History often repeats, hence the saying.
About 50 years ago, gas became scarce and expensive. Average people found – very suddenly – they could no longer afford to drive the huge, V8-powered cars that were once the typical car driven by average Americans. If you weren’t there to see it, you might not believe it. Try to imagine a world in which owning a car larger – much larger – than a current Mercedes S-Class that had a V8 much larger than the little six the current S-Class comes standard with – was not just possible for working class Americans but also common. Just as it was common, once, for working class people to live in single family homes.
They – the large cars – were everywhere. It was a world in which the guy in the Mercedes just had a more expensive car – as opposed to the world today, in which every car is expensive.
Anyhow, what happened to the large cars that were once as common as sneakers, almost? Well, gas got scarce and expensive. There were gas lines – and gas shortages. Those large cars with their big V8s got maybe 15 MPG – so the need for expensive gas was constant as well as expensive. It very quickly became too expensive for working and middle class Americans to afford to drive their large cars and so they traded them in for smaller cars – typically imports from Japan. The traded-in large cars sat on used car lots; it was very difficult to sell them at any price because no matter how cheaply they could be bought, there was no getting around what it cost to fuel them. The new car market for large cars with V8s collapsed. This happened very quickly and the change in the new car landscape from circa 1974 to circa 1984 was dramatic. By the early ’80s, there were just a relative handful of large cars with V8s that were mass-market cars. Most had been replaced by much smaller cars with V6 and even four cylinder engines. The handful of larger cars with V8s that remained were smaller than their analogs of just a few years prior and they came with much smaller V8s.
Today, such cars are essentially extinct – unless you have more than $100,000 to spend on one. They have become For The Rich Only.
Will SUVs soon be the same?
Arguably, they already are – since it takes around $50,000 on the low end to get into one (crossovers are available for less, but they are basically medium-small cars styled to look like SUVs). That’s for one of the smaller ones – a Toyota 4Runner, for instance. The ones that are equivalent in size to the large cars ordinary Americans used to commonly drive – and that have V8 engines like those large cars had – are closer to $60k to start. That alone has been causing ordinary Americans to shy away from them. But it is the cost of fueling them that may well mean the end of them – as other than For The Rich Only vehicles.
Like an atomic blast, it takes awhile for the shock wave to be felt. It is only about four months into this stupid, evil war that Trump decided to launch and it is only about two months since gas prices got not just uncomfortably high but unsustainably high. It is annoying to have to pay 50 cents more for a gallon of gas because a reckless, arrogant man decided to launch a war for no good reason. It is unsustainable when it costs twice as much to fill up – and we’re now very close to that point. The cost of gas averaged about $2.80 around Christmas – just a little more than four months ago. It is currently – as of May 19 – about $4.50 per gallon.
A little more than four months ago, it only cost about $60 to put 22 gallons of regular unleaded in a large, V8-powered SUV such as a Chevy Tahoe. It currently costs about $100 to fill the same tank. If we have not arrived at the point of unsustainability, we’re surely close to it. Its too early to know exactly how soon the bottom will fall out but it is inevitable that it’s going to fall out. The used car lots will fill up with large SUVs with V8 engines – the fire-sale prices notwithstanding because (again) even if it is affordable to buy one, most people still won;t be able to (or want to) feed one.
Then the market for new ones will collapse – and when it does, it will probably result in the collapse of several vehicle manufacturers that have become completely dependent on the profits made selling large SUVs (as well as large trucks).
There is another historical aspect to all of this – an ironic one. The main reason SUVs became mass-market vehicles was due to the extinction of the large cars caused not just be gas shortages and gas lines but also by the gas mileage regs imposed by the federal government in response to those gas lines and gas shortages. These accelerated the transition from large cars with V8 engines to small cars with four cylinder engines but they also triggered the rise of the SUV, because the regs were different for SUVs. They were unpunished (via less onerous “gas guzzler” fines) than large cars were, so the manufacturers started building SUVs as mass market vehicles beginning in the early-mid 1990s, by which time gas prices had gone down again. So people could afford to drive “gas hogs” again.
Just differently styled.
Anyhow, here we are – again. What will arise from the ashes? Probably nothing – because that’s been the long-term goal all along.
. . .
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this “war” would hav been launched no matter what was in power.
See Brian berletic at land destroyer and or new atlas website. He lays out the plan, “which path to persia” written by one of americas ruling classes many think tanks, the brookings institute if i remember correctly. Also dont forget after 911 inside job, the plan to attack 7 countries in middle east.
All these plans by our globalist rulers hav multiple objectives.
think great reset, murder on vast scale/depopulation , greater israel/U.S. project, trying to stop Chinas rise etc.
“It’s like deja vu all over again”-Yogi Berra
The CAFE timeline shows what’s up for our future,.
Just like in the 70’s, and i remember well, the gas prices will double, people will squeal but the transition will be to electric and hybrids, not small cars, like the 70’s, and cheap fuel eventually again, like with “Ray-gun”.
Inflation will make fuel seem “cheaper” but it probably won’t go back down appreciable, so like South Africa, fuel will be $6-10/gallon.
Our (((overlords))) in FEDGOV don’t have that in our future. Yup, 15 minute cities and by 2040 eventually total societal breakdown.
Oy Vey!!! YMMV….
Well maybe we go from here to all EV’s, then 2 seater EV’s, then 7 minute cities with no cars and then finally to full depopulation. Everything is leading to knocking 6-7 billion people off of Gates’s home planet. Once the digital prisons are fully opened and filled, a retarded A/i data center will have full control over your life…especially whether you are allowed to live or you are murdered to save Gate’s and the billionaire’s home planet. Without you knowing it, your approval or any voting for it, you are giving up massive amounts of personal info to the data-anti-privacy thugs. They are going to use it to destroy you.
Just dropped a rebuilt 5.7 in my 98 Tahoe. New tires, brakes, and shocks. Runs and drives like new. Cost me 10 grand. I hope to dive it for another 20 years, or until they take my license away. I call it my $100,000 Tahoe because even with repairs over the last 25 years that’s how much I’ve saved. Made it possible to pay off my house. If gas goes to $8-9 per gallon, I will probably have to cut back on trips, but I’m not giving up on my money saver for a few more miles per gallon and a car payment.
Well-said, Ron –
Yesterday, I helped a buddy put the rear end of his old Tahoe back together; similar deal. That said, I do think new SUV sales are going to crater if gas prices remain where they are, let alone go up. This will do wonders for the prices of used ones!
You mean a 350 Vortec, not some kind of communist denominated power plant, right? Nice job. That 96-99 Chevy is the pinnacle from GM.
Pickup trucks and large SUVs account for
nearly 90% or more of the North American profits
for both Ford and General Motors
high gasoline prices for the past 2.75 months
should boost the sales of small and mid-size hybrid SUV’s
[…] https://www.ericpetersautos.com/2026/05/19/peak-suv/ […]
I don’t see the suv going away at all just going to hybrid like Toyota is doing mpg is almost as good as a car the new RAV4 is around 43mpg the Camry is 48mpg so close enough for most people and sedan are over priced like the rest of car and SUV is usually more useful but I miss the real suv days body on frame v8 an v6 .
‘Regulations triggered the rise of the SUV, because the regs were different for SUVs.’ — eric
I object in principle to the US mf-ing fedgov defining categories of vehicles such as SUVs, crossovers, sedans and light trucks, then writing different regs for them. How dare they?
Imagine if the US fedgov defined three classes of consumer electronics — desktops, tablets, and smartphones — and then wrote regs specifying their dimensions, power consumption, battery size, memory capacity,
crashdrop resistance, and so forth … and also prohibited nonconforming devices.Innovation in consumer electronics would go dark overnight.
Most us became interested in cars when they were a freeish market, with a broad choice of engines, body configurations and features. Now cars are a government-defined, Soviet-style regulated market — dull as dishwater, and featuring offensive, intrusive, anti-consumer nanny tech that no customer asked for.
I don’t give a shit about these over-teched, airbag-bedecked appliances. I don’t shop for new cars and never intend to own one. I would like to see all auto makers worldwide, starting with Volkswagen, bankrupted and liquidated.
“Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate,” Mellon told Hoover. “It will purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down. People will work harder, live a more moral life. Values will be adjusted, and enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people.” — Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon, 1929
Smash the state.
I worked with a guy who drove a sexy new HEMI Dodge Ram in the early 2000’s who sold his truck when gas jumped from $1.20 to $1.60 a gallon. LOL
Our animal brains are prone to react irrationally, with short term stupidity at the slightest hint of uncomfortable stimuli.
They understand this and exploit it successfully.
One thing about Americans is that they are terrible at math.
A big SUV at fire sale prices? Ita a deal. Even at $6/gallon you fuel costs are $3600 a year. So people take a massive hit selling the Tahoe (~20mpg) then what buy a $50,000 Tesla or say a smaller car that gets you 30mpg saves you $1600 a year. They already lost 5 years of savings trading in the tank, then $36,000 plus tax, tag etc on a smaller more efficient car. Situations vary of course, was the tank paid off, if not how much underwater are you, etc. But I can see almost no situation where this is a smart financial decision. We are talking probably a 10-12 year payback or more.
How about a no-gas EV. Yeah well that new data center will triple your electric rates added to the dizzying depreciation of the EV and you are spending dollars to save nickles.
Oh and your new car spies on you too. Rolling stop at that remote intersection at 2am? Uh oh, your insurance company just got an email about that.
I live in Florida and the number of older cars on the road is higher than I have ever seen.
I have 3 vehicles the newest is a 2018 VW Atlas that still does an average of 25mpg with the non turbo V6 and two 2014’s a Mercedes E350 Cabrio and a 2014 Cayenne Diesel. These three vehicles should last me pretty much forever and there is no way I’ll voluntarily get rid of any of them. Yeah Diesel is high but the high mpg makes it still better to drive trips than the petrol cars.
I try to teach this often Alex. Baffles me. I guess these owners couldn’t or shouldn’t have afforded these high dollar rigs in the first place? Time to buy, or soon.
I am/was in the market for a big SUV, but the 75-85K+ was crazy to me. They are dropping now. $5K, $10K off new. I’ll take a gamble and wait a little longer.
I picked up a 24 grand cherokee when stellantis was in a little trouble, when they put $15K off on them.
I’d rather take a CPO or a clean lease return than a new. Frankly the new cars to me are hideous. Between the saaafety and the regulations the new cars are polluted with crap no one but the most retarded Karen would want.
Then those idiotic looking giant screens, we all know about those. Plus the Spyware embedded in them. No thanks.
Off-topic, but I just heard that Massie lost.
Trump people: You’re all a bunch of FUCKING SLAVES!
I can’t believe it either BaDnOn, America is done, thanks to the cult of Treasonous Trump
I watched Massie’s concession speech, and he was much more positive than I’ve been with the news.
He did make some wise-cracks, including something like “I finally got a hold of Ed Gallrein (his opponent) to concede, but he was a little hard to find in Tel Aviv.”.
‘[Gallrein] was a little hard to find in Tel Aviv.’ — BaDnOn
He’ll be even harder to find next year, on the traditional
pilgrimagejunket to Israel that all but a handful of freshman Congress Clowns are obliged to undertake, and then undergo the degrading, wall-kissing hazing ritual.“To learn who rules over you, simply
find outstart ‘noticing’ who you are not allowed to criticize.” — VoltaireOT: the talmudic oligarchy ousted Thomas Massie. Sad day for all of us in the remnant of the constitutional republic.
Ah, C’mon, Eric. We’ve been around long enough to see the high gas price thing play-out quite a few times in our lives; and it’s always the same: Gas goes up….everyone’s dumping their big vehicles at fire-sale prices and buying little rice-burners- including brand new ones…to save a few bucks at the pump.
And then the price of gas goes down again, and people are suddenly jettisoning the rice-burners and buying Hummers again.
Me? I’ll just keep driving what I’ve always driven. I minimize my need to drive anyway; so when I do, I want to enjoy it, and be able to do the things I need to do in one trip. So if that trip costs me $10 at $2.50/gal or $20 at $5.00/gal….in the scheme of things, even to a cheap, low-income Fred Mertz like me, it doesn’t matter. It certainly doesn’t matter enough to cause me to ditch my big 4×4’s at fire-sale prices to buy some freaking Geo or Prius.
Doing the math, there is no payback or ROI is changing vehicles to save a few bucks at the pump. The transition costs are too high.
The positive side is you can get some great deals on sone very nice used cars.
Exactly, Alex. I use times like these to keep an eye out for good deals on old trucks and real (i.e. truck based) SUVs, to keep for the future or to flip when the gas prices go back down. (Of course, I’m not going to be doing that this time, because I’m going to go look at some old sailboats….. Can’t stand to live among this nonsense anymore; not to mention what is coming when all of these data centers get online)
Got my 2013 Genesis with a 335hp V6. gets close to 30 on highway and around 24 around town. Quiet, comfortable, powerful. No LCD screen and no spyware. If gas goes to $6 or $7 a gallon still not an issue.
No way I would every buy a new one.
Old sailboats are cheap to buy, but can be very sturdy and seaworthy. I have a 26 footer built in 1975. Solid as a brick. Market value under $5000 with a trailer. I call it my “escape hatch” if all goes crazy on land. My wife and I could easily live aboard for an extended time. Even if that never happens, it is low cost recreation.
Why the Mitsu Mirage may be a lifesaver in one chart:
https://mirageforum.com/imgs/graph-speed-mpg-mirage2.jpg
look at the impressive mpg readings if you hypermile slow
@ 50 mph you can get nearly 60 mpg
I love to drive the back roads @ 42 mph, that puts me at 65 mpg, what this means I can drive wherever I want for cheap
I wonder if I can coast down hill with the engine off, because when you do you are getting infinite mpg
Ai says: “If you are trying to save gas, just take your foot completely off the accelerator while leaving the car in Drive (D). Modern cars use a system called Deceleration Fuel Cut-Off (DFCO). When you coast in gear with your foot off the pedal, the car automatically shuts off fuel delivery to the engine anyway, using the car’s rolling momentum to keep the engine turning over safely.”
“ I love to drive the back roads @ 42 mph, that puts me at 65 mpg, what this means I can drive wherever I want for cheap”
FFS get out of the way and stop screwing up traffic flow while your dumb ass tries to save $0.25 on gas.
Plenty of nice wagons not available in the USA…yet.
Kid just moved on from an Outback to a hybrid Camry.
Cars vs the price of gasoline musings.
When gas was 25 cents a gallon I could afford to drive a 1965 truck (8 mpg).
When gas went to a 50 cents a gallon, I could afford to drive a Ford Pinto (25 mpg).
When gas went to a buck a gallon, I was searching the Cleveland Plain Dealer for a used Honda Civic (38mpg), but couldn’t find one. A few years later I found salvation in a 1983ish Dodge Precis that got around 40 mpg – and unlike that Ford Pinto, it started every time.
Each time gas went up, I went looking for a fuel economy car. When gas got to $3, salvation was a Geo Metro (50 mpg).
Never had the money to buy a new car. Learned how to fix old ones. Gas is now $5.20. I am screwed once again. Ain’t nothing out there that will save me this time (except a motobike or bicycle, yes I can walk, but how far? I need 70-100mpg to have the same purchasing parity.
The reality of the situation is that when fuel prices go up, your driving range goes down. With the Orange demon, our ability to travel is being reduced like concentric circles with each dollar increase. How far can you realistically travel from home base if gas is $10?
Trump no care, he is robbing the nation blind, he can afford to drive and fly anything, he is raking in billions and billions. Each week I read the stories of how Trump is fleecing and screwing us – yet he still has 32% approval rating? Who the hell are these people, 32% of 337 million people is over a 100,000,000 million who still approve!
I am seriously thinking of buying an economy car again, this time a Mitsubishi Mirage, the latest version, a 3 cylinder 1.2 liter. I am looking to buy one right now, unfortunately most of them have the CVT, which is out of the question.
What impresses me are these attributes:
it is very light, around 2,000 lbs. I have a 8th generation Civic (2732 lbs), it weighs over 700 lbs more. That is a shit ton of weight, my motorcycle with gear weighs around 300 lbs and I can not pick it up. Math:
Mirage + (2) dual sports XT250’s is still lighter than a 2006 Civic.
(Anyone who wants ultra fuel economy knows you want to eliminate every pound, many mpg freaks even remove the seats and paneling)
(My Civic weighs 1,000 lbs more than my (former) 1992 Geo Metro. A civic mind you!)
The next thing that impresses me about the Mirage is the timing chain, unlike the Metro with the belt which breaks all the time.
Hi Jack,
You might also consider a Versa with the manual; they are pretty solid, get good gas mileage, etc. and are abundant ont he used market.
Yep, looked at them too.
https://www.fuelly.com/car/nissan/versa
those fuelly charts tell you alot about what you will probably get for mpg.
i usually drive 2/3 to the right of the bell curve on any of those charts, which is around 38 mpg, and I am getting around that in my civic
https://www.creators.com/read/eric-peters/02/19/2019-mitsubishi-mirage
your article list MSRP $14k
that means a 2019 should of depreciated by 65% by now (7 years old)
“Current Retail/Private Party Value: A 2019 Mirage in good condition typically sells between $5,300 and $7,600 depending on the trim level.”
I also asked Goolag Ai the useful load capacity of my civic vs a mirage, you will be surprised to find out the Mirage can carry more:
“The 2019 Mitsubishi Mirage 4-door hatchback with a manual transmission (MT) has a curb weight of 2,018 pounds and a GVWR of 2,910 pounds.”
Next thing that needs mentioning, the Mirage is way the hell cheaper than it’s rivals like the Prius C. Since the Mirage is a el cheapo car, the public doesn’t want them.
The Prius is real iffy over 100,000 miles when the hybrid battery goes, and they all go, costing $4500 at the dealer to replace.
The Mirage has the next advantage of being very easy to work on and buy parts. Small car = small tires.
Checking Giga-tire, I can get 4 tires delivered for $166
https://www.barchart.com/stocks/quotes/$TNX/interactive-chart
Interest rates are going up. IMO they will eventually go to the moon, but that may take years or even decades.
As the 10 year and 30 year T-bond rates go up, they will drag short rates up also, thus the way to play it is buy short term T-Bills and hold to maturity and roll over, or buy mutual fund that does that.
As rates go up, gold and stocks could be hit. Gold pays no interest, T-Bills do.
Historically the availability of energy-dense fuel is a small blip on the timeline of human history. We live a wealthier and healthier life than probably 95% or more of the humans who have ever existed. That’s not nothing.
It’s also starting to go away, for a wide variety of reasons.
Imagine a perfect libertarian world, with no wars, no aggression, no monopolies or cartels, no ideologues pushing their various insane agendas, limited small governments, no purple-haired nose-ringed Karens, etc., just normal people going freely about their business. How long would that world last?
I can imagine that world. A world without supremacists and government goons.
Generations of late typically reject the vehicles their parents drove.
Millennials helped kill the minivan.
Maybe we get lucky and Gen Z destroys these largely pointless crossovers (that should have been wagons or minivans to begin with, but mom wants the look of an off-roader.)
Ponderous handling, garbage acceleration and relatively poor fuel economy make for an awful driving experience.
I’ll continue to stick to what my grandparents drove in the 50s/60s – sedans and regular cab pickups.
Long live the sedan!
Sadly, the price drops won’t trickle down to K5 Blazers.
I saw an interview with the CEO of Volvo where he thinks there will be a shift away from SUVs. He said they plan on bringing back more wagons as he feels that the US market in particular has gone too far towards an almost all SUV fleet. That would be a great trend if it happens.
Second that Klink, I would love a small wagon for the versatility, especially the few times I need to haul something that won’t fit in the trunk of my car.
See 1990 era Chev Celebrity wagon. My father-in-law had one, just the right size for the older guy to tool around. Good visibility too, reasonable belt line height it wasn’t like sitting in a bath tub.
V6, automatic, cruise, a/c and decent seats. He, the dog, and his golf clubs loved it.
There is hope. Our 22 year-old grandson has a 2003 Mazda Protege’ 5, station wagon. 2.0 Liter, 5-speed with a sunroof. He loves it and promises to keep it for as long as he can get parts for it. It doesn’t hurt that he learned to drive in a Miata and had his SCCA competition license before he could get his NC learners permit. Yes, I’m bragging on him.
Cars also used to be like fashion, with significant styling changes every year. That ended with the 7 year auto-mortgage and ever increasing compliance costs. Shifting from the big boats to Pintos and Chevettes wasn’t too difficult for most people because two years from now it’d be starting to rust and run rough. But today’s cars that can run for 10 years or more you need to play a long game, and that requires stable fuel prices. I know I need to fill up twice a week for my longish commute. How much that’s going to cost is the wild card. Can I get an econobox that I hate to save money? Sure, but then when the next administration plays nice with Iran and oil prices plummet due to over supply, then I’m stuck with 3 more years of payments and a worthless vehicle since everyone’s back on SUVs and trucks again.