Ok... let’s do that. Fortunately, the American Automotive Labeling Act requires automakers to report this information, it is all compiled and listed online. For 2015 models, here are the cases where an engine or transmission is made in China:

Ford Mustang: Manual transmissions (some sourced from Mexico)
Nissan Sentra:…

Access to remove/add equipment.

The picture shows that building is on top of a dam. It wouldn’t be unusual to have such a structure to house equipment for dam operations... such as opening a sluice gate - for which you would likely have a motor house to lift / lower the gate - and the equipment could be mounted above…

There was also the plethora of automatic transmission problems on that generation of Civic.

If it makes you feel better, I’ve got a 2010 Mazda6. Five years on, and not one speck of rust. Underbody looks perfect. I’ve seen some 1st gen Mazda3s with rust, but nothing anywhere near as bad as this photo.

5th:

By the time all pay is taken into account, you’re probably looking at around a $900 price difference on assembly labor costs between China and the US, with the gap rapidly shrinking. But then you have several hundred extra in shipping costs.

There’s a reason automakers aren’t doing this already - it isn’t a…

I don’t have time to search for horrid deals, but in trying to price out whether I want to offer to buy a relative’s Ford Fusion, I ran across this:

“You guys, I think Donald Trump may be full of shit.”

Did you just figure this out? You didn’t even get tipped off by his claims that he helped pressure Ford into bringing jobs from Mexico to the US at the Avon Lake plant by attacking Ford’s investment in Mexico the day before (let’s forget that the Avon Lake move was…

Meh - if Trump had invested his inheritance in the S&P 500, he’d be a significantly richer man today. Not sure how much success there is in inheriting a fortune and underperforming the market.

The guy driving this truck onto the plane better have gone to the bathroom first - cause he was certainly in there for the whole ride.

Have you ever seen video of the PEPCON explosion in Nevada? Fortunately not in a populated area, and somehow only two people died.

Ford has actually reduced capacity in Mexico since NAFTA passed - even after the “new plants” (really just expansions of existing ones) are built. There are many companies that have truly shifted capacity distribution to Mexico that he could have chosen instead (Nissan, VW, Honda, Toyota, Chrysler)

It’s actually a very poor bargaining chip, really. Ford’s sales are currently too high and capacity too constrained to allow them to close another plant. In addition, the Wayne plant was completely rebuilt only a few years ago - there is WAY too much capital for them to depreciate effectively. The union knows that…

More likely it was due to the sales price they could achieve. The Fiesta is built to be cheap. Pure and simple. The Element took a cheap platform and made it expensive. They could afford based on the sales price to put more effort into it. The Fiesta is lucky to break even.

Look at the Fusion, for example - until…

The Stutz Black Hawk.. any model/year combo.

Yeah - look at the companies that article names as examples:

1) FedEx - founded in 1971, profitable in 1975. 4 years.
2) Amazon - founded in 1994, first annual profit in 2003, though losses in years prior always presaged significant growth the next year. 9 years.
3) Turner Broadcasting - profitable until it merged with…

Amazon and Google are operating on a different plane than Tesla. Google is pulling in consistent profits - and no one would consider them to be a startup. They aren’t losing money. They’re simply investing profits into future growth markets. Amazon is piling their money into massive growth, but they aren’t pulling…

Yep - and anytime Amazon takes a breather in development for just a few months, you see profits pop back into play. Their growth has truly been exponential. The fact that they can do this and not pull massive losses is impressive. Tesla really needs to get to breakeven ASAP or they’re done for.

Investing in the gigafactory doesn’t create operating losses - that is a capital investment. It will create a cash burn, but the costs are depreciated over the life of the building and the equipment. It has almost zero effect on the operating profit (or rather, hefty operating loss) on which the $4000 figure is based.…

Ok, sure. Its a business strategy. Or mindset. Whatever you want to call it.

12 years of massive cash burn, losses with no end in sight, and no apparent ability to get on a path to profitability. Any startup would be dead and buried by this point.

Yeah - Amazon gets a lot of criticism for lack of profits. But there’s a big difference between them and Tesla. Amazon is dumping a lot of money into development of new business that can’t be capitalized, but rather is expensed - and those new businesses lose money for awhile then start to pull profits. You could…