this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2023
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Trucks the same size as the right one are the norm in East Asia. Trucks like the left one are basically non-existent. (There are trucks of the same size or bigger here, but they don't waste so much space on the passenger seats.)
We only have large trucks in the USA due to CAFE restrictions. Basically in order to sell a small truck in the USA , it has to have phenomenal gas mileage or the manufacturer has to pay the government fees.
The government is the cause for these stupid large trucks.
There was also a lot of targeted ads that destroyed masculinity if you owned a car. Truck companies were claiming a truck made you more handsome, resourceful, trustworthy and all sorts of other claims that somehow made you a better person for owning a truck.
Which is funny because the opposite law in Japan is what resulted in the tiny truck on the right. They have a class of cars, Kei cars, that are small and very economical. So if a car was too big and wasn't efficient enough they'd have to pay fees... so they went tiny.
This was the actual purpose of CAFE laws, but lobbying from the auto industry carved out exceptions for "light trucks" (meaning not-semi trucks). This exception is also why SUVs, classified as light trucks, have largely replaced wagons.
It's easy to fix, just apply CAFE also to those pickup trucks. Today it's just applied to regular cars
It sounds easy to fix, but reality is the automotive and oil industries have lobbied (bribed) politicians to never do that.
Thanks so much for pointing out the CAFE restrictions. I never knew they existed, and it explains much about the growth of autos in general since 2011.
The kei trucks are also illegal to import in to the U.S., if they're less than 25 years old. "Land of the free," folks.