"choosing"
this post was submitted on 20 Jan 2024
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On other news: disabled people are choosing not to walk.
They're choosing not to drive for the same reason they're choosing to be more thrifty, choosing not to go to college, choosing to live with their parents longer, and choosing not to buy homes. See if you can find the common denominator.
Try living in Singapore, where it now costs SGD146,000 (USD106,000) just to have the right to own a car for ten years (a Certificate of Entitlement).
To be clear, that fee doesn’t actually buy you a car, it’s simply the cost of being allowed to own a car. For ten whole years, then you need to buy another one.
“A new standard Toyota Camry Hybrid costs around S$250,000 [~USD186,500] in Singapore, which includes the cost of a COE and taxes. That is about six times more expensive than in the US.”
It’s certainly one way to encourage the public to use mass transit (which is pretty good, luckily!).
Singapores population density is 232 times higher than in USA
I wouldn't use the whole USA, should compare with metro areas
Singapour is also a country reduced to a city, so that certainly makes transportation easier. The US is on the opposite of the spectrum.
But are you really going to claim that a lot of people are commuting from New york to San Francisco daily (or even across one state?)
Singapore is just as big as NYC, and almost as dense. Cross border commuters from Malaysia do exist but are not the norm because it's a big pain.
Also what's true is Singapore might be true in NYC but NYC is not the norm in US, it's the exception.
It's still ridiculuous how car industry friendly zoning laws implemented in the U.S.A are hurting the citizens but people genuinely argue that it's good being stuck in their cars alone for 2 to 3 hours a day.
My family keeps pressuring me to learn how to drive. I still say no, and will keep doing so for the rest of my life basically. I seriously do not wanna contribute to pollution and congestion.
In my country you're expected to know how to drive as early as 15, way before you even get your permit. I say fuck that.
Another gen-z here, yeah I have no interest in something that requires me to pay insurance even if I'm not using it when my ebike gets me everywhere I need to go. Not to mention having way less potential to hurt someone else because of a lapse of attention on the roads. Add on the health and environmental benefits and that I don't pay for electricity in my house so it's free to fuel.
Lots of these comments feel out of touch or just in touch with their own ideals a little too much.
Car insurance is getting super expensive even more so for younger folks. My renewal came in with GEICO and they raised my 6mo premium from $2500 to $3300. So I got a bunch of quotes from different companies all of them were around $3500-$4000 matching the same coverage. It's insane.
My first car cost $900 in the 90's. It was a '91 bronco 2 that had the driver's-side door replaced and spray painted the approximate colors of the rest of the car. Bought it from some dude selling it along the road. My theory is that gen z'ers are just too picky to live like we did "back in the day" so they say they can't afford things like cars when the real problem is that they can't afford the cars they WANT
"Less Gen Z Americans own a driver's license than previous generations"
This isn't about cars they want.
Are they choosing, or can't they afford to own a car with insurance and petrol costs going through the roof?
My son is getting gifted an electric car from a family friend.
He still doesn't really give a shit about getting a license, it's crazy to me.
I think there's also the issue of where do kids have to go hang out anymore?
By and large, malls are dead/dying, and some don't even allow unsupervised kids anymore.
Movies are expensive. Restaurants are expensive. Concerts are expensive (if you're lucky enough to live somewhere with easy access to concert venues, if you're in the suburbs you probably have an uphill battle trying to convince your parents to let you go wandering around the city unsupervised to go to a concert) Arcades basically don't even exist anymore.
They can barely even go hang out in a park without being harassed by some Karen or the cops, and of course parks usually close at dusk and kind of depend on the weather being decent so in many places there's a good chunk of the year where parks are undesirable.
You can hang out at your friends' houses, but depending on your area there's a decent chance that they may be in walking or biking distance so no need for a car, and if you're just going to be hanging around the house, not a big deal for Mom or Dad to drop you off/pick you up, not like you're going to really need a car while you're there, you got nowhere to go anyway. And of course we get some parents these days who are really weird about their kids going over to other people's homes, which leaves staying home and hanging out online.
About the only thing I can think of that I used to do as a kid that might still be accessible for kids and might necessitate them having their own car is to go hang out at the local comic/game shop to play magic, d&d, etc. Because most of them are pretty cool about people just coming to hang out, but even that could really be a "hey parental unit, can I get a ride?" kind of thing.
Plus, if you have a tight group of friends you always hang out with, you may only need a couple drivers. Even going back to when I was a teen/young adult, a lot of my friends didn't have a license and many of them who did didn't have their own car or couldn't count on borrowing their parents' car. I know the core group I hung out with was probably around 6-10 people, and one other guy and I did 99% of our driving whenever we went to do something because we were the ones with cars. Probably up until I was about 23 I spent a lot of time picking friends up and giving them rides places because I had a car and they didn't.