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Originally Posted by Diesel_Dave
Kodak, there is something to what you're saying about minimum wage laws, etc. However, most people don't realize that Honda, Subaru, Toyato, BMW, (so-called "foreign" automakers) have many, many manufacturing plants right here in the US. And many "US" automakers have many, many manufacturing plats in other countries. There really isn't a whole lot that distinguishes "foreign" and US automakers other than where the headquarters are.
What gets me is the notion that there's some evil conspirisy by the US automakers to squash good FE. I can't remeber the exactly how it goes, but there's an old saying that goes something like, "Don't mistake evil for incompotence."
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I have a counterpoint for you. The automakers have been around for a very long time, and consequently know what works and doesn't work. If we compare the vehicles that we get here versus the vehicles that are sold around the world, usually we will see them get way better fuel economy, but they operate in markets where the fuel cost is much higher. If we take our vehicles fleet average mpg at the current price of fuel here, versus the fleet average of the UK for example and what they pay, the cost per mile is about the same. It seems like it has been this way for a long time.
With all the know how that the OEMs possess here in the US, you would think that building vehicles that get high double to triple digit fuel economy would be old hat by now, but it hasn't happened commercially here. Well, why is that? It's not a question of competence, it's a question of willingness. The solutions have always been there, but when you are talking about billions of dollars being lost in terms of income for Big Oil and states that rely on taxes generated by consumption of petrol products ( and usually they are based on a percentage of the price of fuel, so for sure they want it to stay high ), having a fuel efficient fleet runs counter to their goals. And I will not get into the profits lost by Big Pharma and the healthcare system if the air and water were cleaner because of the reduction in polution. This is big business protecting themselves and maximizing profit, at the expense of the end user.
If the US were to go from one of the highest consumers of oil to the lowest, too many special interests will be put out of power. You can't be in business and have record profits quarter after quarter and not know what you are doing.