No problem at all. To the contrary, this is good for the adoption of EV’s. There are very many people who would like to go electric but cannot afford it. Now they will.
Peter wrote:
If you had to buy a petrol or diesel car to last next 20 years, what would you get?
Toyota anytime.
Petrol or diesel is a tough one. In the long rund diesel would probably be the safer option, as it won’t go away anytime soon (trucks, airplanes, heatings). Currently Diesel has disadvantages (artificially higher pricing, restricted access to some places particularly in Germany).
If it’s a new car by Toyota, it will almost certainly be hybrid at least. Those things are petrol AFAIK but use few enough that even a £4 / liter pricing is still not a total deal breaker.
Peter wrote:
I don’t know to what extent the drop in used values is due to the drop in new EV prices. But obviously all the time new prices are falling (are they falling?) there will be this problem.
Yes, new EV prices are falling. Used car values follow.
With high interest rates, people can’t afford the monthly payments and get priced out of the new car market. Manufacturers reduce prices to get the cars out of the door. I bought a new EV in June. The same spec car today is 20% less.
Peter wrote:
Diesel is needed for trucks and there is no solution for that, not even remotely. So diesel cars have an assured future.
You may want to read this article. Pepsi trucks drive 1200km per day using 750kW chargers.
https://insideevs.com/news/687256/tesla-pepsico-covers-1600-miles-48-hours/
LeSving wrote:
Instead we got a Dacia Duster 4×4Lots of those on Iceland. We met them everywhere, also on roads you will normally use a dedicated off road type, like a Land Cruiser or similar. They cannot be all that bad, and they look kind of cool as well.
White Dacia Duster comprises more than half of all rental cars you meet in Iceland. Surprisingly capable car (we took ours to all kinds of places including Askja, with no problems). In its size class there was/is nothing better for the Iceland highlands kind of driving (the Japanese were more comfortable and powerful, but less ground clearance/worse angles). Land Cruiser and such priced 2.5x as much were the next level of capability – we deemed that an unnecessary overkill and indeed Duster did just fine. Iceland highlands driving is one place where EV’s will have problems…
Well, while we are promoting the Duster, might as well add my positive experience, also in Iceland. 
The only awkward thing is the name, as it means ‘bathrobe’. Well, car manufacturers have made bigger mistakes.
aart wrote:
The only awkward thing is the name, as it means ‘bathrobe
It’s an odd choice for a name, for sure. It doesn’t mean anything in French but it’s awkward to pronounce since it doesn’t follow the pattern of any French word.
There was also the 1970s Plymouth Duster – a truly awful car, the first I ever drove in the US in 1976. I only drove it for a day because it lost all its coolant in that time (if it ever had any – it was brand new).
It means bathrobe? That is interesting. I associated it with something which either “Dusts off” something or is designed to work in areas with lots of dust, e.g. deserts and offroad places.
It seems to be a really capable car. Neighbours got one (7 seat version) for their large family and they are happy with it. They had to wait over a year to get it though after the order. Interesting that we are almost back to the situation where you wait for cars for multiple months, not unlike when you used to order a “Trabant” in the DDR (there it took some years though until you got it).
Mooney_Driver wrote:
Interesting that we are almost back to the situation where you wait for cars for multiple months, not unlike when you used to order a “Trabant” in the DDR (there it took some years though until you got it).
This is hopefully very tongue-in-cheek – the reality was a lot worse.
You had the choice of TWO domestic cars, Trabant and Wartburg, the latter cost twice as much so for most it was the Trabant. It took 10-15 years on the waiting list to get one. A two-stroak plastic car. In the 80s. You could get it much quicker if you were a party boss or a colonel in the army, or if you managed to pay for it in western currency.
Arounf 80% of the cars on the road were domestic – Imports were few and far in between, nobody wanted Ostmark and any hard currency (including Rubles at the time) available was used more strateically. But you could in theory buy Ladas ans Skodas, or funnily enough a Dacia 1300 from Romania, but given currency constraints the volumes actually imported were small so you also had to wait…
Socialism/communism was economically a lot worse than many people these days realise. @Peter can relate…
You also had to be a Comm Party member, go to the meetings, and at the right time stand up and clap. My parents were not in the Party (you can tell I inherited their views 
) so no car, ever. A B&W TV arrived after some years.
Peter, what year did you leave Czechoslovakia?
The oldest times I remember is mid 70’s …
My experiences are from Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia, not East Germany.
You could see Skoda, Lada/Ziguli, Moskvich, Trabant & Wartburg, Polski Fiat, in Bulgaria also Zaporozhec. Add Dacia in 80’s.
Volgas (in Bulgaria) and Tatrach (in Czechoslovakia) were for factory directors and (secret?) police, driver included.
Very, very few western cars, nothing newish.
The waiting list was more like a year to three, not 10-15 years. The price (Skoda) was something like 3 years of average net salary for Skoda … an anecdote from 80’s: “(Father to daughter): We bought the car, don’t thing about a wedding, we can’t afford that now.”
Indeed, things were much worse then (and not only the quality of the cars…) … but the world is trying hard to get back to where the Eastern Block was 40-50 years ago (censorship (including a lot of self-censorship), pervasive surveilance, overbearing state control, hardship for normal people, and yes, even waiting times for cars).
