this post was submitted on 10 Jul 2025
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(page 2) 50 comments
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[–] floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 21 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Where free market? It will regulate itself /s

[–] mormund@feddit.org 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Well China did subsidize that industry massively, to a point were their domestic market is flooded with very low margins. So the market is already very distorted. But I find it hard to hate on that because flooding the market with electric vehicles and solar panels is better than anything economists are coming up with.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Plus people usually bring it up in a stupid way. Yes they did. Yes we do that too (for all the “we” on the internet). Some amount of that is entirely normal on the global market.

The real problem is US conservatives who understand car manufacturing is a strategic industry but do not want to give that guidance to aid the transition to new technology, US politicians who can’t cooperate on a coherent long term industrial policy, US politicians who can’t look beyond short term profits for their corporate owners, or outrage headlines for their constituents. There’s nothing magical about Chinese companies taking over the industry, nothing hidden, just politicians establishing a strategy and sticking with it long enough to benefit

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[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 74 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

Dam maybe some of the American automakers who took billions in subsidies should have built cheaper cars instead of the largest trucks possible to skirt regulations.

I literally can't afford an American car, i can afford a BYD tho.

[–] lightnegative@lemmy.world 13 points 2 days ago

I can afford neither, but if I had to save up for one it would be the BYD.

American cars are just large, stupid and inefficient. Also the parts are very expensive here in New Zealand

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[–] Fedditor385@lemmy.world 22 points 2 days ago (15 children)

American manufacturing seems very incapable of change. If things worked this way for decades, why change it? Meanwhile the world moved on and they ask themselves why doesn't anyone wanna buy american...?

[–] atk007@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You think Americans can't change, just look at German Automakers. They are stuck in Perpetual denial. VW only moved electric because of the massive diesel scandal, otherwise they also would have been like every other car manufacturer.

[–] Fedditor385@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Yes, but nobody ever expected Germany to be quick and adapt. Germany does not do that in general. It takes something that exists, perfects it, and then sells the perfection of the existing thing, ideally until really not a single person on the world needs it anymore. US on the other hand, has the reputation where innovation begins and does wonders. I am asking myself, where is the innovation in their autoindustry? Last thing was actually Tesla itself, when they started producing first electric cars.

It is the same situation, but the expectation is completely opposite.

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[–] sommerset@thelemmy.club 41 points 2 days ago (5 children)

So here is the thing.
U lost. The moment I need American people to bail you out, you need to treat American people way way the fuck better.

Worker rights, mandatory vacations, work protections, pensions, guaranteed healthcare etc.

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[–] thann@lemmy.dbzer0.com 41 points 2 days ago (2 children)

So they dont care about making cars for the world market, they just want regulations to allow them to milk the american market...

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[–] Mrkawfee@lemmy.world 251 points 2 days ago (29 children)

So free markets are a terrible idea now and countries practicing import substitution weren't impoverishing their people.

US hypocrisy at it's finest.

[–] latenightnoir@lemmy.blahaj.zone 86 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Our free market's good, yours is the problem! Gotta read the fine print!

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[–] Vinstaal0@feddit.nl 8 points 1 day ago (2 children)
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[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 51 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (9 children)

The same thing happened in the 80s with Japan. The Japanese were no longer making crappy cars but small and very reliable, affordable cars. Detroit was still making rust buckets, obsessing over powerful engines with bodies that rotted out and defects galore. Detroit got beaten up badly (Chrysler had to get a gov bailout) until they cleaned up their act and improved their products. Protecting Detroit from competition would've just saddled US consumers with decades more of crappy, overpriced, low quality, cars.

https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/how-detroits-automakers-went-from-kings-of-the-road-to-roadkill/

We still don't let in the small pickups the rest of the world enjoys.

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[–] halcyoncmdr@lemmy.world 167 points 2 days ago (14 children)

They have never considered actually competing have they?

[–] dinckelman@lemmy.world 92 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They’ve actually done the exact opposite. The lobbying, the import laws, the absence of a foreign export market, and the manufacturing of cars that would never pass safety laws anywhere else, all resulted in the kind of dogshit that Americans have to experience now. Why improve if you’re the only player

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[–] BeigeAgenda@lemmy.ca 95 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Newsflash: American car manufacturer says "Our cars are crap and overpriced"

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[–] jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works 82 points 2 days ago (10 children)

If you're one of the largest and oldest car manufacturers in the world and the most "innovative" thing you've managed to do in the last 20 years is rebrand Buick into a young family brand, then you probably need some good competition.

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[–] qyron@sopuli.xyz 30 points 2 days ago (18 children)

I don't give two cents for the american auto brands but spare me the drama: try and make a proper car.

Looking at Ford: try importing a few models from the european line and offer it in the states. Small, economic, somewhat reliable, fuel efficient cars.

Stellantis has a slew of models that could be brought into the american market. They make good cars.

And I'm willing to bet GM as a few models they build and market overseas that would be guaranteed sucesses.

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[–] markovs_gun@lemmy.world 53 points 2 days ago (7 children)

American cars have sucked compared to Asian cars since the 1970s. I don't understand why people are acting all surprised that this is true in respect to BYD. Sure in the past products designed in China were stereotyped as poor quality knock offs of western designed goods, but in the past decade Chinese engineers have increasingly proven themselves as perfectly capable of making solid, innovative designs that improve upon those of their competitors. I think it's kind of fucked up that everyone is so suddenly upset about China's role in the world economy since everyone was completely fine using them for cheap labor over the past several decades and are just mad that Chinese companies are beating them at high skill labor and technology. Chinese companies do have an "unfair advantage" given how much they are backed by the Chinese government but American companies receive all sorts of money from the government for all sorts of things as well.

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