American Automakers Suck...And Here's Why
**THE LEGACY OF THE FORMER BIG 3**
American Automakers Suck…And Here’s Why
THE LEGACY OF THE FORMER BIG 3
At the risk of sounding unpatriotic and upsetting millions of people, we’re just going to say what everyone already knows. American automakers suck. Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler suck. And they’ve sucked for a long time.
Believe us; we know this is hard to hear. It’s hard for us to say. But if you strip away the nostalgia, patriotism, and the “American-made” bullshit, and you really dig deep, you have to admit American automakers suck.
But why do they suck? Is it our opinion, or can it be objectively true? That’s what this article is all about.
Recalls
All automakers issue recalls, but for American automakers, recalls are widespread. According to Forbes, Ford secured the number one spot for the most recalls of any automaker in 2022, with 67 recalls concerning 8,636,265 units. Chrysler secured the number three spot with 38 recalls, and General Motors rounded out the top five with 32 recalls.
Historically, America’s Top Three have issued more recalls than any other car manufacturer. According to Bankrate, General Motors secured the top spot for the most recalls issued between 2000-2020 with 671. Ford came in second with 635 recalls, and Chrysler came in third.
Also, let’s not forget that Ford is infamous for recalling the most cars (21 million) for faulty transmissions that would slip out of park into reverse. Worst still, executives at the company knew about the issue for over a decade and chose not to tell consumers. Their silence resulted in 98 deaths and cost the company $1.7 billion in lawsuits.
Source: Associated Press
Not to pick on Ford, but we can’t mention recalls without bringing up the Ford Pinto. Billed as “The Little Carefree Car,” the Pinto debuted in 1970 with one major design flaw – it would burst into flames. The Pinto lacked an appropriate rear bumper, which left the gas tank vulnerable to an explosion in rear-end collisions. In addition, the Pinto’s doors tended to jam, which would trap occupants in a fiery death. [Watch the Pinto’s Crash Test]
In 1978, Ford recalled 1.5 million Pintos after 27 preventable deaths were attributed to the car. In the lawsuit Grimshaw v. Ford Motor Co., evidence proved that Ford executives knew about the design flaw and pushed the car into production anyway. Their decision to put profits ahead of people is still cited as a case study of what not to do in business ethics. In other words, that’s pretty sucky.
Cost of Ownership
Another clue that American automakers suck is their high cost of ownership. In 2016, Yourmechanic.com used its extensive data collection to rank which car brands broke down the most and were the most expensive to keep operational over ten years. General Motors and Chrysler were featured in the top ten, and Ford came in 13th place (out of 30). Maybe it’s just us, but we’d rather use our hard-earned dollars on more important things.
Reliability
Consumer Reports collected customer reviews and data on 300,000 vehicles between 2000-2022. They scored each car brand’s reliability on a scale from 0-100. Not surprisingly, General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler (and their subsidiaries) scored at the bottom of the pack. We don’t know about you, but that’s pretty sucky.
Ford-Werke Plant 1939, Courtesy Ford Motor Company
Nazis
Yes, you read that right. It wasn’t just German automakers supporting the Axis powers in World War Two; so were American automakers. According to an article published by the American Anti-Defamation League, Ford, and its subsidiary Ford Werke, supported the Third Reich and used slave labor from the Buchenwald concentration camp in its Cologne factory between 1941-1945.
In addition, Henry Ford was a known anti-Semite and even was awarded the Grand Cross of the German Eagle by the Nazi regime in 1938. It’s clear that Hitler admired Henry Ford and both read and believed The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which was a fabricated antisemitic text.
Not to be outdone, General Motors established early ties with Hitler and used its subsidiary Opel to modernize Germany’s military from horse-drawn divisions to mechanized war units. In addition, GM factories in Germany used slave labor to build bomber engines for the Luftwaffe, as well as torpedoes and land mines.
General Motors profited from the American war effort and the Nazi war machine. They didn’t care about people or democracy or patriotism. The only thing that mattered to them was money, which they pursued at all costs.
Company Culture
American automakers have terrible company cultures. In 2010, This American Life published a story about the New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. (NUMMI), which opened in 1984. NUMMI was an opportunity for General Motors to learn Toyota’s secrets for manufacturing quality cars at low cost.
The episode documents how General Motors failed to implement Toyota’s production practices – not because it couldn’t, but because it wouldn’t. GM would rather build cars incorrectly on the assembly line and transfer the cost of fixing the vehicle to the consumer than stop the line and fix the problem. The result of this crappy company culture was that NUMMI closed, and GM went bankrupt. That’s pretty sucky.
Conclusion
This article aims to prove to our readers that American automakers suck. We think we did that. But it wasn’t fun. It wasn’t something we wanted to do. We’re calling out Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler because we want them to be better and know they can be.
We are tired of hearing story after story from our friends and readers about how they purchased an American car, and it became a nightmare money pit. Even a cursory search of the Internet will pull up horrendous ownership reviews of new American models like the Ford Lightning and the Hummer EV. And don’t get us started on Chrysler, Dodge, and Jeep. They’re just awful.
Our advice: Don’t buy American car brands. Vote with your dollars. Maybe they will listen before it’s too late.
Hopefully, the fleet of newbie American automakers will change this narrative and Make American Autos Great Again! We already have the hats.
- Alex TheHoward
References
Electric Cars, Solar & Clean Energy | Tesla
https://www.thisamericanlife.org/561/nummi-2015
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/general-motors-and-the-third-reich
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/henryford-antisemitism/
https://www.adl.org/resources/news/ford-motor-company-and-third-reich
https://www.yourmechanic.com/article/the-most-and-least-expensive-cars-to-maintain-by-maddy-martin
https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/3d/119/757.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mqu-gRqt3g
https://www.autosafety.org/ford-transmissions-failure-hold-park/
https://www.bankrate.com/insurance/car/car-recall-facts-and-statistics/
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