Car manufacturers serve many purposes. Aside from keeping the UAW membership onside, they are a strategic buttress for an emerging future war risk.
Australia maintained subsidies to Ford and GM for onshore production precisely because of this. And they stopped when a strategic realignment made successive governments decide the risk didn't justify the expense. A decision they may now be regretting.
This seems so anachronistic.... When was the last war where tanks were important..?
Car are made using components from all around the world... How would you even make a tank in a Tesla factory?
FWIW, I agree with your general sentiment, though.
Also, I'm pretty sure that the car industry as it is now would fight retooling their factories tooth and nail, move production to other countries and do anything else they can to be able to continue making as much profit as they can.
> so anachronistic
tell that to ruzzia
"Car are made using components from all around the world..." That's part of the problem. Building more here may bring some of the components closer, at least to friendlier countries.
The average Chinese person is very gung ho about invading Taiwan
It's 2025. We're still asking what happens when one group has lots of guns, tanks, fighter jets and missiles, and the other doesn't? Also, there is a difference between stockpiling arms and maintaining the ability to produce them if necessary.
It's similar to the logic behind anti-trust actions against monopolists. If the playing field isn't level, then the USA government steps in to level it.
(Whether BYD is subsidised or not is another question, but the above is the logic of protecting local industry.)
More recently though, it kind of seems like if the playing field isn't tipped strongly towards the US, then the US government will step in to tip it their way.
America has some of the lowest cost of capital and most effective financial markets in human history.
If the Chinese markets are blocked that doesn’t mean the rest of the world is inaccessible.
Another aspect of government subsidies is that they mask incompetence.
It would make no sense to destroy your own industry because it can’t compete with a heavily subsidized foreign industry.
