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US carmakers accuse EU of blocking supersized pick-up trucks from roads, FT reports
(www.reuters.com)
Who cares. They should be blocked.
this post was submitted on 08 Apr 2026
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They can't even sell what is a normal-sized pickup truck for the US in Europe. Because there simply isn't any demand beyond that of a handful of people with severe psychological deficits they try to compensate for.
The infrastructure was there two thousand years before we're not destroying that for a monster truck based wasteland.
. "As demand grows for certain vehicle types not commonly found in the EU, such as large pickup trucks"
There is no growth in demand. They sold 7,000, there were 13 million total car sales in 2025 in the EU. US SUV and large pickup truck sales were barely a rounding error.
β¦and?
Their country. Their rules.
Yeah, historically USA didn't take kindly to that notion.
good. Keep them in US, we donβt need them
We have already too big cars here in Europe..
Yeah, I'm accusing EU of not banning big pickup trucks & giant SUVs enough.
Guilty as charged. What of it?
If true, good.
I don't mind these stupid trucks coming over here, as long as you need a C-license to drive one and if they are limited to 90km/h.
Also, cities have special parking enforcement vehicles that will slice the truck to fit into a parking space at the owners expense.
At least over here theres laws about having your vehicle inside the parking space. If its over the lines, you get a fine. Just need to enforce that, double the fines and the morons who buy these stupid things will finance our cities out of financial problems.
those trucks should be banned on US roads. What's worse, most of them are just glorified grocery getters.
Most of the Dodge Rams just exist to drive under the influence.
They're dangerous and environmentally wasteful.
I'm from the US, fuck US carmakers and these stupid ugly monstrosities. Go live out your lame ass monster truck fantasies in a fucking video game or something.
I see some Ford Ranger Raptors (are they really called that? what a stupid name) in Germany. Those are probably the largest trucks on the road here and they are already way too big for cities, don't fit into any parking spots and so on. Nobody here needs an even larger F-150.
Thank you, EU
Silly auto makers. You have to first capture the whole regulatory body and then you can make demands like that. Not before.
The major reason to sell them is specific to the US market anyway.
European countries adopted protectionist tariffs on chicken back in the 1960s. The US adopted counter-tariffs on light trucks. These counter-tariffs remain in force today. This makes domestically-produced light trucks artificially profitable in the US, which means US automakers have an incentive to advocate for policies (laxer emissions rules, more-stringent towing requirements than in Europe, etc) that encourage consumers to purchase pickups and preferably larger, more-profitable pickups, as it's very hard for foreign automakers to compete in this specific area.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax
The Chicken Tax is a 25 percent tariff on light trucks (and originally on potato starch, dextrin, and brandy) imposed in 1964 by the United States under President Lyndon B. Johnson in response to tariffs placed by France and West Germany on importation of U.S. chicken.[1] The period from 1961 to 1964[2] of tensions and negotiations surrounding the issue was known as the "Chicken War", taking place at the height of Cold War politics.[3]
Eventually, the tariffs on potato starch, dextrin, and brandy were lifted,[4] but since 1964 this form of protectionism has remained in place to give US domestic automakers an advantage over imported competitors.[5] Though concern remains about its repeal,[6][7] a 2003 Cato Institute study called the tariff "a policy in search of a rationale."[4]
It's so obvious that for way way too long the US has gotten away with doing whatever the fuck it wants where ever it wants. It's up to everyone everywhere to stop putting up with the US governments bullshit.