car_guy

The Ford Debt Disaster Continues

"look at any quality survey of the past 30 years and you will find american cars in their usual slot as also-rans, far below japanese models. it's a gap that american manufacturers have never been able to close."

Icandoitdon, let's look at this year's JD Powers Vehicle Dependibility Survey. Mercury (the Ford division SeekingAlpha always wants to kill) ranks #2, after Lexus. Cadillac is #3. Toyota is #4, behind 2 US brands. Buick and Lincoln are ahead of Honda. Ford is behind Honda by a 0.25 defects per vehicle. Toyota's Scion brand is near the bottom with a 20% higher defect rate than Ford. Try using some facts next time.

Wake up people the '70s are 30 years ago. At that time the quality "gap" was 4-8 defects per vehicle, not 0.25. The complaining you hear in the media and on the net about US car quality almost always comes from somebody that has never owned or driven one for the last 20 years, if ever (yes I know that some of the negative experiences are accurate. Every brand has its issues, surf the web and you will find people mad about Toyota and Honda quality also.)

The big decrease in market share this year is because the market has shifted back to the cars, especially small cars where the Japanese are strong. The US companies gained share when the market shifted to trucks in 90's, where they were strong, you just never read about it in the media.

GM, Ford, and Chrysler also have vehicles that get as good or better mileage than similar Japanese models, you just never read about that. Everyone, including the Japanese, have made their vehicles larger and more powerful over the last 10-15 years because gas was cheap and that is what people wanted. A 1980 Honda Accord gets better gas mileage than a 2008 Accord. All companies were building products that people wanted, bigger vehicles.

Kirkorian made a huge profit when everyone said Chrysler was going bankrupt at the end of the 80's. He was right then and he is right now.

Management was very deliquent in restructuring the fundamental problems in their union contract during the 90's when the companies were strong. GM tried in '98 and was struck for weeks. The union was never going to change when the companies were making big profits. With everyone's backs against the wall, fundamental change was made and the US 3 will have a very competitive wage & benefit structure in 2010 when the VEBAs are in place. They are making the hard decisions and they will pay off.