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I'd say American car companies. Due to market consolidation and car brands being a symbol of national pride, they were able to enshitify in the 1970's and 80's, producing low-quality expensive cars. Competition from Japan in the late 80's and 90's forced them to improve. American cars still trail behind Japanese cars in quality, but they've gotten much better.
Free and fair competition is essential to any economy. The gutting of antitrust laws in the USA is partly to blame for whatever you call this system we have now (I can't confidently say it's capitalism anymore).
Hard disagree lol, the American OEM standard is a bar so far down you can see the sparks of hell. The improvement was just their initial attempt to catch up before they gave up.
They nuked the EPA regulations which is why everything in the US is an SUV now and they bypassed competition with Japenese OEMs by lobbying congress to make anti import laws (exactly like what they are doing right now for Chinese EVs) which is how we got all these hodpe podge 90s era hybrid deal brands like diamond star or mazda & ford.
By the time those brands finally entered the US market with local production in full, they had already learned the gg ez system from their American counterparts and began to follow the same crappy practices of reducing cost and quality on every possible corner.
I wouldn't buy a Ford vehicle of this decade even if it ends up being cheaper because the thing is made of ABS plastic and Chinese aluminum glued together with the freshly harvested tears of their yearly department layoffs.
I'd argue that the big ~~3~~ 2 never recovered. Car design peaked in the 1920s and never recovered when the larger corps lobbied/wrote safety and fuel standards to force the mass consolidation of companies down to 3. Innovation slowed down so much and it is why China is going to eat our lunch through the transition to BEVs.
Cronyism is the system we have
I agree with you. Ford still sucks though. if only for the awful interiors.
I once heard a take that American cars prioritized a great experience under the hood (spacious, easier to work on, fun to show off) ...but cramped, uncomfortable cabins, while Japanese cars did the opposite.
My old Honda Element (RIP) seemed to support this theory: Interior passenger comfort? SO much leg room and dude, the back was basically luxury theater seating! That thing was ROOMY.
Working on it though? Half the time it legit felt like the only way to get to The Thing You Had To Fix was to run it through a Honda assembly line backwards.
...Or have a VERY strong octopus friend who could work a socket wrench...
That engine compartment was not made for human mechanics once the thing was put together. The starter location was EVIL.
Helped a friend replace the alternator on a 1990 Honda Prelude once. The official procedure was to disconnect one of the engine mounts and jack the engine up a few inches to create a path to get the alternator out. Crazy.
Pour one out for the Honda Element IYKYK!
Japanese cars are currently in a state of industrial shittiness. If the US is still trailing them, there is no hope for the US car industry.
They've been a bit more spotty on a couple engines and transmissions, but dollar for dollar they're still averaging above US on reliability most of the time. Pretty much every car company has had a few complete disasters over the past decade.
I wonder how many companies love the cyber truck for making their failures look good?
Tesla in general. BYD is going to absolutely crush the global market, though. Anywhere they're allowed to sell, they're going to dominate. Better battery tech for way cheaper. Tesla won't shake the global market much, but China will do it.