NADA CEO on Chinese cars coming to America: "It’s bad for our industry, it’s bad for our country, it’s bad for consumers."
  • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    114·
    16 days ago

    God I fucking hate stealerships. If car dealer cartels in the US as a concept die as a result of this era of idiocy we’re in, that’s a pretty great silver lining.

      • Strider@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        15 days ago

        Um, only having been tourist to the US, how does it work?

        Edit: the car dealership. What’s different to e.g. Europe (the referenced American only practice)

          • Strider@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            15 days ago

            The first comment talks about stealership, the next about weird us practice and I have no idea what they are referring to 😁.

            In Europe we habe car dealers, franchise, independent or do buy privately but they can all act independently.

            Is there a cartel or something in the US for car dealerships?

            • harrys_balzac@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
              5·
              15 days ago

              In most states, manufacturers are prohibited from selling directly to consumers.

              There are a variety of reasons for it, some were consumer-friendly (like preventing the manufactures from monopolizing repair/service), but it basically created a system of middlemen that raised costs.

              I worked at a Honda dealership in college and I learned a lot.

              For example, when you finance through a dealership, the dealer doesn’t actually put up any money. They find a 3rd party financer then tack on a few percentage points.

              Salespersons also earn higher commissions on dealer-provided upsales, such as window-etching, rust-preventative, custom badging, extended warranties, etc, so they try to push those things.

              Dealers are also locked into individual manufacturers, usually. That is, a “family” of dealerships, are actually multiple businesses, each with a contract with a different manufacturer.

              The person that owned the Honda dealership I worked at, owned others. On one side, they had a Pontiac-Buick-GMC dealer, then Chevy, Chevy truck, and Cadillac on the other side. Even they it was all General Motors, they were run separately. Down the street, they had a dealership that sold both new Toyotas and Subarus.

    • Melvin_Ferd@lemmy.worldEnglish
      14·
      15 days ago

      Want wasn’t it regean that made it a law you couldn’t buy directly from the manufacturer because he was buddies with people who owned major dealerships. And it just stuck since then.

        • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
          3·
          15 days ago

          Things like that and tariffs are absolutely useful tools for trade issues: TARGETED, TEMPORARY tools. There would have been nothing wrong with temporary protection for Harley Davidson if it were temporary, if there was a deadline where they have to start competing again.

      • scarabic@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        15 days ago

        Regulations were put in place to prevent manufacturers from opening their own stores right next to the dealers they worked with. Dealers assume some risk when they take on inventory. Apparently it’s not like a bookstore where any unsold copies just go back to the publisher. It’s still a flimsy justification though and enshrined these middlemen who then enshittified everything. Worse, in some cases manufacturers are entirely prevented from selling direct, even if they don’t work with dealerships. It’s too much.

  • skisnow@lemmy.caEnglish
    39·
    15 days ago

    “It’s bad for consumers” is one of those phrases that’s been misused so often I’m amazed these cunts still try to use it with a straight face. It’s like “I’m not racist, but” in terms of phrases that are widely understood to mean their direct opposite.

      • skisnow@lemmy.caEnglish
        2·
        15 days ago

        I’m not sure anyone actually does fall for it per se; it’s one of those lies that literally everyone knows is a lie, but CEOs and corrupt politicians need it to be true in order to justify what they want to do next so they have to go through the process of saying it first.

        • Soup@lemmy.worldEnglish
          3·
          14 days ago

          You must have the pleasure of not knowing those people, then. A lot of people genuinely still believe in trickle-down economics and the like.

  • Bubbaonthebeach@lemmy.caEnglish
    37·
    15 days ago

    When all you want to do is sell vastly more expensive but quality poor versions of last century’s product, you should be afraid. American automakers have had the government prop up their manufacturing for decades leaving the rest of the world open to create this century’s products.

    • P1k1e@lemmy.worldEnglish
      7·
      15 days ago

      Oh man…I am American but I yearn for the day when I can buy a pickup with a full bed the size of a Daewoo Lanos

      • turdburglar@piefed.socialEnglish
        3·
        12 days ago

        second this.

        that slate truck/suv is lookin good tho even with the bitty bed. jay leno’s garage youtube just did a video about it

  • Pacattack57@lemmy.worldEnglish
    32·
    15 days ago

    This might be the best thing to happen to Americans in a long time and it’s the result of shitty anti consumer US policy 😂 at long last I might be able to buy a Toyota helix

      • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        15 days ago

        I think you mean this as deserved punishment and I agree, but maybe there’s also a silver lining: we deserve this, to break up the dead dinosaur cartel, to restart innovation, to free consumers from a prison of protectionism around overpriced legacy vehicles and help light the way to future technology

  • Zier@fedia.io
    25·
    16 days ago

    I really hope American car manufacturers go bankrupt. American cars are the worst. The rest of the world has better cars.

    • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      5·
      15 days ago

      American manufacturers (GM, Tesla, Ford) only make up a minority of sales here. The majority of car sales are manufacturers from “the rest of the world.”

      • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        15 days ago

        Before the current chaos, it really didn’t even make sense to have that distinction. My Toyota and my Honda were both built in the us. Not just assembled, but with a higher percentage of us-manufactured parts than my old pontiac

        Why do we care? I can be a shareholder either way, if I had money. The executives dont care about me either way nor do they directly affect me. But it’s nice when the factory is here, employing thousands of my fellow citizens.

        Having lived through it, I also understand this was a hard-won battle for local labor, fought for in previous trade battles

  • kalkulat@lemmy.worldEnglish
    17·
    16 days ago

    “It’s bad for our industry, it’s bad for our country, it’s bad for consumers.”

    I think they (accidentally, of course) left out the people that it’s worst for.

    Once these guys are gone, where are the Better Business Bureaus gonna find smarmy guys in suits?

  • Enceladus@lemmy.caEnglish
    14·
    14 days ago

    They missed the EV push in the 90’ by GM, in the 2010’ by Tesla and now once again. They would never change without market pressure.

  • MrSulu@lemmy.mlEnglish
    10·
    16 days ago

    Ah, the “American dream”. Competition. Sadly only if it is competition not just lobbying power.