At the IAA, Volkswagen presented its new entry-level model for the age of electric cars that is just beginning.
This is of paramount importance because it shows what is in store for buyers, for society.
VW boss Herbert Diess has recently started moving across the country with the message that running an electric car will soon be cheaper than running a model with a combustion engine.
But at first the signs show something else. The compact car, later named ID.2 or ID.1, is expected to hit the market in 2025. A purchase price range between 20,000 and 25,000 euros is announced. Either the manufacturer has got used to the sweet poison of the subsidy and pricing in the state subsidy in favor of its own margin. Then the purchase price would be reduced by 6,000 to 9,000 euros, and it would reach tolerable regions for customers - and be proof of the distorting effect of subsidies. Or the manufacturing costs will really still be that high in four years' time. From the industry it is said that Moore's law does not apply here so far. The production of a drive train with a battery is currently around four times as expensive as that with a combustion engine. A halving is to be expected in ten years,then the battery drive would be twice as expensive.
But because politics is making the internal combustion engine more and more expensive in all its facets, costs, and probably prices too, will converge over time. Just at a higher level. A VW Up with a petrol engine is now available from 14,000 euros, a Polo from 16,000 euros. In France, not so long ago, people took to the streets wearing yellow vests because of a ten-cent increase in gasoline prices.