The changes affecting the global auto industry are nothing new but they are more serious. Too bad carmakers didn't learn the first timeIf hindsight is 20-20 vision, then automotive executives must spend a lot of time looking in the rear-view window.
Like many great industries, the auto sector has seen tremendous achievements, pioneered new technologies, and changed the course of history. But it has also had its share of blunders and missteps; some worse than others. What is different today is that many of these bad ideas are responsible for the woeful state in which the auto industry, Detroit in particular, currently finds itself.
The biggest of these, obvious to anyone who has tried to fill up his sport-utility vehicle or pickup truck lately, is that General Motors (GM), Ford (F), Chrysler and, to lesser extents, companies such as Mercedes-Benz (DAI), Porsche (PSHG), and BMW (BMWG) continued to make fuel-inefficient cars for the U.S. market long after concerns about America's dependence on oil, foreign or otherwise, became known. Like cigarette smokers, they continued puffing away, ignoring the mountain of evidence detailing the dangers.
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