Car marketing is the worst. Buy this car and you can have a beautiful wife, healthy and happy children, a nice house in the suburbs, people fawning over you and empty roads to drive on.
So if they don’t need a larger car they shouldn’t have them?
Small cars are available, even in the US, but most people aren’t interested in buying them. There are lots of reasons for that. Unless you plan to get draconian about it, people would need a reason to favor small cars.
Cannot read the article but the abstract does not make any of your claims. From personal experience I've only seen people on the internet saying they don't want cars, if they had been any significant majority I am sure I've met one or two in real life over the years.
Why car manufacturers don't advertise to the "necessary" buyers at all? A new Kia Rio is still cheaper than a used MB GLS.
Some people buy don't buy a small car because they might need to haul a sofa around town once a year. Other people don't buy a car with limited range because they might need to drive more than 4 hours without a long break once a year.
You don't actually need it, but if you can be convinced you need it or want it, then you'll pay more for it. Most people don't buy cars based purely on practicality. They buy the car for the lifestyle they wish they had.
The marketing maybe a challenge though. "Imagine being stuck in traffic every day, and now you can spend that time working while your car watches the road" does not really make one want to buy a car?
I'm not sure why it's a surprise that people buy cars because of the image they project. That's been true from the beginning, and for more than about transportation.
People factor a lot of things into major purchase decisions, and it's really not a big deal to refuse to purchase a vehicle from one or more car companies. Some people will only buy a Honda, for example.
Personally, I don't want to fund Elon Musk's culture war bullshit. I don't like being lied to (FSD, and vehicle reported range). And I don't like their doing away with all of the instruments in favor of voice control and a single display.
I don't think any manufacturer or buyer would tell you that's one of the problems they are trying to solve. People buy cars for status, comfort, fun, and convenience. A distant notion of a carless world that most people can't imagine is never going to get any traction in the United States if it's positioned as an alternative to cars.
Aside from those whose livelihood depends on car sales, who have an obvious incentive not to believe it, why is it so hard to believe that people might simply not want to own a car? The whole tone of this article seems like: It appears that millennials don't want to own cars, but that can't be right, can it? If I could get away with not owning one, I certainly would. As it is, I spend as little time in it as possible (much preferring to bike).
Why is your target market "people who already have cars" and not "people who don't have cars and have a much higher likelihood of being on the lookout for one"?
Most people don't ride off the road, yet they get themselves rugged downhill bicycles with crazy big wheels in the city. Other people buy SUVs, in the city, where a smaller vehicle might have a ton of advantages.
This is all in a certain sense irrational behaviour, but in another sense it is more about the feeling. People like to buy things that they can imagine them helping in all life situations.
A car is not a small investment for many and if you have the choice between one that perfectly serves 95% of your trips and might suck at the rest and another that serves 100%, but the 95% are slightly worse/inefficient/expensive, that is a choice one can make. In certain circumstances it could even be the rational choice. E.g. if the charging infrastructure where you live isn't there.
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