Any question answered...

I won't go that far. A milk float is pretty useless if you try to use it as a personal transport vehicle, as were most electric vehicles until recently. Now the technology exists to make a half decent electric car, people are buying them. But until recent developments in batteries, motors, and electric drive controllers electric cars were basically shit, expensive and useless. I wouldn't consider anyone to be an asshole for not paying well over the odds for something which is fundamentally incapable of fulfilling its intended purpose.