Sorry, this just empirically isn't true. Tesla raised supercharging prices 50% overnight without a whimper in my country, while another EV charging chain raised AC rates 100% just because they can. Two years later, neither of them went bankrupt as a result, nor did any competition undercut them
In theory, anyone can open a new charging station. Also, in theory, theory and practice are the same; in practice - they are not. In the real world, economies of scale and supply chain limitations basically guarantee an outcome of oligopolies coalescing into a silent cartel, each of them happily milking their 5-10% margins without any desire to rock the boat.
I don't understand how one can empirically observe this when EVs haven't yet become the dominant vehicle on the road.
Tesla's are rather niche, as a percentage of vehicles on the road it's insignificant. There's not enough demand yet. Tesla drivers are still largely well-heeled early adopters of a luxury brand, of course they're going to be exploited.
It’s not a luxury brand. It is a high tech brand with a few luxury features. I bought a Tesla as a frugal move to save money in the long run, not to spend more, and so far it’s working.
The up front investment is higher but the long term costs are lower. If you think in purely purchase money terms you can trick yourself to think a Yugo or Skoda or Yaris or Leaf etc. is cheaper, but I factor in safety and fun, so my calculation differs.
They can raise prices all they want. Right now, they are just affecting the “rich people who have EVs” and not us “normal people”. I never knew the prices increased and not did I care. Still don’t, actually. But if I was affected, I would probably do something about it because I do care about keeping my costs low.
The way Sweden and Finland admission process unfolded makes a complete mockery of democracy
Rushed, decided behind closed doors, by a small clique of elites, without any semblance of democratic mandate, unconstitutional, no real public debate, no referendum, all in an atmosphere of McCarthy-like media frenzy. Any nuance is instantly brushed aside as Putin's propaganda
The polls put the support at ~52% in Sweden and ~61% in Finland. That means 48% and 39% of the people are neutral or against. This mass of people have no representation in mass media, and no major political party to back them. This void will be filled, probably by some outlier parties, possibly extremists. It's a recipe for a disaster
Only 21% and 12% are against in Sweden and Finland, respectively, vs 57% and 76% who want to join.
I understand your point about fracturing politics on issues like this (we're still paying for "Brexit"), and that 10-20% is a fair chunk of voters, but even then, you've got to be really against it to throw your lot in with an extreme single-policy party. A minority of the minority will be disillusioned or angry about it.
Given that the vast balance of opinion wants to join, joining takes months and can be reversed, and both countries have general elections within the next 12 months, I think democracy will be just fine.
Finland and Sweden are parliamentary democracies. Officials are elected to carry out governmental processes. These people are trusted to serve the interests of the country. Not everything needs to be put to a vote of the people.
And additional interesting bits, both the president have backed joining, and Sweden is joining NATO too:
"A possible Swedish application for Nato membership would raise backing in Finland to 83 percent.
A clear position by the Finnish president and the government backing membership raise support by around the same margin, to 82 percent."
Meaning the support to join is overwhelmingly in majority.
It's done within the constitutional system in Finland and Sweden. The timing and the speed of process is a rational choice while Russian military is choking in Ukraine and is unable pose a serious military threat elsewhere right now. It's a window of opportunity and the wise leadership used it.
It's disingenious to only state the support percentage for polls that also have a significant amount of "don't know / don't care / undecided" answers. And the polls I've seen all had a pretty large amount of responses that were not directly opposed to joining NATO.
The most recent poll I've seen for Finland also has an even higher percentage of support for joining NATO now than your poll.
Not to mention, NATO can't accept any countries with an active border dispute, because it would immediately trigger Article 4. As a result, Russia has an established strategy of taking a slice of any country that considers joining NATO. It worked in both Georgia & Ukraine.
If you don't move quick, you won't move. This is the purpose of representative democracy - to allow trusted leaders to make decisions like this on your behalf.
And if you try to hold a referendum on joining NATO, Russia will be all over it like nobody's business. I'm glad that we decided to not have a referendum and considering how pro-NATO the opinion polling is, I'm not really worried for the death of democracy.
Referenda have always been double-edged swords. They’ve been using by totalitarian populists since at least the Roman republic.
In most representative democracies, treaties have to be approved after the fact but they certainly do not need to be pre-approved before being negotiated. This is not more undemocratic than a spur-of-the-moment referendum.
Trying to remember the last time a military defense treaty went up for referendum, anywhere.
But, if we look at Brexit and how much Russia (apparently) corrupted that vote, I can’t say I’m shocked that either country would choose not to subject themselves to such a process.
There's a general election in Sweden in September. If you are correct then I suppose the outcome of the election will show massive losses for the parties that stand behind this decision and so democracy will win.
In a non-democracy, the dictator decides whatever they what.
These are democracies, and so people elected their representatives, and the representatives decided to join NATO. I lived in Sweden for many years, and it seems like the general population indeed supports it. No law says you have to go a referendum, and it's definitely not against the constitution. The fact it was a quick decision is a actually great IMHO - people often see democracies as slow to respond, and here you have two countries moving a democratic process relatively quickly.
HN to me is a enigma. I see comments on here a lot lamenting simple majorities for presidential elections being a necessary for a “democracy”, and now comments describing simple majorities being un-democractic.
I am not making a comment that either is good or bad, just it seems that what “democracy” means tends to be pretty damned subjective.
> I see comments on here a lot lamenting simple majorities for presidential elections being a necessary for a “democracy”, and now comments describing simple majorities being un-democractic.
It might also be that both sets do not overlap much. Nerds have always had strange opinions about what democracy is.
Dividing the available arable land by global population leaves only a 100x100m plot per person - and that's before barns, silos, houses or warehouses. That's not a whole lot - as a city dweller, I'm confident I'd starve the first winter if not earlier
Modern agriculture is really impressive - farmers manage to feed around 10-20 people from such a plot
It's not really as bad as you suspect. A lot of homesteaders target food self-sufficiency on a quarter acre; while there's some debate [1] over whether that's possible, pessimistic estimates for the amount of space needed to feed a skilled organic gardener's family of 4-6 top out at about an acre. A 100x100m plot is about 2.5 acres.
The bigger problems are a.) skills and b.) labor. Homesteading methods basically require full-time gardening by people who have put significant efforts into maximizing yields, intercropping, planting multiple harvests, growing vertically, etc. The advantage of our mechanized farming system is that we can feed the population with 1.4% of the population.
I was hoping your figure would be wrong and it is, but the situation is actually worse than than. 1.4 billion hectares of arable land divided by 7.9 billion people yields 0.18 hectares per individual, which is actually a 18×100m plot per person, 5 times less than your figure. And that's before conservation areas, wasting arable land to build suburbs, etc. Looking into national figures is interesting, showing that China has less than half than amount, but also shows that something is off with the figures themselves. Extremely arid and sandy Niger has more than 5 times the global average, which doesn't pass the smell test. I was personally shocked by the sheer unsuitability of the land for growing crops in the most fertile regions of that country, much unlike the lush southern areas of Mali for instance. Forested areas don't count as is clearly seen from low-ranking Brunei, which is 98% primary forest with extremely luxurious landscapes. Papua New Guinea is mostly self-sufficient and yet also extremely low, clearly demonstrating that agroforestry systems aren't accounted for at all. I'm sure other absurdities are to be found. Lies, damned lies, and statistics…
That is a super fun fact. Not that it changes the calculus, but I would be curious what percentage of human calories come from water sources (fishing, seaweed, lobster, etc).
IMHO a bigger problem is equating innovation with digitization. In the end, living standards mostly stem from our interactions with the physical world, not digital. After all, rich people buy yachts and mansions, not Adamantium armor++ set
Venture capital ought to have it's hand on the pulse of technology. The most impactful tech of the last 5 years, with massive societal and financial returns, was mRNA vaccines. Yet I've never heard VCs raving about them. As soon it touches physical world, it gets shunned by investors
In theory, anyone can open a new charging station. Also, in theory, theory and practice are the same; in practice - they are not. In the real world, economies of scale and supply chain limitations basically guarantee an outcome of oligopolies coalescing into a silent cartel, each of them happily milking their 5-10% margins without any desire to rock the boat.