Tariffs, corporate timidity driving US automakers into a ditch: Bloomberg

WASHINGTON - The United States seems to be giving up on electric vehicles (EVs), as tariffs and corporate timidity are causing "an astonishing loss of nerve" in the country, "whose capitalist hunger once created the modern auto industry," Bloomberg has reported.

"Cosy within a market protected by distance and tariffs, and fearful of the wrenching shifts required by both electrification and Chinese competition, many executives would like to believe the whole energy transition thing was just a bad dream," said Bloomberg columnist David Fickling in an opinion piece on Saturday.

US President Joe Biden is reportedly planning to raise tariffs on Chinese clean tech, and the centerpiece will be a quadrupling of levies on EVs to 100 percent, Fickling quoted The Wall Street Journal as saying in the article titled "Tariffs and timidity are driving US automakers into a ditch."

Meanwhile, US carmaking giants are confronting serious challenges in their development of EVs. For example, Ford Motors is reducing orders from battery suppliers as part of a plan to trim its spending on EVs by $12 billion, according to Fickling.

Likewise, General Motors has missed its electrification targets for two years running, while Tesla is cutting 10 percent of its workforce and disbanding a Supercharger team that the United States is relying on to provide refueling options on the go, said the author, citing public reports.

"Like birds on isolated islands, America's carmakers are evolving to suit an oddly congenial environment -- one where they can grow big and bloated in the absence of competition from hungry rivals. Gradually, they'll lose the ability to fly," he noted.

"Consumers who'd like to get their hands on affordable, clean and innovative cars will be the ones to lose out," Fickling added.