Cars.com Kicks Off Annual "American Made" Debate: Ford Falling?

Edward Niedermeyer
by Edward Niedermeyer

Every June cars.com trolls the protectionist elements of the car guy world by trotting out its “American Made Index,” which has been topped by the Toyota Camry for the third year running. So what’s cars.com’s criteria for the American Made Index? According to a presser

Cars.com’s annual American-Made Index ranks the most-American vehicles based on percentage of their parts that are made domestically, where they are assembled and how many are sold to U.S. buyers.

That last bit goes a long way towards explaining the Camry/Accord dominance: this is not just a measure of assembly and “domestic parts content” (which NHTSA strangely counts as parts made in the US or Canada), but popularity with Americans as well. If, on the other hand, you just look at the raw 2011 “domestic” parts content percentages… well, it tells a slightly different story.

This is the list of all the vehicles that NHTSA confirms are made with 75% or more “domestic” parts content [full list in PDF here]. Notice anything interesting? I’ll leave you to draw your own conclusions about how cars.com cooks these numbers to get to their AMI, but here’s a quick comparison that’s worth noting: last year, Ford had nine vehicles with 90% domestic parts content or more. This year, only the dying Sport Trac maintains any presence at all above the 89% threshold. As goes Ford, so goes the world of 90%+ “domestic” vehicles…


Edward Niedermeyer
Edward Niedermeyer

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  • Bryce Bryce on Jun 27, 2011

    GM build all it 6cyl engines in Australia at fishermans bend

  • Obruni Obruni on Jun 28, 2011

    for the people looking to buy a car untouched by union labor: good luck. you will be depriving yourself of most of the products from the German car makers; as well as anything made in Mexico, Japan, and South Korea. You can forget about the Mini as well. have fun in your boring CamCord!

    • See 2 previous
    • Geeber Geeber on Jun 28, 2011

      @geeber Not in the real world. Most of us realize that there is a considerable difference between EPA ratings and real-world numbers. That comes from personal experience - much like the appreciation for the superior engineering, build quality and reliability of these cars.

  • John Horner John Horner on Jun 28, 2011

    Ancient treaties with Canada have the US counting Canadian work as "domestic", which is silly if you care about such things. If the NHTSA is going to publish this kind of data (and what does this have to do with Traffic Safety???), then they should publish it for NAFTA zone production and not include Canada whilst excluding Mexico. Pre-NAFTA, there was a certain kind of logic to the US-Canada grouping thanks to old treaties. But now, it makes no sense.

    • Wmba Wmba on Jun 28, 2011

      John, the only thing I'll say is that Canada chucked in over $10 billion to keep GM and Chrysler afloat a couple of years ago, TWICE the per capita loans from the US government. The Mexican contribution was, so far as I know, zip, nada, nil, zero. So, at least as far as the bailout was/is concerned perhaps you Americans can at least acknowledge that GM and Chrysler Canadian operations are "domestic". We think of them as domestic in Canada, and the average joe here thinks a Civic or RX350 almost entirely manufactured in Ontario as an "import". Mexico does nothing but complain about border policies and offers only cheap labor for the car industry, and then exports the majority of their output to the US and Canada with no tariffs charged due to NAFTA. Ultimately though, either a free trade zone is a free trade zone or it's not. If it really is, then I agree, Mexican sourcing should be part of "domestic" content in the US and Canada and vice versa. However, I wonder if any US or Canadian production actually is exported to Mexico. It's very much a one way street, and has contributed mightily to the demise of US and Canadian industrial production, even before the monolith of Chinese production.

  • 86er 86er on Jun 28, 2011
    That last bit goes a long way towards explaining the Camry/Accord dominance: this is not just a measure of assembly and “domestic parts content” (which NHTSA strangely counts as parts made in the US or Canada) Your auto industry is our auto industry.
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