Recent studies have shown, gorr, that so-called range anxiety isn't as large an issue as it was in the recent past. We can probably thank much online reporting and followup debate on the subject to help more folks than before realize that - given typical daily driving requirements - most can do just fine with the range being offered on today's EVs, such as the Leaf.

As for charging being "very difficult," I don't see that either. Most early adopter EV owners are also home owners and, as part of their EV purchase, typically have Level 2 J1772 equipment in their carport or garage. They plug in at night and charge while sleeping. What could be easier?

Long range EV travel is a bit more problematic, as is home charging for apartment/townhouse dwellers. But these are largely infrastructure issues that will be addressed in time. Most of the civilized world is already wire for electricity. So, it's not going to be insurmountable to move forward on this.

No, recent polling has shown that most folks who have been hedging against getting an EV sooner than later are concerned more with the higher initial purchase price (compared to ICE cars) than anything else. Before we get $20,000 EVs with 200+ range stats and/or hydrogen, car companies are going to need to take existing or soon-to-be-introduced EVs and offer intelligently stripped-down entry level models of these cars, if they wish to bring more people into the fold.

@Benjamin Nead,

I'm not convinced that it will be so easy to lower the price by stripping out the luxuries. The problem is that these things (electric windows, bluetooth, GPS, ...) cost very little for the automaker to install. In the traditional model, they would take a basic car, add $100 worth of extras, and charge $2000 to the consumer. Naturally, they loved this. With new technology such as EVs (and previously hybrids), they have come from the opposite end. These new vehicles are simply more expensive to produce - at least at first - and they need a way to justify the higher price for the consumer. So they slap in all these extras so the consumer doesn't feel like they have a $30k stripped-down econobox. Rather, the consumers get what would have traditionally cost thousands extra on the ICE vehicle. The downside is the automakers lose that extra profit margin. Plus, stripping the extras out cannot reduce the price much, since they aren't driving it in the first place.

On the topic of hand-cranked windows versus electric, I personally have had crank windows fail (cranks break, windows stick or fall off the tracks) on multiple cars. I have never once had an electric window fail. Furthermore, I find it hard to believe that the price (for the automaker) is much different between the two. A tiny electric motor costs a couple of dollars. Same with the hand crank and gears. What's worse, designing a car and gearing an assembly line for both options is far more expensive than simply making them all the same. It is my impression that this is why you almost never see hand-cranked windows any more - it's actually more expensive.

This is much more significant than some government bureaucrat pulling some number out of his sleeve about what he thinks the price for anything should be.