[zebra]

Originally Posted by stovt001

Seems to be. I used to work at a Toyota dealership and I needed a new car at the time. The obvious route was to use my discount on a Toyota product, but then I saw the rapidly declining quality and reliability, and the problems with service work. Yes the Japanese cars up until the mid 2000s actually were very nice and probably better than their American competitors, but things changed. I saw where it was all going. I looked at Toyota and saw complacency. The people believed they were high quality, good cars, they had Consumer Reports firmly in their pocket, and the rest of the media was coming right along as a free marketing and PR team. With all this confidence and loyalty, Toyota simply stopped trying and quality plummeted. I bought a Cobalt instead and it has been wonderful. Easy maintenance, low costs, very fuel efficient, fun to drive, and as reliable as you could hope for. Immediately after I bought the Cobalt, the Scion tC, the other car I was considering, was recalled for side airbags that deployed if the door was shut too firmly. My grandma bought a Rav4 on my discount and it is repaired weekly. I buy American because buying Japanese means buying rapidly declining quality and reliability.

let's only hope and pray that the American manufacturers don't develop that same kind of attitude when people finally realize that our cars are as good or better than foreign competitors. if that happens, we'll go right back to where we're at now.