With computers, it's largely a perception problem. It used to be true, that newer computers were a lot more powerful than computers that were only a few years old. Most people with even an older I7 would see a massive improvement in perceived speed my replacing the hard disk with an SSD, or just replacing MS-Windoze with a real operating system.
When I build a new computer, I fully expect to use it for a decade. In the past, I might end up upgrading to a bigger disk, but these days, I don't even have to do that. A modern CPU has boatloads more raw computing power then the average person will ever use. Heck, I've got 16 cores on mine and the only time I really max out the CPU is when I rip DVDs, so I can copy the file to my media player. It really is cool seeing my load average go to 11 or 12, but that really doesn't happen much.
With electric cars, the batteries really do degrade over time even if they are not used much. So while the comparison might have once been true, it is not so much anymore.
>Heck, I’ve got 16 cores on mine and the only time I really max out the CPU is when I rip DVDs,
You’re clearly not the target market for the latest CPUs and GPUs. My kid is running a 3xxx processor and 760 GPU both circle 2014, which is more than enough to run the games she likes. Also, as per my statement above, it’s not like I could sell the parts to someone and get enough money to make the selling worth the trouble, much less to build her a better one. It’ll run until it doesn’t.
Talk to the guys running games on triple 4k monitors or 5k VR sets, or the PCs sitting on cloud server farms. That’s why I made the comparison; really EVs are like cutting-edge home computer tech in that they’re for specific use cases or bragging rights.
The problem comes when government (stop the sentence there, it’s perfect).
The problem for EVs comes when government and business collude to try and force developing tech on everyone. Imagine Brandon teaming up with Zuck to mandate that everyone buy a 4080-class GPU and Ryzen 9 or Intel 14xxx processor because Everyone Must Have VR By Mandate In Five Years. Of course Five Years from now those things will be outdated and outclassed and unsellable albeit usable in the same way a 150-mile range used EV still works if you already own it, but you can’t pawn it off on anyone.