott charts the decline of the British auto manufacturing centres and the government’s allegiance to its Net Zero programs:
Custom image by FEE
Britain was once a giant of car manufacturing. In the 1950s, we were the second-largest producer in the world and the biggest exporter. Coventry, Birmingham, and Oxford built not just cars, but the reputation of an industrial nation; to this day, it is a source of great pride that Jaguar–Land Rover, a global automotive icon, still stands between Coventry and Birmingham. By the 1970s, we were producing more than 1.6 million vehicles a year.
Today? We have fallen back to 1950s levels. Last year, Britain built fewer than half our peak output—800,000 cars, and the lowest outside the pandemic since 1954. Half a year later, by mid-2025, production has slumped a further 12%. The country that once led the automotive revolution is now struggling to stay afloat, and fighting to remain relevant.
This is why the news that BMW will end car production at Oxford’s Mini plant, shifting work to China, is so damning, bringing this decline into sharp focus. The Mini is not only a classic British car; Alec Issigonis’s original design made it an international icon. For decades, the Mini has been the bridge between British design flair and foreign investment. Its departure leaves 1,500 jobs at risk at a time when the government is desperate to fuel growth and convince a wavering consumer market that there is no tension between industrial production and Net Zero goals.
It’s a bitter reminder that we in Britain have been here before: letting an industrial crown jewel slip away.
The usual explanations will be offered: global competition, exchange rates, supply chains. All true, in the midst of a global trade war that is heating up and damaging major British exports. But such a diagnosis is incomplete. The truth is that Britain’s car industry is being squeezed by a mix of geopolitical realignment and government missteps.
The car industry has become the frontline of a new trade war. Washington has already moved aggressively to shield its own firms: the Inflation Reduction Act offers vast subsidies for US-made EVs and batteries, an unapologetic attempt to onshore production, and something that became a flashpoint of tension in Trump’s negotiation with the EU in the latest trade deal. On the production side, the Act has poured billions into US manufacturing: investment in EV and battery plants hit around $11 billion per quarter in 2024.
Ripples have been sent across the world in the US’s wake: Europe, faced with a flood of cheap Chinese EVs, has imposed tariffs of up to 35% after an anti-subsidy investigation. Talks have even turned to a system of minimum import prices instead of tariffs. Unsurprisingly, China has threatened retaliation against European luxury marques, while experts warn the tariffs may slow the EU’s green transition by raising prices.
This is no longer a free market: cars are treated as strategic assets, the 21st-century equivalent of shipbuilding or steel. Whoever controls the supply chains, particularly for EV batteries and the mining of lithium, controls not only the future of the industry but an important lever of national power.
The results are visible. In July 2025, Tesla’s UK sales collapsed nearly 60%, while Chinese giant BYD’s deliveries quadrupled. Europe responded by talking up new tariffs. Britain did nothing. In this asymmetric contest, our market risks becoming a showroom for foreign producers — subsidizing both sides of the trade war without defending our own.
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July 7, 2025
The federal government’s EV mandate cannot stand
Following its established pattern, the Canadian government will seek any possible path other than economic reality, especially when it comes to things like mandating that all vehicles sold in Canada must be EVs by 2035:
Nissan Leaf electric vehicle charging.
Photo by Nissan UK
It’s not always the unexpected that gets governments in trouble — often enough it’s their own bad judgement, poor timing or general clumsiness that gets in the way. But the unanticipated does happen a lot.
Parties and politicians put time and effort into concocting a set of policies aimed at winning votes by proposing remedies to problems identified as occupying top rungs of current voter concern. If they’re lucky they get elected, presumably intending to put those policies into effect at the earliest opportunity. Then the world shifts and pulls the rug from under them.
Former prime minister Justin Trudeau was a big fan of the attention-getting promise. Especially if it was a pledge timed well into the future when he was unlikely to still be around to be held responsible. Carbon reductions too ambitious to be realistic. Budget targets too unlikely to be believed. Statist planning projects that tended increasingly to the surreal.
Mark Carney is left with the detritus and the problem of what to do about it. As prime minister he’s already acted on a few of the problematic leftovers, ditching the carbon tax even though he’d previously supported it as a good idea; scrapping an increased tax on capital gains although the Treasury could certainly use the money; “caving,” as the Trump administration so tastefully put it, on a digital services tax that was a bad idea to begin with but pushed through by the Trudeau government anyway.
There’s an argument to be made, and not a bad one, that each retreat was the right move for the moment. And if there are mistakes that need abandoning, the early days of a new government is proverbially the best time to do it.
But righting wrongs has confronted Carney with a new predicament, in that there are so many Trudeau-era wrongs that need righting. Washington was still in the midst of its victory dance over its digital tax triumph when Canada’s auto industry came along to plead for similar treatment from Ottawa, insisting automakers couldn’t possibly meet previously-set electric vehicle targets and urging the new Liberal government to backtrack post haste.
Carney hosted the session with Canada’s chief executives for Ford, Stellantis and General Motors. Brian Kingston, chief executive of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers Association, was blunt in identifying the targets set for electric vehicle (EV) production as the main topic.
“The EV mandate itself is not sustainable. The targets that have been established cannot be met,” he said on arriving for the meeting. Afterwards he told Politico‘s online news site, “At a time when the industry is under immense pressure, the damaging and redundant ZEV mandate must be urgently removed”.
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June 13, 2025
QotD: The Subaru BRAT
Imagine, if you can, a truck with factory-mounted seats in the bed — and spotlights the size of a 747’s landing lights mounted on its T-topped roof.
If you know this truck, you also know why it’s no longer available.
Such fun things are no longer allowed.
They are not saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafe! “Moms” are “concerned”!
But in 1977, the Safety Cult — which ended such fun things — was still a backwater aberration, like dancing with rattlesnakes — and most people still esteemed fun over fear. There were roofless Broncos and K5 Blazers — and cars with beds.
You could buy all kinds of different stuff back when America was still a fairly free country — and the Subaru BRAT was as different as it got.
BRAT — all caps — was short for Bi-Drive Recreational All-Terrain Transporter. It was superficially similar to other small import pickups of the ’70s, such as the Datsun 620 and similar models from Toyota (SR5), Mazda (B210), and Chevy (via Isuzu) Luv.
But unlike them, it was a four seater — with two of the four in the bed, facing the other way. The seats were made of all-weather plastic and far from the most comfortable — but the view was spectacular. Watching the world recede as you progressed is another one of many freedoms denied today in the name of “safety”.
Subaru wasn’t “unconcerned” about “safety”. Grab handles — to keep passengers from bouncing out of the bed — were included. Though holding onto them made it harder to reach for a cold one in the cooler. That was another fun thing people did in pickups back in the day — before the Safety Cult put the kibosh on that, too.
The seats were actually a dodge — of a federal fatwa known as the “chicken tax”, which was a retaliatory tariff of 25 percent applied to import-brand pickups manufactured outside the United States as tit-for-tat for tariffs applied by foreign countries to American chicken exported outside the United States.
The “chicken tax” hit trucks with just two seats — at the time almost exclusively the small import models, which didn’t offer the extended and crew cab configurations that are commonplace today.
By adding the extra seats in the bed, BRAT qualified as a passenger vehicle rather than a “light truck”, and thus Subaru evaded the chicken tax on a happy technicality — and was also able to sell the BRAT for less than two-seater rivals that had the cost of the tax folded into their MSRP.
Eric Peters, “Doomed: Subaru BRAT (1977-87)”, The American Spectator, 2020-04-26.
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April 28, 2025
Unintended consequences of vehicle mileage regulation
On the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, Sheel Mohnot explains the amazing unintended consequences of another “great idea with the best possible intentions”:
Ever wonder why sedans disappeared and every car is huge now?
“Thanks, Obama!”
His administration changed fuel economy standards in a way that had the perverse impact of making cars even bigger.
Here are all the vehicles for sale by the 3 largest US automakers. 62 vehicles, 4 sedans (6%). 20 years ago this chart would have been ~50% sedans!
What happened?
Obama administration changed auto fuel efficiency rules to tie fuel economy targets to vehicle size.
Under the new system:
-The bigger the car’s footprint, the easier the MPG target was.
-Light trucks (including SUVs and crossovers) had far lower requirements than passenger cars.
-Crossovers were quietly reclassified as “trucks,” giving them a huge regulatory advantage.Instead of building lighter, more efficient cars, automakers simply made everything bigger, and made more trucks and SUVs.
Notice that cars that used to be sedans are now crossovers? They do this so it counts as a light truck – they raise ground clearance, square off the rear for cargo capacity, and meet off-road approach minimums so they get qualified as a light truck. Think Subaru Legacy > Subaru Outback.
As you can see in the chart, it’s a LOT easier to meet MPG requirements if your vehicle is classified that way.
So cars got LARGER to meet fuel efficiency goals. The new Honda Civic is 20 inches longer and 4 inches wider than it used to be, about the same size as an old Accord. By making the Civic larger, Honda slightly shifted it into a more favorable regulatory category.
… and smaller cars disappeared. The Honda Fit was a great little car, but would have had to hit 67 MPG in 2026, which would be nearly impossible … so instead, Honda stopped selling them.
So, the only way to make small vehicles now is to make them EV’s (Chevy Bolt).
The Slate truck that is all the rage now is only possible because it’s an EV … otherwise its footprint would have demanded an overly onerous MPG target.
So in short – Obama era CAFE standards had the opposite of the desired impact: sedans died, vehicles ballooned in size, and America’s streets turned into an SUV parking lot.
All thanks to a policy that accidentally incentivized bloat instead of efficiency.
Don’t get me started on “cash for clunkers!”
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March 22, 2025
Fundraising is much tougher for Democrats right now … and they’re not coping well
It’s not just Canadian politicians getting driven completely insane by the Bad Orange Man’s antics — he’s even doing it to his domestic opponents in the Democratic party as well:
“REMINDER: It Is Offensive And Possibly Illegal To Photoshop Anything On These Democrats’ Signs That Would Make Them Look Foolish.
The Babylon Bee.
Kansas City Star:
Democrats Suffer Blow Ahead of Senate Elections
It’s a goddamn slide show, but as it might be amusing I shall wade in. The things I do for you people …
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen’s retirement is expected to significantly impact the Democratic Party’s prospects for the upcoming Senate elections, amplifying pressure on Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). The party’s challenges ahead have heightened with the departures of Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI) and Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN). Democrats must regain four seats to reclaim the majority.
It sure looks like the Donks are planning to get clobbered in 2026. Or, more likely, they anticipate a series of bruising primary fights as the old grift-and-grin Democrats are challenged by True Believers, because as HGG has taught us — credit where it’s due — SJWs always double down. Batshit insanity is the hill they’ve chosen to die on — Trump keeps handing them 80/20 issues, and they keep jumping on the 20 with both feet.
CNN’s Chris Cillizza recently noted the Party’s challenges in the upcoming Senate elections. With the need for a net gain of four seats, Cillizza expressed concern over potential financial limitations that may hinder effective campaigning.
Yes. “Financial limitations”. Democrat donors are stupid — if they weren’t, they wouldn’t be Democrats — but even they can see that 80 is way, way bigger than 20.
Oh, and also: It doesn’t help that you’re openly, gleefully endorsing no-shit terrorism against Tesla dealerships — and drivers! — calling for Musk’s assassination, and so on. It’s a bad look in general, and a bad look in particular, because now the guys with the big checkbooks are wondering if that kind of thing won’t happen to them if they get crosswise with the most lunatic members of the lunatic fringe (hint: It will. As the scorpion said to the frog: can’t be ‘elped, mate, it’s me nature).
Cillizza said, “The money that gets spent there playing defense, just to hold Democratic seats, means money that doesn’t get spent playing offense in, let’s say, a state like Ohio, where Democrats are trying to recruit Sherrod Brown, the former senator, to take on John Huston, the appointed Republican senator.”
Yes, a dwindling asset pool forces those kinds of choices. It also doesn’t help that you keep going back to the well like that. One assumes there’s a reason Sherrod Brown is a former senator. Do you have no one else?
Haha, just kidding, obviously you don’t have anyone else. That’s one of the biggest problems with gerontocracy — the Groovy Fossils are going to have to be carried out at room temperature, so anyone with anything on the ball has been giving Government a pass since the 1980s. Trump went around the Official GOP for lots of reasons, but not the least of them was: he had to. They have the same gerontocracy problem as the other side of the Uniparty. It’s turtles all the way down.
Cillizza concluded, “I just do not see it. I don’t see the money there. I don’t see the energy there. I don’t see the candidates there to expand the playing field”.
It won’t be for lack of trying, though. You’ve still got The Media in your pocket, and they can still do some damage. You’ll never get to the 80 side of those 80/20 issues, but you might get it to 50/50 — as has been done with abortion, gay “marriage”, and so on. On the other hand, those took 40, 50 years, and The Media hadn’t totally pissed away all its credibility back then. It’s a real corner you’ve backed yourselves into,
guysgalspersyns.It also doesn’t help that you’re stupid:
Democrats have identified potential pickup opportunities in Maine and North Carolina, targeting Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC).
Holy breakdancing Buddha, why would you target them? Thom Tillis is the very definition of “RINO”; Collins is a Leftist, full stop. The next time they vote against the Democrats on any issue of substance will be the first time they’ve ever done it. It’s as predictable as sunrise, so much so that it’s a joke to anyone right of Mao — the GOP officially has X number of seats, minus Collins and Murkowski.
Vulnerabilities among current incumbents, especially Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), have added to the party’s challenges.
Oh, don’t worry about it — the GOP will find some way to throw it. Georgia, Georgia … hey, what’s Herschel Walker up to these days? Think he’s up for another run? Why not parachute in Alan Keyes or Ben Carson? They’re still alive, right? What about “Nikki” “Haley”? She’s gotta keep her arm loose for the 2028 primaries …
Some Democrats have remained optimistic despite the hurdles. Discussions have included potential candidates such as Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) and State Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-MI) for key races. New Hampshire Democrats have prepared for competitive primaries, with Rep. Chris Pappas (D-NH) considering a bid for Shaheen’s seat.
As we know, when it comes to crime 13 does 50. When it comes to Leftism, though, it’s more like 20 does 100, and there’s no better illustration than New Hampshire. It should be the reddest state in the union, and people who live there tell me it really is… except for their Congresscritters, because the good people of New Hampshire didn’t shoot every Masshole they could catch. The fine folks in Oregon, Colorado, and (soon enough) Texas know what I mean — y’all didn’t introduce migrating Californians to wood chippers when you had the chance.
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February 25, 2025
Argentina’s experience of life with high tariffs
Marcos Falcone explains how Argentina’s unusually high tariff barriers distort ordinary economic activity for Argentines every day:
When Argentines go abroad, they usually go shopping. Many of the products they want cannot be bought at home, ranging from clothes to smartphones and all kinds of home appliances. Because of this, it has become a tradition to return from a trip with one or two extra suitcases filled with smuggled goods. Did you know that it is more expensive to buy an outdated iPhone in Argentina than it is to fly from Buenos Aires to Miami, stay for three days, and get the newest one?
[…]
Tariffs do not just make it difficult to get phones at home — they can make life dangerous as well. Argentina’s most sold car, which is artificially expensive because of protectionist measures, got 0 (zero) stars on one of Latin America’s most renowned safety tests. Cars in Argentina are not only more expensive than elsewhere in the region, but also markedly less safe.
To achieve these terrible results, the only thing Argentina had to do was enact tariffs, and now the US seems to be heading in the same direction. But in the past, protectionism has caused the same damage in the north as it caused in the south. Back in the first Trump administration, protecting the steel-production industry saved some jobs, but eliminated many more. Tariffs have also hurt businesses that rely on imports within the US and can continue to do so in a world of globally integrated supply chains. More generally, the 1933 Buy American Act, which forces the government to pay more for US-made goods, has been proven to be both ineffective and costly.
There is no escaping the negative effects of blocking outside competition. The more barriers a country enacts, the more damage it causes to itself. If we, as individuals, acted in a protectionist way, we should aim to grow our own food, build our own house, or make our own cars. But how does that make any sense? Economist Robert Solow once said, “I have a chronic deficit with my barber, who doesn’t buy a darned thing from me”. He meant it as a joke, but he had a point: What matters is to create wealth, which can be done both by selling and buying from others.
The revival of protectionism in the US is worrisome. To avoid it, Americans should take a look at the enormous destruction of wealth that tariffs have caused in other countries. Despite President Milei’s recent efforts to lift tariffs and take Argentina out of the “prison” in which it exists, the fact that the country shot itself in the foot decades ago has put it in a very delicate economic position. The US should not follow its path.
February 12, 2025
Electric vehicles and cold Canadian weather
The Canadian government has been a noisy proponent for Canadians replacing their internal combustion vehicles with electric-powered alternatives, but unlike places like California it gets cold in Canada … very cold indeed at times. The CAA conducted some tests on popular EVs to find out how typical cold conditions impact the range of the cars:
Nissan Leaf electric vehicle charging.
Photo by Nissan UK
CAA is out with the results from their first ever road tests of how electric vehicles (EV) charge and perform in a Canadian winter.
They tested out 14 electric vehicles which included seven of the top 10 sellers in Canada. They were driven from Ottawa to Mont Tremblant and the temperatures during the drive ranged from -7 to -15 degrees Celsius.
Each vehicle was driven until the battery completely died to determine the range in winter conditions. The results were compared to the estimated driving range published by Natural Resources Canada. CAA says officially posted EV ranges (below) in Canada are based on overall, year-round numbers.
“CAA is responding to a top concern of Canadians when it comes to EVs,” said Ian Jack, vice-president, public affairs, CAA National. “We measured the effective range of electric vehicles in cold weather and how quickly they charge. These insights are critical for both current EV owners and those considering making the switch.”
The association says a recent poll revealed more than two-thirds of Canadians say the drop in driving range during winter is the top barrier to purchasing an EV. Out of those who own an EV, 65 per cent said they experienced a lower battery range in extreme cold weather.
The rest results showed the vehicles drove 14 to 39 per cent less than their official range.
“The vast difference in results really highlights the importance in truth and advertising when it comes to EV range and making sure that Canadians are comparing numbers when it comes to winter performance,” said Kristine D’Arbelles, Senior Director of Public Affairs for CAA National.
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December 12, 2024
CHEVROLET with Cartoonist Rube Goldberg: Something for Nothing (1940)
Charlie Dean Archives
Published Aug 27, 2013Cartoonist Rube Goldberg creates a little animation to explain how fuel is converted to power in the modern automobile engine.
CharlieDeanArchives – Archive footage from the 20th century making history come alive!
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December 5, 2024
Look at Life – The City’s for Living In (1968)
Classic Vehicle Channel
Published Apr 19, 2020Traffic was still an issue in the 60’s. Residents discuss how they can divert to traffic from the city. This film features great archive of city traffic in the late 60s
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November 30, 2024
QotD: Unrealized promises of a “Great Society”
Amity Shlaes, Great Society: A New History, 2020.
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October 14, 2024
QotD: Americans and their cars
Severian, “Cars, Bikes, Motorcycles”, Rotten Chestnuts, 2021-07-25.
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October 7, 2024
The demographic impact of modern cities
Lorenzo Warby touches on some of the social and demographic issues that David Friedman discussed the other day:
US Birth Rates from 1909-2008. The number of births per thousand people in the United States. The red segment is known as the Baby Boomer period. The drop in 1970 is due to excluding births to non-residents.
Graph by Saiarcot895 via Wikimedia Commons
Cities are demographic sinks. That is, cities have higher death rates than fertility rates.
For much of human history, cities have been unhealthy places to live. This is no longer true: cities have higher average life expectancies than rural areas. But they are still demographic sinks, for cities collapse fertility rates.
The problem is not that more women have no children, or only one child, making it to adulthood. Such women have always existed, though their share of the population has gone up across recent decades.
The key problem is the collapse in the demographic “tail” of large families. Cities are profoundly antipathetic to large families, and have always been so. This is particularly true of apartment cities — suburbs are somewhat more amenable to large families, though not enough to make up for the urbanisation effect.
While modern cities do not have slaves and household servants who were blocked from reproducing as ancient cities did, various aspects of modern technology have fertility-suppressing effects. Cars that presume a maximum of three children, for instance. An effect that is worsened by compulsory baby car-seats. Or ticketing and accommodation that presumes two children or less. There is also the deep problems of modern online dating. Plus the effects that endocrine disrupters and falling testosterone may be having.
These effects also extend to rural populations: falling fertility in rural populations is far more of a mystery than falling fertility in urban populations. How much declining metabolic health plays in all this is unclear. Indeed, futurist Samo Burja is correct, we do not really understand the “social technology” of human breeding.
Be that as it may, cities as demographic sinks is a continuation of patterns that go back to the first cities.
Matters at the margin
There are factors at the margin known to make a difference. Religious folk breed more than secular folk, though that is in part because rural people are more religious and city folk more secular.
Educating women reduces fertility. This is, in part, an urbanisation effect, as more education is available in cities. It is also an opportunity cost effect — there is more to do in cities, both paid and unpaid.
Education increases the general opportunity cost of motherhood, by expanding women’s opportunities. This also makes moving to cities more attractive. Women having more career opportunities reduces the relative attractiveness of men as marriage partners, reducing the marriage rate.
Strong cultural barriers against children outside marriage can reduce the fertility rate, by largely restricting motherhood to married women. This makes the fertility rate more dependant on the marriage rate.
Educating women makes children more expensive, as educated mothers have educated children. Part of the patterns that economist Gary Becker analysed.
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