Originally Posted By: 2002 Maxima SE
Originally Posted By: bretfraz
Welcome to Big Business. If you don't think stuff like this happened in Japan or elsewhere, you're fooling yourself. Learn why some companies like Toyota became hugely successful after WWII and companies like Subaru did not. Japanese corporations have a much closer relationship with government than American corporations and they have leveraged that to their advantage. Look at how Toyota "partnered" with the Japanese gov't to develop the Prius. Ever see a domestic automaker pull that one off?
I think you're missing the point. No one said it doesn't happen, but these huge corporations have killed off competition in a free market. Yes, Toyota gets government funding but they actually produce newer technology. GM had an electric car in the early nineties (though it's widely debatable to why it was killed off along with Ford's offerings).
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Anecdotal evidence has no meaning to the larger picture. There are lots of people who have owned crummy foreign cars. That means nothing. As for the Aztek, styling aside, they're excellent cars which have a very loyal following. Import car makers have produced countless lousy cars that were far less reliable than the Aztek. Using the Aztek as a whipping boy is a convenient but unintelligent choice. Every automaker in the world has produced dogs; it happens, that's business.
Even the Cadillac Cimarron has a following.
Fair enough. My point was that the American automobile industry really didn't put much of an effort into nice, affordable, fuel efficient cars in the last 20 years. Why do the imports offer so many choices here and the US auto makers offer so few? Read the book "Car: A Drama in the American Workplace" by Mary Walton and you'll see some of the mismanagement that has lead us to where we are today.
The trucks and SUVs are outstanding, but that's about all.
You're saying that large, powerful corporations dominate markets and drive smaller companies out of business? I thought that's how a free market is supposed to work. You're right, I don't understand your point. Can you rethink your argument and repost it?
AFAIK, the EV-1 was never designed to be a mass production car. It was a technology demonstration taken as far as it could be taken. All Toyota did was pick up where GM left off, went to the Japanese gov't for support, and took the concept to the next level, a consumer-ready product.
I have Walton's book as well as industry books by Mickey Maynard, the excellent book from Ingrassia and White, and others such as "Arrogance and Accords", "Where The Suckers Moon" and many others. I recently finished a book on the history of the Ford family. They all provide a fascinating insight into this complex industry.
As for small cars, Detroit has NEVER been interested in the entry level market. Never. 20 years? That's 1989. I'm talking go back to 1959, back to when the Beetle first came to the US in the early 50's. I agree that there has always been a good sized market in the US for economical, affordable cars but Detroit has never liked them. Unless their market share was being affected, they were happy to let first the Europeans then the Japanese have the low end of the car market.
The unfortunate thing is both Ford and GM's European operations have made excellent small cars for markets outside North America. The problem has been convincing US-based mgmt to focus their massive resources on marketing them in NA. Import brands do small cars well because that's all they do. It's only been recently that imports have gotten into larger vehicles like SUV's and trucks.
The real problem is during the past 20 years (your timeline) while brands like Toyota, Honda and Nissan expanded into traditionally strong domestic markets like mid sized sedans and pickup trucks, the domestic automakers did not elevate their game in smaller cars and advanced technologies like hybrids. The domestics let the import brands come into their markets and beat them at their own game.
