What The WSJ Thinks About The Ford Announcement -- August 15, 2025

Friday, August 15, 2025: what The WSJ has to say about the new Ford. Link here.

Doug Field sounded a lot like Elon Musk when unveiling Ford Motor’s strategy to compete against the rise of Chinese electric cars. 

At an event this week in Louisville, Ky., Field detailed the thinking behind Ford’s affordable electric vehicle program, which promises a midsize pickup priced at around $30,000 in 2027.

His ambitious plan boils down to implementing hardcore engineering to take down costs, while keeping performance; and upending 100 years of manufacturing practices to go faster, including through more automation.

All of which rang familiar to anyone following Tesla’s announcement in 2023 to slash the cost of building its next-generation cars by 50%.

Ford Chief Executive Jim Farley is warning about the threat of Chinese rivals making more affordable EVs. He called this week’s announcement Ford’s new “Model T moment.”

In an industry known for hype and hyperbole, there is, perhaps, no single engineer who has been attached to more fantastical personal transportation projects in the past 20 years than Field. The Segway scooter, the Tesla Model 3, the Apple car. And, now, the Model T of tomorrow. Field is basically being asked to save the company from irrelevance—at least in the minds of Wall Street investors who think China has already won.

After Monday’s event, however, investors didn’t seem sold on Ford’s latest hype-mobile. Shares finished the day down slightly—not the sort of reaction one would expect for such a game-changer.

One factor in the apparent apathy may have been that Ford didn’t display an actual vehicle. Rather it showed video of employees supposedly looking at it off camera. (“That’s awesome,” one employee said.)

 With regard to the Tesla Model 3:

The original price for the base Tesla Model 3 was advertised as $35,000. It was introduced in 2017, with production beginning in the same year and customer deliveries starting later that year. 

While the $35,000 base model was initially planned, Tesla initially focused on higher-priced, more profitable versions due to production delays and cash flow needs. The $35,000 base model is no longer available.

 

$35,000 in 2017 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $45,901.09 today, an increase of $10,901.09 over 8 years.

The $30,000 2027 Ford priced in today's (2025) dollars:

With a projected inflation rate of 2.2% in 2025 and 2.1% in 2026, the likely cost today (2025) of something expected to cost $30,000 in 2027 would be approximately $28,750.60.