I have been thinking about this part of your statement for days and think you are being very short sighted on things.
There may actually be things that might not be cost effective to leave out from the companies perspective but you are still paying more to have it in there even if you can’t use it.
Then look at the long term and the cost of said thing, once that company starts actually installing more the demand goes up, the cost goes up. Does the company then start leaving it out? No they simply raise the price of thier product more to cover it even for those not using it to avoid any possible loss.
If anyone thinks they are getting an unusable feature for free hidden in thier car or truck, I have some swamp land and a bunch of bridges I can sell you for very fair prices. Cash only!
Janet
I just have a couple observations to add to this. You are correct on something like an engine or transmission. However, there are other things at play. Economies of scale are a real thing. Lets use a headlight switch in a Ford Mustang as an example. Every automobile has to have a headlight switch.
There were 52,414 Ford Mustangs sold in 2021. So we will assume the same number of headlight switches and that these switches are only used for the mustangs.
There can be multiple options:
1. Manual headlights no fog lights
2. Manual headlights with fog lights
3. Auto headlights no fog lights
4. Auto headlights with fog lights
Automated tooling is very expensive. I would estimate that tooling for each switch *could* be in the $200,000 range, regardless of options.
Assume 80% of the cars use all options. 41,931 cars. $4.77 per switch for tooling.
Assume there is $5 worth of material and labor in each. $9.77 each switch total.
Now assume only 5% use the manual option with no fog light. That makes $76.31 in tooling per switch.
Even if the cost of labor and material was half for this switch, they would still cost Ford $78.81 each.
In this situation it would make more sense to use the "more expensive" all option switch in all vehicles and not enable the software on the lesser ones. But it would probably still be cheaper not to add the fog lights themselves to all cars that don't need them. Not taking into account of economies of scale on the bumper openings for the lights... There are more variables at play for example some of the tooling could probably be used on all 4 options etc. Also the inventory carrying cost of holding 2 options and slowing product turnover. But this illustrates that there is more beneath the surface than some expect.
I never have understood going out of your way to hurt your neighbor, even if you don't get along don't go out of your way to do him harm, some people you just gotta love from a distance.
