Quote:
Originally Posted by GretchenGotGrowl
Yet there were V8s during that entire time (as poor as some of us think they were). The pressures on the car industry today are not nearly what they were during the oil embargo. That was not foreseen and it was at the same time new emission standards hit. That was a double whammy with little time for the industry to respond. Then new standards have a long time horizon and way more flexibility.
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Absolutely agree. Add that in the 70's the American car companies had to switch gears, as in entire design and engineering philosphies relatively overnight. The oil embargo created a fear based market that changed the way people felt about cars. I don't think it was really all that much about government that drove it, as it was market demand. Understand that we went from loving our big, heavy, flashy and powerful "American Steel" without a thought about gasoline availability, much less price, to what happens when I can't find gas, and when I do, will I still be able to feed my children. This happened in a very short time. The foreign manufacturer's were ready to pounce on that opportunity, because they had been building small cars for decades already. We didn't see many of them over here because we didn't want them. All of a sudden, we felt like we needed them. Thus, we had a lot of catching up to do. Add EPA into the mix, and it was even more. Though i wonder if EPA regs didn't buy the Americans some time, as the foreign cars had a new engineering hurdle to clear if they wanted to sell in America.