[jyl]

Just because a Congressman is talking about the MPG issue doesn't mean that the car company's management isn't aware of the quality issue. They definitely are.

And some of those "car guys" had their heads in the sand. Bob Lutz is an example - I think he spent the last decade of his career badly out of touch with the future direction of the auto industry and the consumer. if he hadn't been so vocal about hybrids not making sense, global warming being a crock of *****, the rebirth of retro muscle cars, etc, maybe GM would have a Volt to sell today and for less than $40K too. Maybe they'd have more unit-body compact SUVs, more and better compact cars.

I do think Detroit has a MPG problem. Their MPG problem isn't so much on a head-to-head comparison of equivalent models, but in the model mix, especially at the two ends of the spectrum.

At one end, Detroit is far too reliant on large SUVs and pickup trucks, and lag in small SUV/SAV/minivan built on car platforms. I'm not saying we shouldn't have full-size pickup trucks, but if you agree that oil prices will trend higher over the next 10 years and you don't expect another housing boom anytime soon, then its not a good thing to depend on the 1/2 ton P/U for your profits.

At the other end, Detroit is way behind in the highest-MPG platforms. Toyota and Honda have affordable and effective hybrid cars now, the Europeans have high-MPG diesel technology, and Detroit's hybrid cars are still concepts or will be egregiously overpriced (GM Volt). I'm not counting Detroit's lipstick-on-a-pig "hybrid SUVs" like the Tahoe Hybrid which can't even beat the non-hybrid Toyota Highlander in rated MPG.

I agree Detroit also has a quality/reliability problem. Ford has made the most progress here, current Fords are roughly equivalent to or even better than most European makes, even if they still have a gap to the Japanese. GM and Chrysler have not made as much progress. But even for Ford, it will take many years for good quality to show up in resale values - a bad reputation is hard to erase. And even Ford still needs to catch up in perceived quality - how are the interior materials, how nice is the trim, etc.