Technology

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

US hypocrisy at it's finest.

They have never considered actually competing have they?

Oh no! The type of capitalism where we have to compete!

Make it go away, Daddy Trump!

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

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.

Good. Fuckem. They make shitty, oversized trucks that are a danger to pedestrians and people who drive reasonably sized cars anyway.

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.

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.

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.

I am pretty sure there is some financial fuckery going on with BYD. My parents own two, and they are very nice, but way under priced compared to every other EV manufacturer.

Can't prove anything of course, but there is something odd going on when everyone else is 20-30k more expensive.

Hard to feel sorry for GM though, they suckled at our governments (Australia) teet for decades before giving up and leaving entirely. At least if BYD is being propped up we are at least getting good cheap cars from it.

Maybe GM could, I don't know, innovate?

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.

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

Capitalism is all about competition unless it's not.

Former GM Executive: BYD cars are better and cheaper than American. If we let BYD into the U.S. Market, we wouldn't be able to be greedy and enshitify our products any more, which would end up destroying american car manufacturers. FTFY.

P.S. Actually the average american would be benefited from that

I mean, didn’t Japanese and Korean automakers already do that?

So when can we stop with this "free markets" nonsense in the third world aswell??

First the enshittified the food

Then the health care

Then every consumer product

Finally they enshittified the nation itself

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.