re: why can't American car companies compete on reliability

My last Silverado was very reliable. So was my last Tahoe.

Not sure I'd buy an economy car from the same company though.

People buy new cars every three years, so the engineers shoot for three years or 100k of reliability. Why would they over build something? It would just cost more

The roads weren't full of potholes.

Germany is very unionized but not like our unions

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Germany is very unionized but not like our unions

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Same with Japan autoworkers.

TOKYO (Bloomberg) -- Labor unions at all of Japan's automakers are seeking an increase in base salaries and bonuses, as companies including Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. forecast record profits this fiscal year.

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I'm saying we have way more domestic vehicles sold in the US, so more people have domestics that break down.

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This is just dumb. All of these statistics are rates, not total number of issues.

Honda has been falling in reliability ratings along with Acura. i think they have some major issues with the Civic. MDX gets reviews of developing rattles.

Audi surprises me too, I would need a few more years of data before dropping $60k+ on one of their cars.

https://www.dashboard-light.com
Another source of reliability data. Different method of obtaining the data and mostly similar results. Only considers mechanical reliability (engine and transmission)

Now go look up the most recalled vehicles over the last five years.

How many of those "foreign" cars are now made in the USA?

I have friends that work as technicians in the auto industry (*Sauces... lol). Some of which started in the 70's out of high school and still work in that industry.

Here are a few tid-bits of information that have been passed on to me through recently by them.

-American and Japanese car mfg design their vehicles with the idea they will have 250K miles put on them.

-Statistically, the frequency of repairs increase substantially on a vehicle after 80k miles.

-American mfg have a tendency to roll out new tech in their models faster than Japanese Mfg. While new tech is tested it is not usually proven in real life so as a result, Japanese mfg vehicles tend to be marginally more reliable (as in less prone to minor problems such as switches, buttons, software glitches, ect..)than their American counter parts.

I have no independent data to support any of the above. Merely what I have been told..

I believe the Lexus hype too. I really do. I still think if they made dually's and 3/4 trucks that got really put to work their reliability would suffer. How could it not. Look I know why Buick is up there and Chevy/GMC isn't. Because going to church and the grocery store once a week ain't a lot of abuse.