Wise words. My thought is that people buy cars because they either need them or because other people have them and they want a better one in the way of a status symbol.

Unfortunately the range of cars just gets narrower as time goes by, and they all tend to become SUVs or Jeeps - the majority of which never go off-road, use their 4 wheel drive, or have even seen a country road.

The consumerist approach has a lot to answer for as the car industry is itself a massive self-perpetuating machine rather than providing a service.