question about "premium" paid for hybrids

I don't think it's ugly! Closest thing to my '86 Tercel hatchback. While I liked DH's '03 Gen I, I hated the body style. I was hooked the first time I set eyes on the Gen II three years ago. And still loving it. In fact, it's the only thing I find fun in wintertime. How many more days until spring?

 

The 1968 Javelin was a nice looking car.

 

You could use this same information to say that the market established a value higher than MSRP as the price of the car, so Toyota actually has been subsidizing sales of the Prius.

I willingly paid very close to MSRP, and I've never thought I paid a "Premium" for the Prius. In fact, I think I receive many more benefits from driving the car than could ever be experienced by those unfortunates who drive other vehicles.

 

I really thought my Prius was fun to drive for the first year or two. Now it's just a car. A very reliable, safe, well-built, fuel-efficient car, but still just a car.

Now driving my Xebra is fun! I think a new toy is always fun, until it becomes commonplace.

 

As was the 1970 AMC Rebel Machine. I wouldn't hesitate to buy a nice example like this:

 

Have you actually been in a Yaris and driven it vs. a Prius? You'll find it's very bare bones and totally lacking in a TON of available and standard features that have already been mentioned (smart key system, nav, futuristic dash and MFD, backup camera, voice recognition, Bluetooth support, etc.).

BTW, here's what Consumer Reports got in their testing along w/the list of the most efficient vehicles: http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/cars/buyingleasing/most-fuelefficient-cars-206/.

Another thing, although the Yaris has good reliability, it scored too low in Consumer Reports testing for them to recommend it.