I really don’t believe this is so much about tires, as it is about ghetto rims. It’s not unusual where I live to see what
appears to be a $500 car with 2 grand worth of rims. Used tires can still be picked up fairly cheaply.
DING DING DING DING we have a winner.
When I was I kid, I used to ride the Lake Street El trains down into the loop and back for fun (25¢).
As the train passed through the poorer areas, you could stare into the tenement living rooms. They all had color TVs, which were not the default, and not cheap, at that time.
Later, I had the experience of driving through northern New Hampshire and Vermont. It was startling, passing by trailer-housed subsistence farmers and noting the satellite dishes in the backfrontyards, next to the clotheslines.
>>I really don’t believe this is so much about tires, as it is about ghetto rims.
I work in the red zone in my town and there are at least three wheel and tire rental stores there. They don’t have anything under 20’s on display outside and the cars in the parking lot are exactly what you describe: the $500 POS cars with $2k worth of tires on them (and a $5000 paint job on several of them).
Yep. I have bought sets of good used tires for less than the first month's rent.