the old underpowered shitty american cars with huge engines that were detuned to shit

hell even in the 90s with the US spec M3 that was detuned

and now, look to china with western cars

where because of import taxes and taxes on big engines

they offered really horrible engines in huge cars

there was a jag XJ on sale in china with a 2.0 diesel

Those 1970s engines weren't detuned by choice.

That was universal emissions regulations that choked those

"Regulations affect products on the market" god forbid

That was a "emit less than this or don't sell the car at _all_" situation

Businesses do business anyway

the car industry does not operate to make any kind of loss, instead it will deceive regulators and consumers while maintaining profit

that means that regulations force substandard products usually

but car manufacturers aren't going to start producing things that literally wont sell

Hol' up

cocaine why are you the only rational person in this chat

Was it the Porsche 944 or some other car that...wait I'm gonna need to look this up to get numbers

@Sediment It would be incredibly unusual for an industry to not have loss leaders.

I don't know of any other industry that does, at least not that sells directly to private consumers

What the fuck do you think a loss leader is for?

What is the function of a loss leader

Or other products sold for a loss.

loss leaders don't work in the car industry

No one is going to the car store for a big sale and then deciding "Oh while I'm here let me just spend *an extra fifty thousand dollars*"

loss leaders work for places like walmart to get people through the door and buy the loss product and other products which counter the loss, but yeah

cars are mostly a one off purchase

You can, however, sell a car with the intention of shining positive light on a brand

Ie, halo cars

but no mass production car can do that because it would be too costly

I will apologize for being rude earlier. @Sediment I was frustrated after the deal with Matt.

I won't apologize but I will accept yours

Well....fuck you I guess?

Did you mean that to sound assholish?

It kind of did.

ford europe got themselves into a slight issue by basically upping the quality of the fiesta and focus so far that it was better than the vast majority of their competitors but simultaneously couldn't up their cost to match due to the brand

they weren't making a loss, but it ate into profits a fair chunk

Alright I will admit I was wrong on the subject of selling the cars at a complete loss.

Word of advice though, @Sediment Going on the back end of horseshit and calling names tends to result in more shit being stirred up

ford now sell the fiesta at the same money as the vw polo, but it means a lot of people buy the polo because "german engineering" while the fiesta is the better car

Brand loyalty is disgusting

Hell "[x] country makes this car so I love it" loyalty is disgusting