You’re overthinking it.

Fuel consumption correlates strongly (on average) with income. Simply take the tax collected and hand it back out as a flat per-capita (of working age) refundable tax credit.  Problem solved.  As long as you use less gas than average, your credit will exceed your tax paid.  Since this is the…

Except you can get a damned good similar sized vehicle for under $25k. That $40k+ is still a hefty premium over cars for the masses.

I’m actually amazed on some of the sets -kids got spoiled this year and some of the Harry Potter stuff does an admirable job of avoiding special pieces. The Saturn V rocket is similarly very, very well done in sticking with generic parts.

The newer city stuff, though, is generally poor.  To build a decent cityscape of…

I dislike their new airplanes and much of the city stuff. The old methods of building an airplane were limited, but they still resembled an airplane and the bricks were useful for other builds, too. The newer ones are a cheap way of making a simple plastic airplane toy.

That set is still cooler, IMO, than many of these newer cars.

Hell, the Mazda dealer replaced the passenger side bag in our 6 in about 30 minutes.

There’s a reason I avoid the Ford dealership for service.  Everything takes forever.  They charge standard times for their work, but good lord, they can’t schedule anything worth a damn.

My replacement airbag is FINALLY in stock. And I still can’t get it replaced for another 2.5 weeks because the dealer insists on scheduling an entire freaking day to do the job.

Mind you, to do this repair, you have to depower the airbag system, remove the glove compartment, pull two easy to access bolts, unplug the…

If an ICE car catches on fire it’s because it’s been in an accident.

Yeah... sat radio in the Trax was such a savior when driving across remote Montana and all it would do was let you listen to the promo tracks...

So imagine “Can’t Stop the Feelin’” looping for days on end....

shiver...

I don’t doubt its shallow and small - but the pics I’ve seen loaded with luggage look just like what we had to go through with the trax - not really any worse.

But yes, I don’t see the point of these vehicles at all. An Escape has considerably more cargo space (though rear legroom is poor) and hardly costs anything…

And try taking a family vacation through the rockies for 2 weeks with all that luggage crammed into that pathetically tiny vehicle.

I still haven’t forgiven those jerks.  Upgrade, my ass...

The Captiva?  Couldn’t be as bad as the Trax.  Not humanly possible.

I haven’t looked at an EcoSport, but oddly enough, it actually rates as having higher cargo capacity behind the second row than the Trax.

Ugh... I had Enterprise once “upgrade” me from a full size sedan to a Chevy Trax... and the bastards insisted that it was an upgrade and they couldn’t “downgrade” me to something that didn’t suck.

I still am curious to try one just to see if it is worse than a Chevy Trax.  Because for the life of me, I don’t see how that would be possible.

“Taking back control” by shooting yourself in your own foot is exacatly what led to Trump.

I always thought if the US went off the deep end I could call on my British citizenship for a rescue.  Never pondered both countries going bat-shit insane at the same time.

“Taking back control” by shooting yourself in your own foot is exacatly what led to Trump.

I always thought if the US went off the deep end I could call on my British citizenship for a rescue.  Never pondered both countries going bat-shit insane at the same time.

Your argument isn’t proof that we can’t make it work. Your argument is that we often do a half-assed job (or even less than that) and wonder why it doesn’t work.

Half of the top 20 cities in the US for mass transit ridership have less than 1 million in population. 9 out of those 20 are under 320,000.

Milwaukee is 39th…

No one is arguing that you have to build rail/subways everywhere. That’s not all there is to mass transit. And cherry picking the most extreme costs is absurd.

How about this - in Cincinnati, there was a proposal to build a regional light rail system on abandoned lines, combined with commuter rail and realigning buses…

China already WAS at the negotiating table.  All  the shit Trump started got us nowhere.  We’re back where we were on tariffs, with NO new concessions from China.  But we’ve weakened our negotiating position significantly by pissing off our allies who we needed to get to go along with us.  China needs us less now than…