Who will be the US "Big 3" in 2016?

My prediction for the 2016 *retail* US sales rankings:

1) Toyota 2) Honda 3) Hyundai 4) GM-Ford (as a merged company)
Reply to
John Horner
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Why is Hyundai on the list? Everything I have seen made by them is a piece of shit compared to anything Japaneese or American.

Reply to
Reasoned Insanity

Hundai is a heck of a success story. Near death after selling a bunch of crappy cars, they turned things completely around in recent years.

Don't give up on Ford or GM they can make a comeback.

IMHO, their fist big step is making cars that appeal to younger people. All the teens want Hondas and Toyotas and probably continue buying them as they age. I've worked for the same emplyer for 17 years and know many people well. If they're not driving a Ford or GM truck, then it is a Toyota, Honda or Mazda. Many of the US passenger cars are older models. One minor trend is a couple of new Ford Fusions out in the lot.

I find myself wanting a Toyota Yaris liftback. I find myself needing something with better mileage for daily driving (I need to keep the truck for hauling for my side business). Once I again, the American Automakers are asleep at the wheel. They don't produce anything that compares to the Yaris/Fit/Scion. Yes GM has the Aveo, but what's with the crappy fuel mileage? I looked at the Focus, but the design looks tired and boring after nearly 7 years.

Next there's the Ranger compact truck. A decent, reliable vehicle that actually has some Japanese hardware in it, but Ford won't redesign years after it should have been and the "middle" engine is the anemic 3.0L V6 that gets SUV like gas milege and has less HP than many 4 bangers (like GMs new model). The 4L V6 is better after they gave it some more power a few years ago, but the full size truck mileage mumbers stink.

Next there's GM that dumps the compact truck and intruduces a redesigned "midsized" pickup in the midst of higher gas prices. Fuel economy could be a bit better and it still gets the solid black dot treatment with CRs reliability score - just like the crappy S10 it replaced.

Pontiac. Lets build cars that all the models look the same! Let's make the GTO a family appeal car. RIP new GTO. Sheesh.

Overall, their problem is they are too slow in responding to the marketplace and seem to clueless in designing cars with appeal. John

Reply to
JohnR66

Their first big step is unloading all the union contracts. They are watching Northwest do in their unions. GM will follow. Cut overhead first.

Reply to
dbu.

If you want to level the playing field, then let's have national health coverage like all the other industrialized countries. Get it off the back of the corporations. Why should GM have to pay for it while Honda doesn't?

Reply to
dgk

Hondas employees in the US do not get as good a wage, benefits, including healthcare, or pensions as do GMs employees. Surely you do not believe that national health coverage will be free, do you? Why do you think gas cost $6 or more in Europe and they have a VAT tax? LOL

mike

Reply to
Mike Hunter

In order to promote good transport systems and it is working

Reply to
Gosi

Excessive taxation slows economic growth. Hence the poor economic growth in Europe, over the past ten years or so, and the high unemployment rates. Free medical is anything but free. Surly you do not want the US to emulate Europe? ;)

mike hunt

Reply to
Mike Hunter

Taxation on petrol has prompted new technology to go away from petrol and thus promoted smaller cars, bigger trains and better economy

US could do well emulating Europe

Europe has been improving a lot its transport system over the last decades and not the least because of controlled taxation by taxing petrol and promoting alternatives

Market economy with lots of interventions by the governments in health care and unemployment benefits has created a very good balance and a strong middle class

The high unemployment rates are mainly in former east areas and results of former centralised controled governments

The production per manhours is much higher in Europe than in the US

The norm is for 6 weeks paid vacations, many countries 35 hour work weeks, not unusual around 50 year pension schemes

The underground economy where people pay each other without letting the government know is also quite high so the overall economy is much better than the official figures show

Unemployed people, people on holidays, medical benefits or pensions are often working and paid with black money giving extra strenght to the economy

The US could learn a lot from Europe but they do not because they think they know it all

Mike Hunter wrote:

Reply to
Gosi

No, but it costs a lot less than health care in the US and everyone has it.

Why do you think gas cost

Reply to
Gordon McGrew

Here is a question for you, Mike. What is the second richest country in the world that doesn't have nationalized health care?

Reply to
Gordon McGrew

Let me guess - English is your second language? If not, you should find your high school English teacher and sue her for not doing her job.

Reply to
rmac

"Mike Hunter" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@ptd.net:

Instead of creating a nationwide healthcare system, we oughta shore up the free market healthcare system in several ways. First, we need more MD's and nurses, and this can be done by creating more medical colleges and expanding nursing education programs. Quality of care would go up, and costs would go way down. Supply and demand. There are few spots open in medical schools. The difference in credentials between those getting in and those not getting in are negligable at best. There are many qualified people who can't get into medical school, because there are so few spots open. Also nursing. A family friend is a nursing professor at a university near here. There are way more applicants to the nursing program than spots open in the program -- about 5 to 1. There aren't many spots open (even though there's a huge demand for nurses to the point that some make $50/hour), because there aren't enough nursing instructors (they'd rather make $50/hour as nurses in the hospital rather than $20/hour as nursing instructors at a college). We need to increase funding for nursing instructors so as to train more nurses. Also, we need to cap these huge medical malpractice jury awards. Many times, the awards are lopsided. A few victims get the lion's share of the malpractice dollars available, while others get nothing due to the malpractice insurance co. going bankrupt. Capping awards would lower the huge rates that doctors have to pay. All of these measures WOULD lower medical cost and increase the level of time a physician could spend with their patients, and overall improve the healthcare industry.

Reply to
grappletech

Really? The Canadian government can command a US company to sell its products in Canada and then set the price? And all the other countries can do this also? How does that work?

Don't be naive. Big Pharma makes a good profit selling to those other countries. They are making a killing in the US. Don't believe the big sob stories about their research and FDA approval costs and the great new drugs they give us. While there are constant improvements in drugs, most new drugs launched on the market are little or no better than the old ones and a new drug always carries an uncertain risk. And a lot of the research is marketing driven.

Reply to
Gordon McGrew

A lot of work needed, no doubt. Fortunately there are lots of working models to learn from.

If you want to be scared, check out the number of personal bankruptcies which are caused by medical expenses and the stories behind them.

Reply to
Gordon McGrew

Everyone who want to lower health care cost in the US should write to their Senators and ask them to vote to stop debate, on pending tort reform legislation so it can come up before the Senate for a vote, and you will have more Doctors and Nurses. I have a personal friend, a well known heart surgeon who no longer practices because of Mal Practice Insurance costs.

mike hunt

Reply to
Mike Hunter

But medicare pays less than private insurance. And private insurance pays less than you do with no insurance. How the hell can it be Medicare's fault that the price is high. The fact is that Medicare runs a very tight ship. (Except for Bush's welfare subsidy to Big Pharma masquerading as a drug plan for seniors.)

Yep, what we have now is the most expensive health care in the world. When you look at it that way, hard to imagine that the government could make it worse.

Reply to
Gordon McGrew

You must have your head pretty far up something if you haven't heard that:

  1. The US is virtually(?) the only industrialized nation that does not have universal nationalized health care
  2. The US has the highest per capita health care costs in the world by far.
  3. The overall quality of US health care is mediocre.

  1. All the above are getting worse.

Read up:

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The United States continues to spend significantly more on health care than any country in the world. In 2005, Americans spent 53 percent per capita more than the next highest country, Switzerland, and 140 percent above the median industrialized country, according to new research from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The study authors analyzed whether two possible reasons - supply constraints and malpractice litigation - could explain the difference in health care costs. They found that neither factor accounted for a large portion of the U.S. spending differential. The study is featured in the July/August 2005 issue of the journal Health Affairs.

The study authors reviewed health care spending data on 30 countries from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for the year 2003. U.S. citizens spent $5,267 per capita on health care. The country with the next highest per capita expenditure, Switzerland, spent $3,446 per capita. The median OECD country spent $2,193 per capita.

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Reply to
Gordon McGrew

Take it to email or an appropriate newsgroup.

Just go to alt.autos.toyota if you want to see what you're turning this previously fine newgroup into.

Reply to
Elmo P. Shagnasty

You think the government can not make things worse? You have never been in a VA hospital or seen by a VA doctor. Piss poor doctors and second rate coverage if you can even get into a Hospital or find a doctor

You are confused Medicare sets the rates charged by hospitals and doctors in a given area, and sets them high. I don't know what private coverage you have but my coverage arranges with doctors and hospital to pay far less than Medicare allows per person in the area. The reason Medicare pays five times as much as the VA for the same coverage, is Medicare payments to hospital are a round about way to reimburse hospitals and doctors for free emergency care they must provide, under the Hill Burton Act, for the indigent.. The only was a doctor can charge you less than the Medicare rate is for him not to treat Medicare patients

Paying for drugs was never a problem for me but I now spend around $250 less a month for my meds, since the drug law went into effect, and I do not buy part 'D'. The sad part is, even though I never applied for SS, because of the Medicare law I can not even buy private coverage unless I sign up and pay for part 'B.'

Because of all the old folks in Florida, they get all of their drugs free and need not pay a monthly premium.

mike hunt

Reply to
Mike Hunter

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