South Dakota’s automotive dealer lobby is trying to keep Tesla out of South Dakota’s market. I should be irate at the car dealers for rigging the market to protect themselves from competition, but if the Republican/Prostrollo lobby is sticking it to Elon Musk, I ought to celebrate, right?
Ah, but I still believe in the fair market, I don’t trust salespeople, and injustice for one, even for Elon Musk, is injustice for all, so I’m going to have to take Tesla’s side.
Tesla sells cars directly to consumers, skipping the costly and complicated business of setting up franchises and farming out sales, service, and customer relations to middlemen. South Dakota and some other states hinder direct-to-consumer car sales with dealer licensing requirements cleverly crafted by the auto dealers lobby to protect the middlemen’s privileged market position. Good capitalists applying for a dealer’s license in South Dakota must certify that they are either franchised by a vehicle manufacturer or are selling used cars. They must certify that they will do business at a physical location where the Department of Revenue can inspect all their books, records, and files and where they have “sufficient space to adequately store all vehicles offered for sale.”
Without franchisees and physical stores, Tesla can’t get a dealer license. Without a dealer license, Tesla can’t even display cars at the mall:
The situation stems from a Tesla informational kiosk that was set up in The Empire Mall that was shut down near the start of October. The group says they were shut down by the South Dakota Department of Revenue (DOR) due to licensed-dealers law.
According to South Dakota codified law 32-6B-87: “A vehicle dealer licensed in this state may lease space in the common area of a shopping mall for the display of new vehicles without a supplemental license if the shopping mall is located within the corporate limits of the municipality where the dealer maintains its principal place of business.”
…Tesla does not operate traditional franchised dealerships. Instead, it owns and runs its stores, galleries and service centers.
Christine Erickson, President of the [South Dakota Auto Dealers Association], said the law was enforced not because of hostility to electric vehicles or innovation, but because all manufacturers — traditional or new — must abide by the same rules.
“These are really done in order to create a level playing field and protect the consumers and to ensure accountability,” Erickson said. “The second largest purchase that anyone makes is a car purchase, and that’s really important to make sure that the system is there to protect the consumer and making sure if there’s an issue with the car, they’ve got a place to fix it” [Michael Doorn, “EV Group Advocating for Change to SD Dealership Law,” KELO-TV, 2025.10.13].
Level the playing field, protect consumers, ensure accountability… that’s lobbyist-speak for make Tesla use the same bloated rent-seeking system that preserves us middlemen’s wealth and power. Wouldn’t good capitalists tell us that competition levels the playing field? Wouldn’t anti-nanny-staters tell us that consumers can protect themselves by making wise choices with their own money about the kind of cars they want to buy and the kind of people they want to buy them from? Wouldn’t free marketeers tell us that the market ensures accountability by allowing information to flow freely right alongside capital so that people will hear quickly if anyone is selling lemons or providing shoddy service and thus stop doing business with bad manufacturers and dealers?
But auto dealers, some of the richest and most influential people in the political scene, need the state to protect their business model.
I’m not rooting for Elon Musk. But suppose some young innovator found a way to 3-D print complete, customizable, and reliable automobiles. Suppose she set up her printer in a shop in Madison and started taking orders and printing cars. Why should South Dakota law require her to contract an SDADA middleperson to sell her cars for her and reap profits on her innovation when she’s able to sell cars for a few thousand dollars cheaper by her own efforts?
A nameless, faceless Facebook group, “South Dakota EV Fair Access“, has popped up to protest Tesla’s booting from the mall and maybe lobby for changes in the law. KELO-TV associates one Tayler Owens with the FB group, and Owens says the otherwise nameless group will push lawmakers to “establish EV-specific legislation allowing direct-to-consumer models.”
But hold up: why EV-specific? Why not allow manufacturers of any kind of vehicle—electric, gas, diesel, hydrogen, steam—skip the middlemen and sell direct to consumers? We all want a level playing field, right, Tesla astroturfers?
Here in New Mexico Tesla peddles its vehicles on two Pueblos to skirt state law but tribal governors are taking plenty of heat over it from their own members.
Do you suppose many SD car dealers are Republicans that can’t handle capitalism? Most likely.
If it hurts elongated skum’s bottom line, I am all for it. Buy a Tesla and be sure to bring the hot dogs to roast when it catches on fire. Capitalism without socialism bailouts is a joke
Christine Erickson needs to do something with her hair.
Surely Musk would enjoy skirting the law and make some easy sales by hawking Teslas outside the Royal River Casino.
I’m waiting for those cheap Chinese electric vehicles. I also buy lottery tickets.
Dump your Tesla for a Scout!
Back in the mid 1970s the International Harvester dealer in Brookings, South Dakota debuted a Scout Terra. It was four wheel drive El Camino cool but really doggy with its automatic transmission and four cylinder Nissan diesel engine so the last one rolled off the line in 1980. IH rebranded as Navistar International Corporation in 1986 then entered a strategic alliance in 2016 with Volkswagen who bought the company in 2021. Herb loved “Binders” too and we talked about driving that Terra right up until he left the Earth. Now, a factory in South Carolina is producing electric Scouts under the International® banner.
Gotta disagree. Haven’t you had enough of these billionaires destroying local businesses just so they can funnel all the money to themselves? At least the local dealerships circulate the money back into the local economy. In Wisconsin Musk tried to buy a Supreme Court justice seat in order to get the Wisconsin law overturned. He funneled millions of dollars to failed ex-AG Brad Schimel’s race. That was millions of dollars down the drain, because Schimel lost.
Musk, of course, bought the Wisconsin Republican Party, and they have been doing their bidding and passing laws. Thankfully, Gov. Tony Evers has vetoed these efforts.
I’m sure he will buy the politicians and judges in South Dakota, if he hasn’t already,
The old free market strategies have made way for the new. The ONLY logical end for a business in a free market is monopoly — anything less is losing money in the zero-sum game of competition. The new capitalism means take it on the jaw, lose money, until you capture the full market share; THEN use your monopoly power to price for profit, obscene profit, non-competative profit. WalMart, Amazon . . .
I have no sympathy for owners like Musk who cannot quite get phase one taken care of: they cannot capture the monopoly, in this case electric cars, so they can reap the benefits of the monopoly strangle hold by absolute control over price.
The government’s place in even a free-market economy is to protect the competition and keep production (including the workforce) safe. It needs to be active to break up monopolies to protect the consumers from noncompetitive practices. In other words, a check on obscene greed.
Capitalism is now dead and gone. In it’s place, we shall have two bitcoin’s that vaporize like flatulence in the wind.
Ok, is it AI screwing with me or not. According SD medium income in 2000 was $37,618 in 2023 it was $72,421. I was looking to see who could afford vehicles averaging over 50k.
BYD Atta 3, an SUV, price in Europe 27,780-30,000 Euro with subsidies depending on the range. Check out what you get for your money. Dacia Spring EV from Romania 16.900 Euro. Americans are being fleeced by big oil and by US car makers.
Cost is less of an issue here in Santa Fe County and charging stations are all over but those of us who live beyond the grid pure EVs are a challenge so there are several hybrids in our community of about a hundred properties where lots of Ford Escapes, Toyota Highlanders and Subaru Crosstreks and Foresters are in service. Tesla Cybertrucks are mostly scorned by bumper stickers on sedans that say Elon with a slash through them are ubiquitous.
Tesla Cybertrucks are mostly scorned but bumper stickers on sedans that say Elon with a slash through them are ubiquitous.
Buy a Tesla. Park it in your garage after work. After charging it leaves your garage and becomes a robo-taxi all night long. You get up. Plug it in. Drink coffee. Shower and head to work. As your Tesla robotically drives you to work you review the clients served overnight and the revenue generated. Voila …
Now. It’s time for the Dakota-negativity gene to kick in. You people see negativity BEFORE you see an opportunity to make a new idea work. That’s why SD is in the bottom five states in innovation skills.
Well Porter, many homes on the barrier islands went up in smoke when seawater got into those garages during the hurricanes.
So what? Take precautions or don’t own an electric car in a hurricane zone. I wouldn’t own a Tesla in a harsh climate state like FL OR SD, anyway but that’s no reason to criticize people’s choice who live in mild climate areas like CO. Tesla’s are very popular here despite the ketamine addicted founder.
But, complaining as entertainment is common in those states with a majority German-American ancestry.