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It probably hasn't escaped your notice that cars have gotten very expensive recently. Almost across the board, automakers have abandoned smaller, cheaper product lines. Then came the pandemic, and then the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Supply chains collapsed, and production lines were idled. New cars became scarce, with huge markups in many cases, causing used car prices to soar. But used electric vehicles have been bucking that trend, according to data from the car-shopping app CoPilot.
As we enter the second half of 2023, many of those logistics and sourcing problems have been overcome, and many automakers have ramped up EV production and increased imports into the US. That increase in inventory is being painted by some as new EVs becoming unsellable; this week, Axios warned of EVs "piling up on dealer lots," for instance.
That piece and quite a few others like it quote data from Cox Automotive about increasing inventory among brands like Genesis and Audi. It blames high purchase prices and a lack of federal tax credit eligibility as problems. Even more affordable EVs are called out—the Ford Mustang Mach-E is described as "once-hot" but now oversupplied, but that's a direct result of Ford heavily ramping up production over the course of 2023.
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