Irritation

[annissamazing]

Last night this commercial came on:

Well, maybe not this exact commercial. The one that was on last night had several people talking about how I should buy an American car. Because it's my patriotic duty as an American to buy an American car. And it pissed me off.

Firstly, I buy American when I can. I know a lot of people in the manufacturing industry and I try to support them whenever I can. I am willing to spend slightly more for an American-made product because the quality tends to be higher and I'm supporting my friends in manufacturing. I apologize for sounding self-righteous, but I wonder how many of the folks in last night's commercial do the majority of their shopping at Wal-Mart.

However, I have never bought, nor do I intend to buy an American-made car. And I have what I believe are valid reasons for this.

1.) American car manufacturers can make good cars. They usually choose not to.
2.) The very few well-made cars they actually make are well outside my price range.
3.) American-made cars are ugly. Yeah, that's right. I said it.

After the commercial break, the news came on. Top story: Chrysler, Ford, and GM asking for a government loan to keep them from going bankrupt. I hate to sound like Rush Limbaugh here (known for giving easy answers that would never actually work to very complicated problems), but have the American car manufacturers considered making solid, safe, fuel-efficient, good looking cars to sell at a reasonable price?

Side note: I actually considered a GM vehicle in my recent test drive line-up. The Saturn Astra which I just found out is built in Belgium. Also, according to Wikipedia, GM announced 3 days ago that they intend to sell, consolidate, or close Saturn (and Hummer, Saab, and Pontiac).

Comments

[sprgtime.livejournal.com]

The pressure to buy American cars has always been really hot here in Detroit, with three of the big auto makers based here.

Both of our cars happen to be considered "American" but it's a crock anyway - most "American" made cars use mostly parts from other countries. What's the difference? There are some foreign cars that use American parts.

I hadn't heard GM's intentions about Saturn, but it made me sad at first to read it. I love my little Saturn SL2 that I bought when I was 19 and still have today, 10 years later, the most reliable awesome car (that still looks so good it looks newish when clean). I see tons of SL2s on the road even though they discontinued it in like 2001 or something. When we were looking at getting a car last year, we looked at Saturns because we love our SL2. Unfortunately, none of Saturn's models since then have as good of gas mileage or track record, and they seem expensively priced for what you're getting. I don't know why they discontinued the best car they ever made.

[transistorblast.livejournal.com]

There is an interesting book written by David Halberstam, in the mid-80's, The Reckoning, that explains how the American auto industry lost so much market share to non-American competitors in the U.S. It's been awhile since I read it, but if I remember correctly, Halberstam suggested that the problems stemmed from 1) the big three not responding to consumer need (especially during the 70's energy crisis) and favoring market complacency, and 2) management at the companies falling out of the hands of engineers and managers (ie, the people who actually worked on the cars and understood how automobiles worked) and into the control of Ivy League MBAs, who understood statistics on a page, but not the product.

[jairen82.livejournal.com]

I totally agree with you, save for one thing. I own a Ford Focus. It is cheap, reliable, fuel-efficent, and not too shabby lookin' (though the new focuses leave something to be desired). I have not yet had a problem with it (save for little wear-and-tear; mostly my own fault) and truly think it is possibly the best car I have owned to this point.

On all other points (and cars) I couldn't agree more. Most American-made vehicles definitely leave a lot to be desired. Used to be they would make wonderful autos that were fuel efficent (even some of the old steel muscle cars got good gas mileage) and lasted a long time. I think, and I could be wrong here, that I found the one exception to the rule. Perhaps it is only my vehicle, but I sure did luck out as far as buying American. That being said, I would buy foreign nine times out of ten in any other situation.

And I don't think you're Rush Limbaugh (you're not that ugly).

Have you bought your new car yet or are you still waiting?

[annissamazing]

I haven't bought it yet for a couple of reasons. 1.) Justin just started a new job where he is paid on commission, so we're waiting to see what our average monthly income is going to be. 2.) I have a massive amount of credit card debt that I'm attempting to pay down/off.

I was pre-approved several months ago for enough money to buy one, but then the economy collapsed and I'm pretty sure that pre-approval no longer stands. I'm watching auto-trader.com for a used one that makes my skirt fly up. There's one in Chicago right now that I'm interested in, but it's not certified and it's selling for several thousand dollars less than it's worth. So there's some red flags there.

[elgordo42.livejournal.com]

Bummer about Saturn, but maybe they will do well as a spin-off independent?
For a while there, they were doing things differently, with labor and management cooperating, building quality by making it everybody's personal mission.

As I have mentioned before, my wife just loves her now 1 year old Saturn Ion 2, which replaced her 8-year old (also bought new) Saturn sedan.

[annissamazing]

It's a shame they discontinued the Ion. That was a sharp-looking car and one I seriously considered buying a few years ago (about 2 weeks before discovering I was pregnant).

[silverfish.livejournal.com]

Driving is outdated.