I finally get to use all this crap I learn at school.

1) American cars overseas (even Canada) are not very popular. Since the demand is (really) low, prices have to be jacked up so the dealers can break even. It's hard enough to break even, nevermind make a profit selling American cars overseas.

2) Foreign cars are made in the US so they can compete with American cars. For example, one of the things that lowers the price of the Mercedes SUV is that they are made in North Carolina. There are many other examples like this.

3) Here's the deal with the drastic change in prices. These are all generalizations. In 1970, the average car buyer bought a car that would take most of their yearly income (usually more) to pay off. Today, people don't even consider a car that is anywhere near their yearly income. The cost of living has dramatically increased also, but if you compare the price of cars with the average annual income using a CPI chart, the cost of cars actually inflated at a lower rate than the average annual income. Why did this happen? The cost of auotmobiles changed mostly because of the fact people make more money. Labor expenses are the highest portion of most cars total production cost. Also, cars have become more involved to make. More technology in every single part of the car. This raises the costs of engineers, designers/builders, suppliers, and even assembley line workers. The same kind of inflation happened on gasoline. In 1980, the average price of gasoline was $1.18. Gas prices, now one of the most bitched about topics, actually aren't that high when divided into disposable, or even discretionary income.

4) The fact that car prices are so high is the reason there is so much competition at the sub-$25,000 level. WRX's, Neon SRT's, and Protege whatever they call it are still only that cheap because of the higher prices. It's giving the low-end buyers more bang-for-the-buck and the high-end buyers lose out more.

Enough of that. I'M WITH JVOJR - IT SUCKS.
But unless we all take a pay cut, deal with it.

-Andrew