Do you own an EV and work in a STEM type of job sector

No STEM heads in this house, but 3 EVs and into them for a long time (former petrol head). I do like technology and very keen on renewable energies / battery storage.

Power System Consultant Engineer and EV owner

@crisco10 - "I loved planning our summer holiday and "charging strategy"

Shoulda got a Tesla. No need for any planning for charging 😂 The car is wasted on me, I almost never need to publicly fast charge.

Yep, the region we were in was the same. Closest SUC in any direction was an hour away. Granted the drive down thru france might have been easier to plan, but ionity and SUC had similar coverage on that route.

Own a BEV but don't work in STEM

1-2 EV household (currently 1, havent replaced the Ioniq yet, may not replace for some time).

Both employed in tech.

It stands to reason because you need relatively well paid people to afford EVs.

Not true. Changing from your existing ICE to an EV is a lot more expensive than changing from ICE to ICE. The majority of people changing cars are not buying new cars either. If changing to an EV they probably are going with a new car. Its an expensive change.

I work in STEM, other half doesnt and we have an EV and an ICE. We both drive whichever one fits our trip on the day.

You dont get it do you :) Gone off on a tangent.

Take a step back and look what the thread is about, now ask yourself, how many people do you see driving EVs from lower paid soci economic grooups compared to how many of them drive ICEs. It really is one of the most obvious things if you open your eyes.

Would STEM jobs be on the higher end of the salary scale? Yes they would, by a long way. Now put the two together. Doesnt matter about anyones opinion on how expensive it is to run an ICE or an EV. Its the barrier to entry that is relevant to this thread.

Your argument doesn't stack. Cost is not the only barrier to entry. Fear, ignorance, lack of supply, unsuitable for (insert reason here), I could go on. On cost, you don't need to be wealthy to own an EV. I wasn't an Engineer and didn't work in STEM. My earnings were quite low at the time actually, but I saw the bigger picture and took a stretch to buy a 3 year old Leaf 24 from the UK. Cost around 14k. Added a bargain 5 year old Leaf 24 a couple of months later for 5k. Sold our petrol cars for around 3k. In 5 years of ownership, both cars had tyres and wiper blades replaced. Brake pads on one car. Saved hundreds per month on fuel and around 1k per year on tax.

My FIL is a pensioner. He drives the older Leaf I sold him. My MIL drives a Leaf 24 nearly 4 years now. Not exactly a wealthy woman.....stay at home mom. My SIL works in a restaurant and drives a Leaf 30. She is just above minimum wage. Her hubby is a chef...doesn't drive. I know several EV owners in regular non tech and not high paid. I also know a sh¹t load of engineers and trades people, none of them drive EVs. A couple of them laughed at me when I said the repayment on my Model 3 was 800 a month. Crazy money they said. They only pay around 400-500 for their 3 year old Golf/Octavia or whatever else. But they also spend an average of €100 a week on petrol or diesel. They didn't laugh after the penny dropped.

Now....consider the repayment for something like a Leaf 40 is 500 per month and fuel cost would be less than 100 per month. The sums start to make sense and that's before we talk about second hand EVs.

Not in STEM (accountant). I drive a Leaf because the numbers stack up.

Software engineer. Wife is a real engineer. One EV, one petrol.

Driving EVs 8 years now. Relatively early adoption on my part.

Gas thing is you could have kept the leaf 24 for the 10 years and sold it today for the same as you bought it!

10 years ago you couldn't finance a packet of peanuts unless you had the money in savings to back it up. Nowadays, even a person in a low paid position can afford an entry level EV if they can afford an ICE. The caveat is that their fuel spend should roughly match their repayments. Anyone doing over 300klms per week should easily meet that threshold.

A 3 year old Leaf can be picked up for €25k or less with repayments of about €400pm. If someone is spending €100 a week on fuel, it's a no brainer. Fair enough if someone wants to spend a few grand cash on a bangernomics car, but it's a false economy most of the time and a lack of understanding of TCO.