We wrote in the Is Detroit Dead as a Dodo? blog below that over 70% of the cars sold in Silicon Valley have foreign labels. The San Jose Mercury News reported in its Friday, July 20, 2007 edition the top 20 vehicle brands sold in Santa Clara County from January through May, 2007.
Here is the list:
Toyota Prius 1,627
Toyota Camry 1,611
Honda Civic 1,504
Honda Accord 1,211
Toyota Corolla 1,168
Honda Odyssey 823
Toyota Sienna 765
BMW 3-Series 721
Ford F-Series 591
Toyota Tacoma 589
Lexus RX 497
Honda Pilot 489
Chevrolet Silverado 483
Toyota RAV4 468
Mazda 3 413
Lexus IS 394
Lexus ES 390
Nissan Altima 374
Acura MDX 351
Infiniti G35 31
Total 14780
Note there are only two ‘American’ cars in this list and foreign labels make up for over 92% of the total! By the way, The Merc also reported that 30,463 new cars and trucks were registered in the Santa Clara County between January and May 2007, but did not provide a breakdown by make and model.
So, Detroit is still a dodo in the Valley!
1 comment:
Hi MR! (nice blog)
Regarding this story I just find it interesting that the Prius is number 1. Reminds of that documentary of Who Killedthe Electric Car (which I first heard about on Democracynow.org (http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/13/1421243) where they talk about how the EV electric vehicle sold so many units, but GM pulled them from the market by forcing owners (who were overall happy with the car) to sell (by cutting of service contracts, and supplies, and spare parts). Literally they were taking cars that worked and took them to the junk yard to be smashed to a pulp (watch the video on line!).
This conspiracy of car companies and oil companies to kill an environmentally friendly car is the corner stone of why we are losing the car race, why Japanese car makers were so foreward thinking, and why we are now in Iraq.
Our addiction to oil, and the corporate intersts that created the conditions that we find ourselves in now, is the problem. Japan, while a huge oil consumer, at least their car companies knew that they had to live in an oil scarce world.
Just another way that corrupting influences lead us to our destructive ways.
Great blog! Keep up the good work.
Post a Comment