The New York Times says car dealers are actively subverting peoples’ attempts to buy electric cars, even when they really want them. One reason they cite is that electric cars need less service like oil changes, and dealerships actually make a lot more money from service than from sales. This may be a rational explanation. But part of the explanation may also be that people can get sucked into longstanding institutional cultures even when they are highly irrational. I face this quite often in my work, and I have faced it around the world – groups of people can be incredibly motivated to defend the status quo, even in the face of incontrovertible evidence that there are better ways, and even when the people in question are young, intellgient, well-educated and well-intentioned. Sometimes the facts just do not matter. I don’t have the answer to this, if you do please let me know.