Safety Advocates Push For Self Driving Cars May Dramatically Cut Demand Of New Vehicles

U.S. auto sales may drop about 40 percent in the next 25 years because of shared driverless cars, forcing mass-market producers such as General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co. to slash output, a Barclays Plc analyst said.

Vehicle ownership rates may fall by almost half as families move to having just one car, according to a report published Tuesday by the analyst, Brian Johnson.

Driverless cars will travel twice as many miles as current autos because they will transport each family member during the day, he wrote.

Large-volume automakers “would need to shrink dramatically to survive,” Johnson wrote. “GM and Ford would need to reduce North American production by up to 68 percent and 58 percent, respectively.”

Self-driving cars have become a frequent topic for auto executives as the technology for the vehicles emerges.

TheSteve - 5/20/2015 4:12:27 PM

+1 Boost

The only scenario I can imagine in which two driver-operated cars are replaced by a single fully autonomous car is the one in which driving times don't overlap. For example:
- 8am to 9am: Car drives dad to office
- 9am to 9:40am: Car drives home alone
- 9:40am to 4pm: Car is available to mom for errands or to drive mom to work
- 4pm to 5pm: Car drives alone to office to get dad
- 5pm to 6pm: Car drives dad home from office

The fully autonomous car's ability to drive to a location without occupants *might* help to reduce the need for a second car, but that depends very much on how a family uses their cars.