For some time now, President Joe Biden has been trying to push his Build Back Better bill through Congress, a piece of legislature that aims to invest a substantial amount of money in infrastructure, including rolling out a round of new EV incentives to replace the long-running $7,500 federal tax credit. While BBB doesn’t look likely to pass the Senate at this time, Ford CEO Jim Farley and a handful of other executives are currently at the White House discussing a variety of BBB-related topics, including its proposed EV incentives, which Farley calls “mission-critical for the EV industry,” according to Yahoo Finance.
“If we don’t get our act together, we’ll be behind as a country,” Farley said. “It’s not just about helping consumers make this transition. All the battery production, all the jobs, the raw material development in our country, all the intellectual property. We were the number one employer in the United States in the auto sector. We want these American jobs, these innovative technology jobs to come to America. This bill and the incentives for consumers will absolutely be the key thing to help us do that. We need to be competitive as a country.”
Biden’s proposal in the BBB bill aims to increase the current EV tax credit from $7,500 to as much as $12,500 for union-built electric vehicles, while also introducing a $4,000 credit for used EVs and make companies like Tesla and GM – which have surpassed the current 200,000 EVs sold cap for the existing tax credit – eligible once again. BBB also calls for a 30 percent commercial EV credit and $3.5 billion to convert existing facilities for the production of EVs. While BBB passed the U.S. House of Representatives last year, it died in the Senate amid concerns over its high cost and potential to drive inflation even higher.
Meanwhile, Farley and Ford aren’t resting on any laurels when it comes to investing heavily in EVs and battery production. On the heels of selling a record number of electrified vehicles last month, Farley – who was recently recognized as MotorTrend‘s Person of the Year and landed on the Bloomberg 50 list – announced that Ford plans to double its annual EV production by 2024, while also scaling Ford Mustang Mach-E production up to 200,000 units per year by 2023 and boosting Ford F-150 Lightning production to 150,000 units per year by 2025.
We’ll have more on these proposed EV incentives soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for 24/7 Ford news coverage.
Comments
Of course he and other corporate execs are in favor of it. They know they will need to bribe people to buy these things (EV’s). Makes it easy to support when it’s other peoples (taxpayers) money.
Handing out money the government does not have is not a wise move. Why should taxpayers subsidize people who have higher incomes that can afford the EV, while most can’t? Four percent of US sales are EV. The average EV buyer has a household income of over 100K. The median household income is about 67k. In a free market EV should be sold based on their own merits and not with bribes from the government.
I’m wondering if you same whiners got all umbragey when Congress and Former Guy gave away your tax money to millionaires/billionaires so their own taxes could disappear. Or billions in tax credits to Exxon-Mobil so they could buy back their stock. Or the trillion dollars of our tax money handed out to big businesses in 2020 with—-as specifically stated by Former Guy—-“no oversight”, which they then used to buy private jets (you listening, Joel Osteen?). Lots of examples. Too many examples. Greed and corruption ruled those people.
I’m fine with common, everyday patriots getting the benefit of tax incentives to buy electric vehicles. EVs are the future of personal automobiles. I have every intention of buying one at the point my 2011 F-150 needs a pleasant retirement.
But your sky ain’t falling just yet, Chickens Little; our fossil fueled vehicles will live to see another day. Your arguments against electric vehicles, however, are on life support.
Ford/Lincoln apparently weren’t interested in rebates for their PHEVs in New York State because the 2021 and 2022 Lincoln Corsair GT (PHEV) vehicles are not on the list of vehicles eligible for the NYSERDA’s “Drive Clean Vehicle” program $500 rebate. Ford/Lincoln senior management need to do something about this because NY State won’t add the Corsair PHEV on their own. I note that all of the foreign manufacturers got all of their PHEVs onto the list. The Corsair GT which is made in Louisville Kentucky (USA) is not!