“WORKMANSHIP MYTH” 1970s DOCUMENTARY FILM AMERICAN VS FOREIGN CAR COMPANIES AUTO WORKERS 66474

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This documentary film "The Workmanship Myth" was created by acclaimed journalist Martin Agronsky and produced by the Bill Sandy Company. It examines the comparative quality of workmanship in American car factories vs. foreign car manufacturers in the late 1970s. The film seems to date to between 1977 and 1979, a time when domestic car production was under threat by foreign cars, especially Japanese cars, which the public perceived as better quality products. Throughout his documentary report, Agronsky interviews various key figures who comment on the international market for manufactured products in the 1970s, especially cars. Interviewees include: Japanese business managers (3:00), a representative from the U.S. Department of Commerce (5:00), youth and auto workers (8:45, 13:35), and a General Motors executive (14:45). Footage of various 1970s vehicles parked and in motion and car assembly lines in the U.S. and elsewhere are a major component of the film, interspersed with the interviews.
Contents in detail:
Recreational baseball, man slides to makes second base (0:05). Various individuals in the 1970s (0:25). TV store; Colortrak sign (0:40). Martin Agronsky discusses labor market in 1970s (0:45). Title: “The Workmanship Myth” (1:35). Martin Agronsky speaks to camera about work and workmanship (1:45). Busy Japanese department store (Isetan) in the 1970s: children play with toys (Tonka truck); towels; clothing; jewelry; Polaroid camera; Pulsar LED watch; pens with American flags; Stanley tools (2:22). Interview with Kazumasa Kohshiba, Isetan Tokyo department store manager, about American consumer product imports (“functional, durable, reasonable”) (3:05). Customers and salesman at Japanese Black & Decker department store: small appliances, tennis rackets, American paraphernalia (4:30). American Ace cargo ship, shipping containers, American flag; crane moving shipping container off ship (4:50). Martin Agronsky interviews Charles Hostler, Deputy Assistant Security for International Commerce (U.S. Department of Commerce) (5:08). Martin Gronsky addresses camera while on warehouse lift (6:15). Workers on assembly line at Volkswagen car factory (6:30). Women drive finished cars at Volkswagen factory (6:50). Agronsky addresses camera again (7:00). Cars drive through Equitable Trust Bank (7:15). Sleek red car (ID?) drives through Jack in the Box (7:20). 1970s Toyota cars drive off Toyota ship (7:29). Various different 1970s cars parallel parked (7:30). Agronsky at dark assembly line presents information about American job loss in 1970s (7:40). Young man in leather jacket interviewed at unemployment office (8:49). Agronsky speaking again (9:12). Three-lane American highway, 1970s (9:30). Visual sequence outlining car purchase rationale: cheap cars listed (Datsun Honeybee, Honda, Toyota Corolla, AMC Gremlin, Pinto Pony, Fiat 128, Subaru, Chevette, Vega); EPA fuel economy rankings explained (Honda CVCC, VW Rabbit, Chevrolet Chevette, Datsun B210, Subaru, Pinto Pony MPG) (9:35). Agronsky presents at car park (10:40). Various 1970s car owners are interviewed about perceptions of foreign manufacturing (11:40). Datsun, Fiat, and Chevette assembly lines; phenomenon of temporary workers in Germany discussed (12:03). 1970s American auto workers interviewed-Mike Schutak, Marlin Whitey Ford (of UAW Local 1112 Ohio) (13:35). Agronsky speaks to camera; headlines highlighted about new Volvo and VW U.S. factories (14:20). Agronsky interviews General Motors Vice President Robert Lund (Chevrolet General Manager)-workforce quality; “the bottom line of technology is still people…” (14:45). Various steam engines in Smithsonian Museum, train steam engine display (16:30). Agronsky speaks at Smithsonian Museum amid various historic engines (16:50). Various shots of American men working at factories; narration: “We are the American workers. We are not some nameless, faceless legion; we are us.” (17:15). Credits: The Smithsonian Institution; Chevrolet Division, General Motors Corp.; U.S. Department of Commerce; Isetan Co. LTD., Tokyo; U.S.A. Embassy, Tokyo; Bill Sandy company (17:50).
This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit www.PeriscopeFilm.com

[@Nomorewarsforisrael]

This is the type of thing we’d have to watch in jr high school whenever there was a substitute.

[@paleghost]

The most ironic part was the Vega being used as an example of quality and worker pride in a job well done. . GM was pushing output at the Vega Lordstown Plant to the point where it had the highest productivity in the world. It also had the lowest quality and highest degree of worker dissatisfaction. The workforce was sabotaging cars in protest of the line speedups and poor working conditions. Poor design decisions such as too small radiators led to engine overheating and excessive oil burning. Eliminating the inner fender liners contributed to the Vega's rusting out before the cars were half paid for. Favorably comparing the Vega to a contemporary Toyota was delusional.

[@AudiophileTubes]

Lordstown, LOL! And look at how they abruptly stopped making the P.O.S. Chevy Cruze there as well! You would think that American manufacturers would learn from the superior Japanese, all these decades!

[@lukestrawwalker]

@@TugIronChief Don't forget the Chevette... OMG what a TOTAL POS... OL J R : )

[@lukestrawwalker]

@Not Expat Joe Yeah when I was in mechanic's school one of my instructors told a story about a brand new Cadillac that kept coming back with the owner griping about a rattle... They had test driven it and worked on it several times, kept coming back, so finally one day in desperation they tore the entire dash out of it and AC unit down to the firewall... when they got it all apart they noticed some tape and a string on the firewall, going over the edge of a hole in the sheet metal down between layers of steel sheet in the firewall. They pulled the tape loose and pulled the string out of the firewall hole, only to find 2-3 washers tied onto the string a few inches apart, and a note at the end something like "Ha ha, fvckers" or something of that sort... disgruntled factory employees had put it there.

[@DerwoodPFreen]

I worked with a guy who had worked there and he told me the same thing, 30 years ago.

[@googleusergp]

@@lukestrawwalker My coworker worked at a local Cadillac dealer and was told to bring a car from storage to the shop for prep. When he got halfway up the ramp, the car died. They had to push it into the bay. Got into looking at it, and there was a handful of pushrods just thrown into the engine before it was assembled. This was a 1984 or so Fleetwood Brougham, rear wheel drive (with an HT4100 V8). He had to take photos of it otherwise no one would believe him. Another time at the same dealer, a customer bought a car back to the shop saying it had a bad odor. After some investigation, they took off the door panel to find a rotten half eaten sandwich tossed into the door before the panel was put on.

[@pauldg837]

And the American, Dr.Edward Deming was wholly instrumental in introducing to Japan new methods in manufacturing, addressing both improving quality and productivity. The Deming Award is still highly coveted today in Japan. I was fortunate enough to have met Dr.Deming when in his later years, he was a consultant to our company. Even in his later years, he had incredible foresight and remained a remarkable visionary.

[@alextallen8019]

I love reading about him. His lectures are hard to watch, but the points he makes are amazing. Really cuts through a lot of the bullshit

[@symbionese2348]

W. Edwards Deming: a hero to modern manufacturing; and, of course, ignored by the leaders of U.S. automobile manufacturing (mostly drunken.)

[@andrewnardo1021]

The irony is cars of this era were heaps for the most part. The auto makers got caught on their heals when foreign company’s rebuilt post WW2 and to compete the US automakers pinched penny’s on materials and engineering to keep margins high instead of eating it and accepting it as it was. People forget that our golden years of manufacturing post WW2 were literally because we had no competition and we were rebuilding everything we blew up in the war. The same goes for the steel industry, once Europe and Japan were mostly rebuilt, the need for our massive mills fell off. Their smaller mills could do multiple heats of different material a lot faster and cheaper. But instead of modernizing our mills, the CEOs just kept plugging along thinking they werent that far behind and not willing to sink the money into modernizing the plants until it was too late. As much as some people try to blame the unions, it was American industries inability to adapt and change that killed them, not the unions.

[@johnstuartsmith]

The unions aren't the people who design the cars or scrutinize the designs to nickel and dime every bit of extra quality out of what gets assembled into a car. At the GM Lordstown plant assembly workers were forced to assemble Chevy Vegas from collections of cheap parts at an ever-increasing pace in horrible working conditions. It was a case study in how not to manage an assembly plant. If GM hadn't tried to blow-mold a cheap aluminum engine and put another hundred bucks into the the Vega's cooling system, it could have been a great success, but too many of the original Vegas were delivered to dealers as flawed trash and few of them were on the roads after 2 years.

[@stevecagle2317]

I was a teen in the late 70s and my Dad worked for Allison gas turbine. As a GM employee, he got a discount on GM cars and would buy one, sometimes two new cars each year. He bought mostly Oldsmobiles but the last car he bought which I drove was a '79 Pontiac Grand Prix. We ordered it and when it arrived, the dealership called so we could pick it up... I guess they thought we wouldn't notice but on the front of the hood we're 3 big rings in the paint that looked like someone at the factory had set cans on it while the paint was wet! This made it past whatever "quality control" GM had at the time... Basically NONE! That the dealership thought we'd accept this was a double insult. Over my objection, they talked Dad into letting them repaint it... They did and the paint never matched the rest of the car knocking at least $1,000 off trade in value. The following year, I bought my first car... A 1980 Honda Accord... Dad was pissed but that car lasted 5 years - by 2 years, our GM cars were costing us so much in maintenance fixing broken stuff because warranty was only one year & 12,000 miles. In 5 years and 50,000 miles+ the only thing I paid for was oil changes, tire rotation, one new set of tires and turned the front brake rotors! So, don't tell me how great GM cars of the 70s were! It's well known how bad they sucked and I saw it first hand! 😡

[@somersetdc]

Trying to shame Americans because they didn't want to buy a second rate domestic car is absurd.

[@snarky_user]

Martin, while One Percent (maybe) more American cars were still on the road after June years, you've failed to tell us: 1) How much money has been spent to keep them running? 2) How many are still being driven by their original owners? I remember those days. It was common practice for "middle class" people to buy a new American car every three years before passing off the used car to a blue collar guy who could work on it himself for another few years before passing it off to a poor guy or teenager as a beater. Meanwhile, the working class guy could buy a Datsun or Honda and drive it for many years with few repairs until it was time to pass it off to one of his kids.

[@nlpnt]

Unless it was a road-salt state. Those early Japanese cars rusted almost as bad as Fiats and Vegas.

[@howebrad4601]

Datsuns in the 70s rusted so bad they wouldn't make it more than 5 or 6 years. my 79 Datsun 210 rusted so bad the suspension control arms separated from the chassis. still ran great but the steel, fabrics, and general material quality was horrendous

[@CaptHollister]

American car companies trying to defending themselves for their shoddy workmanship. Hilarious. Those of us who were around in the 70s remember how bad they were compared to what the Japanese were selling. Notice that they ask the Japanese importers about US tools and toys, not about US cars.

[@emanuelmifsud6754]

I worked here Australia in 1980s making variable ratio power steering components under Arthur Bishop the inventor. His biograpy book states that the reason Americans have like 8 lane highways is because of the poor steering workmanship and therefore one needs that amount of space to steer an American car. I realise it is tongue in cheek, but the units we built were being put in local cars and Mercedes. I know the quality was excellent when it left the plant. I tested many material to ASTM standards and signed off to their quality. Australia now imports all cars and manufacturing is virtually non-existent, curiosity of our government.

[@discerningmind]

I'm an old once gearhead and life-long car enthusiast. I can say that if you go to some vintage car shows and take a look at our American cars from the 1970s, you'll find that by-and-large our cars were beautiful, well-made, and comfortable. And I can confirm that they would last to 150K or more which was excellent at the time. It wasn't long before, in the 1960's that if you wanted a car to last that long you had to buy more expensive cars, like Oldsmobile, Buick, or Cadillac, in short. Though Ford and Chrysler did have long-lived cars back then. In the early 1970s foreign cars were still well known for not holding up to the distances we drive here. Think of crossing our southwest desert states, Colorado, and many other places that were hard on cars. It wasn't until the mid-70s that our cars were getting a bad rap primarily due to the infancy of heavy emission controls. The Japanese cars and the small German cars drove differently than most of what we were building and were appealing to a younger market. Auto magazine writers praised the foreign cars because they had something new to write about. However, the Ford Pinto and the Chevrolet Chevette were excellent cars that lasted over 100K, mostly trouble free and they were inexpensive to repair when needed. (Save the Pinto wise cracks) The imports were expensive to repair. The other bad rap was that the American manufacturers were slow to make improvements, particularly GM. In the mid-70s they had a run of door pull straps that would constantly rip off in various makes and models of theirs, and the same design kept turning up year after year. That didn't make the whole car bad though. I wish we could buy brand-new 1970s American cars now. They were a lot nicer than the boring black and gray things we're forced into now, and they were a lot more comfortable too.

[@CaptHollister]

@@discerningmind There is confirmation bias at work here. Any car from the 1970s that survived until today is likely to have been a particularly good unit to begin with. The majority were not as good. I don't know where you live, but up here US cars of the 1970s generated countless jokes about their biodegradability. It is equally true that a car that somehow managed to reach 160k km (100k miles) would very likely be a rolling wreck on its last legs. US cars were not alone in this. The 1970s saw the end of many of the cheaper European cars in Canada like Austin and their dreadful Marina, or Fiat and Peugeot, with the notable exception of Renault which had moderate success with the R5 and R12. Ironically, both the Fiat 124 and Renault R12 would soon return in the guise of their communist versions, the Lada and Dacia respectively which both had quite a bit of success (to this day the Lada remains the most successful new-car launch in Canadian history). The 1970s is the decade when Japanese manufacturers came into their own in our market. They were tough and universally well-made. My wife had a Pinto in her student days and my dad had a Chevette. They were not unreliable, but they were painfully basic, especially the Chevette. By the the time my dad bought his Chevette, you could buy the earliest Hyundais in Canada. The Pony (a model never sold in the US) was very similar to the Chevette in size, layout, even in overall shape, but it was cheaper and was much better finished and came with more equipment. At least the Chevette was indeed dirt cheap to maintain, but that didn't keep my dad's from blowing the main seal on the 1.6L engine after just a couple of years of service. That said, before the Chevette, dad had a 1975 Chevy Caprice company car. This was the last year before GM began downsizing their larger cars. Big and comfy (though the seats smelled funny when it was parked in the sun), but also thirsty and the inside room was smaller than the outside would lead you to believe. It wasn't until the 1990s that US automakers really upped their game with much improved quality and durability.

[@Chris_at_Home]

@@discerningmind You are correct about the mileage of an American car back then. Most Japanese cars back then were 100,000 mile cars. I owned a various cars in the 70s including a 73 Cheyenne Blazer, a Volvo 145,, Audi sedan and two Datsun pickups one that I moved to Alaska in in 79. It would never start when the temperatures were below zero. In 1981 I bought 3 Chevy trucks, a 3/4 ton van, a 4x4 pickup and a Blazer all late 70s. The engines were all the same and I put torquer cams in all 3. I still have 3 Chevy pickups spanning almost 40 years and they all run great. Another thing is parts for American cars were a lot less expensive and most places had them in stock.

[@discerningmind]

@@Chris_at_Home Well said. Thanks for that.

[@calbob750]

When you bought a new car in the 70’s you probably paid $125-150 dealer prep fee. This was to fix the problems that were ignored when the car rolled off the assembly line. The philosophy was “pump em out and off the line” and let the dealer fix the problems. In the fifties a statistical engineer Edward Demming approached the American car manufacturers with the Total Quality Management concept. He was ignored and the Japanese auto industry listened. If you’re old enough you’ll remember the early difference in quality between US and Japanese cars.

[@stifledvoice]

US consumers bought more reliable cars from overseas because the US made some real crap cars in the 1970s.

[@20alphabet]

@Georg Andexler Andexler Jay Leno said Dr. Kevorkian sued Yugo for patent infringement.

[@Doodlesthegreat]

@Georg Andexler Andexler Yugo: 0 to 60 in three... tries.

[@CaptHollister]

@Georg Andexler Andexler In the conclusion of their road test of the Yugo, Car and Driver summed it by saying that no one should poverty that seriously and if all you had was Yugo money you should spend in on a used Toyota.

[@cipherthedemonlord8057]

Minus AMC and Ford trucks pretty much.

[@jasonhsu4711]

At 9:47, you see a list of 9 car models. One is from a company no longer in business (AMC), and one is from a company that pulled out of the US market but returned to haunt Americans by buying Chrysler (Fiat). One was infamous for exploding (Ford Pinto), one was infamous for a self-warping engine (Chevrolet Vega), and one was infamous for being miserable in a general kind of way (Chevrolet Chevette). That's 5 of the 9 cars. The rest are Datsun (now Nissan), Honda, Toyota, and Subaru. Unfortunately, Nissan has gone down the tubes ever since Renault acquired it. There's another example of a an automaker that pulled out of the US market and then returned to haunt Americans by buying a major automaker. This one stings even more, because Nissan used to be be known for making quality cars, while Chrysler's high water mark in quality was the K car of the 1980s.

[@robkunkel8833]

Lot’s of information here. Interesting.

[@Paramount531]

Nissan quality.....doubling down on the POS Jatco CVT transmission, with consumers paying high repair bills. Thanks, Renault.

[@discerningmind]

Subaru still has engine heads that don't hold up. That issue dates back decades and yet they won't fix it. The K-cars were not a high water mark. Prior to 1975 a Chrysler was the best car you could buy going back to 1926. Dodge and Plymouth were good cars. You just weren't around back then to know these things.

[@Bobo-ox7fj]

And half of Toyota's current range are Mazdas, Subarus or some other brand under the hood - not to say that's necessarily horrific, just that it shows all the gooduns are petering out. The day is rapidly approaching where you actually won't be able to buy a decent new vehicle anywhere, at any price.

[@BluetheRaccoon]

Having been poor since childhood, I learned how to identify quality at thrift stores early in life. It's been very disappointing seeing the quality decline over the years, as people are less able to afford quality and make do with what they can afford. I hope that "Right to Repair" at least makes us able to repair and maintain what we have instead of filling landfills with things that cannot be repaired. Workmanship is ideal, but these days it's a luxury.

[@lukestrawwalker]

We live in a "throw away" society and I don't see that changing. The companies make too much money selling us overpriced crap that is built like junk with low quality and over complicated parts that are prone to failure, and now they don't even provide repair parts for very long... That's why I'm still driving my 2002 F-150... there's things I don't like about it, it's not as good as the 96 F-150 I had before and it wasn't as good as the '91 I had before that, but these new ones-- COMPLETE junk, over complicated, and WAY WAY too expensive to buy and complicated/expensive to fix. SO long as my repair bills are a fraction of what the notes on something newer would be, I'll stick with the old stuff that I know that is tried and true. Later! OL J R: )

[@buckodonnghaile4309]

I miss the heavy smoker's voice that was ubiquitous back in the day. The grey haired guys talking in this were most likely WW2 vets If this was filmed in 70? Growing up in Canada back then it seemed everybody's grandad served.

[@jon9021]

Same with me growing up in England…except the BBC, who in those days, spoke with refined British accents!

[@lifeindetale]

Just smoke 3 packs A-day and you'll sound same.. hey back when cigarettes weren't 13$ pack

[@jesusislukeskywalker4294]

$50 a pack in Australia 🤠 unless you buy a cheap imported packet from china , im not joking 😂 and people here today can’t hardly even speak english 👍🏻

[@lifeindetale]

@@jesusislukeskywalker4294 no kiddin..

[@Gr8thxAlot]

You are correct. Charles Hostler who was interviewed was in the OSS, took part in D-Day, and worked with the French resistance. I miss this generation.

[@jeffpiatt3879]

Double post, but I had the luxury of owning both 1970's American Cars and a 1980 VW Rabbit. The quality difference was so obvious. The weatherstirpping was still good on the VW 10 years later, as was the paint. The car was still running 10 years later. The weather stripping was gone on the American cars after three years. The paint was dull after 3 years and fading through and flaking off after 5. None of the american cars made it to even 100K miles. The 70's was a terrible time for American cars.

[@discerningmind]

That's probably because when people buy foreign, they give it all kinds of TLC but they'll ignore the hell out of their American car.

[@patrickcannell2258]

Thanks to your EPA pests! Woke green brigade.

[@jimh2887]

Japanese car companies did something else very well, they really pushed good maintenance. It was pushed by the salesman from the very beginning.

[@nlpnt]

12:18 - that was a first-year, 1976 Chevette being built. Last year for Chevy Engine Red, they went to GM Corporate Blue for the engines starting in '77 and then black sometime in the early '80s.

[@jtsena]

American car makers were dragged kicking and screaming to the fuel economy market back in the '70s. When forced to finally dip their toe, they did so cheaply and half-heartedly (much as they are approaching the EV market today) and the product was far below the standards coming from Europe and Japan, where they had been coping with high fuel prices for years. As the purchaser of a 1978 Chevette in 1984, I can tell you it never quit on me. But the sheet metal body was the thickness of a Coors can. And it rattled and squeaked itself half to death by the time I traded it in 4 years later.

[@howebrad4601]

you're not entirely wrong, but they were told to do 3 opposite things at the same time. double fuel economy, cut pollution by 95 percent, and dramatically increase safety. efforts to increase safety usually meant more structure, which is weight, and that made economy worse. emission controls did clean up emissions but that also hurt economy. and having to do all three of these by government dictate faster than natural market forces demanded meant while doing these things costs were higher than they could've been and thorough engineering had to be rushed with many things rushed to market half baked. then to maintain cost control to keep prices in check cost cutting needed to be done elsewhere which lowered overall quality. look at the design, engineering, and quality of a mid 60s gm or Ford and its obvious they had the wherewithal to produce great products, so the fact that they struggled in the 70s and early 80s seems to indicate outside forces at play

[@dave1956]

I think that cars were the biggest example of how shoddy workmanship, but more importantly the attitude of the company came back to haunt America in the 70’s, 80’s and even today. Each side felt like the other was at fault. In the end we all saw who won and it wasn’t the American people, that’s for sure.

[@steven2212]

The Japanese outproduced and surpassed the US in reliability in the 70's and into the 80's. We built a lot of junk in the car industry, and paid a dear price. When a video has to be produced to bolster our own industry, there is a problem.

[@gmamagillmore4812]

I was a lifetime user of American made Craftsman tools. I would still buy them if Sears hadn't gone to South Est Asian crap.

[@jaminova_1969]

I turned in an American made 1/2 ratchet and they sent me a Made in China replacement. I miss walking into Sears and having it replaced on the spot. The irony is Sears, Wards, and Pennys invented "shop at home" and they all got plowed under by Amazon and cheap Chinese made junk.

[@tombrunila2695]

American managers wanted more short term profit. And by moving factories away from the USA they got cheaper labor. They also used the cheapest components they could find because that increased short term profit. They didn't care about retaining existing customers which is a good way to increase long term profit. .

[@mr.goodpliers6988]

In general, 70s cars left a lot to be desired, but some had exceptional durability in spite of themselves. Except Fiats, they were all junk.

[@jimkeskey]

70's cars were pretty frickin nice compared to the junk of the 80's. The U.S. really lost its mojo and only lately have they regained some of the ground they lost over those 40 years.

[@jaminova_1969]

My parents bought a Mazda RX6 in the early 70's. After my mother and baby brother were nearly killed by a guy in a Chevy, it was always big American tanks my family owned! I remember walking home from school and seeing Moms car in the driveway and it looked like a cube from one of those car crushers and thinking she was dead!

[@kc4cvh]

Small consolation, but the accident likely avoided the need for an engine rebuild. Wankel engines rarely made it to 50,000 miles without an apex seal failure, that plus poor fuel efficiency and constant oil consumption led American car makers to wisely abandon the rotary engine concept after initial investigation.

[@markthrasher6770]

Japan and other post WWII emerging economies and cultures had every right to repudiate America and the West. Workmanship wasn't the only things lagging and declining in our sphere. The take down and challenge did us good... American and Western workmanship has been steadily rebounding since the late 90's. I started buying Ford again in the 2000's. Most of my electronics and household items are American and European again. Many iconic American food brands have improved after years of poor quality. America and the West always had high quality workmanship on an independant and cottage industry level..... American art and culture is rebounding again, thanks to the internet, which again, is another form of localization and independent enfranchisment. Ironically, global forces plus overlooked potential domestically and failing to adapt and restructure in that regard probably played more of a hand in the West's recent declines.

[@blacksmith67]

I grew up with these cars and even owned 80s and 90s versions of a couple of them. My Chevette was a rust bucket that did zero to sixty in a couple of minutes. I’ve owned Ford and GM as well as Honda, Hyundai, Kia and Mazda. For at least four decades Japanese and later Korean cars were way better than their American counterparts. Better fuel economy, longer lasting, less rust, and less money spent on repairs. I probably have a bad case of observer bias, but my personal experience and that of my family, friends and acquaintances all seemed to support the general idea that NA cars were worse by far.

[@20alphabet]

Moral: Don't hire foreigners to build your cars. Japanese cars are built by Japanese people. Turks build German cars, Mexicans build American cars.

[@almostfm]

Let me tell you about my current car. Not counting normal consumables, I've: a) replaced the alternator b) had the radiator flushed and rebuilt c) replaced the Idle Air Control valve d) replaced three coil packs, e) had the clutch replaced, and f) had to replace the serpentine belt. Sounds like a pretty crappy car, right? Well, not really when you realize I bought it in 1999 and those are all the repairs I've had to do in 23 years of driving. Follow basic maintenance rules, and modern cars can last a long time.

[@Christian___]

Yes, typical '70s Silent Generation marketing 'buy my stuff or you're a traitor'.

[@walterkersting6238]

Watching this on a phone built with slave labor to a degree of medical reliability; you could trust this thing to regulate your heart…

[@tedsaylor6016]

The ad was right, American cars did not suck because of workmanship. They sucked because of penny-pinching exec's that wanted the cheapest parts available. A double life part that cost 1cent more than a spec life part would be rejected every time. The asians gave the consumer a better value, especially in the 70's & 80's.

[@Paramount531]

I agree, once Toyota opened plants in the US, their quality was excellent. Don't blame it on the workers, blame it on the Big 3 cutting every corner they could. If you design crap, a la Vega, your workers build crap and consumers seek better products from foreign manufacturers.

[@tedsaylor6016]

@@Paramount531 There are some vids on YT about the Vega. Some of the reasons given (and there are plenty) were "interbrand fighting" - aka parts of GM didn't like they had to work with other parts of GM so crap was designed. Wow.

[@jacksons1010]

Bingo! Anything to keep profits up in the short term, while ignoring the need to invest in new tooling. They squandered the goodwill and lost the confidence of the American consumer. American CEO’s still get their big bonuses based on today’s profits, with no obligation to ensure future competitiveness.

[@MrSloika]

I had relatives who worked at Ford Mahwah Assembly, which was closed in 1980. One of these relatives told me an interesting story about working the line at Ford's. The efficiency experts calculated that the median acceptable defect rate for cars would be 'X' if the line was running at maximum production capacity.. If the median defect rate was less than 'X', it was assumed that the line was not running at maximum capacity. So, if the line workers did a good job, and the defect rate was lower than the rate calculated by the efficiency people, the line workers were 'rewarded'. The were rewarded by having the line sped up or by management pulling people off the line. In other words, if the line workers did a good job, they screwed themselves. The workers than retaliated by deliberately making 'mistakes'. Leaving out parts, installing parts incorrectly etc. It was things like this that poisoned the relationship between management and labor, something US industry has still not recovered from.

[@thomasmelnick9140]

@@MrSloika I was told at the Mahwah plant workers would put rocks in body cavities and weld them closed. How sad if this is true.

[@twokool4skool129]

"Buy local" sounds good, but at the end of the day, you need things to work. In 1980, my parents bought a Honda Civic and an Oldsmobile Cutlas Sierra. The Civic was so reliable and virtually maintenance free that they were able to use it for 20 years. The Oldsmobile, which costed more, had something break down every year. My parents weren't rich. Were they supposed to drive a terrible car, that's literally hurting their family, just to theoretically "help" someone they've never met? The union workers wouldn't do that for them. Why should they expect anyone to do it in return. Oh, and if you've never heard of Oldsmobile before, it's because they finally went out of business after the brand was officially cancelled after the 2008 recession. Turns out no one, foreign or domestic, wanted to buy their terrible cars.

[@d.m.3645]

Your parents should have bought a Delta 88 it would have lasted longer.

[@ramongonzalez7458]

Gracias

[@Paramount531]

This is a laugh riot! There were some really hideous foreign cars shown, Fiats and the dreadful Audi Fox, along side equally hideous Chevettes. They really picked them! American consumers jumped ship to foreign brands after the 1973 fuel shortages as the domestic small cars were just crappy. The Vega rusted and the engine self destructed, the Gremlin was crude but more or less reliable, the Pinto was fairly reliable, but the Japanese makes tended to be more reliable and of higher quality. Detroit truly didn't get it and continued to not get it for years. I bought a new 1982 Honda Accord, my father in law paid about $2,000 more to buy a new Mustang. The Mustang was rough and crude with its 2.3 liter 4 banger, my Honda was like a fine watch in comparison, it also held its value much better. It took near collapse for Detroit to finally get the message, blaming consumers for being selfish by buying what served their best interests was just the wrong thing to do.

[@ramongonzalez7458]

Excellent

[@PeriscopeFilm]

Thank you! Cheers! Love our channel? Help us save and post more orphaned films! Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/PeriscopeFilm Even a really tiny contribution can make a difference. Join this channel to get access to perks: kzbin.info/door/ddem5RlB3bQe99wyY49g0gjoin

[@theplateisbad1332]

I like how the Isetan Tokyo manager praises foreign goods while probably knowing the planned strategy of hitting back, once the domestic industry had learned enough to do so.

[@bsteven885]

How ironic that quality suffered in American cars during the 1970s. 🤔 The American workers knew how to build cars, but the companies gave them poorly designed and engineered parts that eroded (literally and figuratively) their goodwill. The American People therefore started buying foreign cars that didn't need constant visits to the repair shop.

[@Randy.E.R]

Things were different then. If you bought something made in America back in the 1960s or 1970s, you kept it for a long time. Television, vacuum cleaner, washing machine, or anything else, you could expect to have them around a long time. That doesn't mean they didn't break, people actually repaired things then. Whether they repaired it themselves or had it done. Every small town had at least one appliance or TV repair shop. It was a profitable little business. People couldn't afford to replace things every couple of years. Inflation in the 1970s crippled most peoples wallets. You had to make things last or do without. When my wife and I married in 1983, we got my parent's clothes dryer the bought in 1966. It still worked just fine until 1990. By then, I couldn't find parts for it anymore. I realize most things aren't servicable anymore. If an LED television goes bad, there isn't much you can do with it. A lot of modern appliances have some kind of computer controls that make them nearly impossible to repair. Guess I am getting old

[@6StringPassion.]

American cars is the 70's were mostly 4 wheels connected to a turd.

[@drmarkintexas-400]

🏆🏆🏆👍🇺🇲🙏. Thank you for sharing

[@HM2SGT]

😹 *That's some propaganda!* Anybody else remember the Detroit lemon factory? That guy who was so fed up with his POS Then he took it to the factory and torched it?

[@kevinlearner40]

Sounds like the Blue Oyster cult music video Burning For You

[@jmfa57]

It is still, as it was then, sooo easy to blame poor quality on the people who assemble products, rather than on the faulty design of the products, and the foolish prioritizing of American management on cost cutting to maximize short term profits over long term customer satisfaction. I was a manufacturing manager whose hardworking staff did the best they could with questionably designed highly complicated diagnostic and biomedical research instruments. Didn't matter. Our trade practices drove manufacturing out of this country. My old factory got demolished after it had been there since the 1950s. Sad. Oh well, I now work for the government agency that regulates asbestos emissions from demolition of that very factory. DOUBLY sad.

[@risingsun9064]

Workmanship or not but they are really good at narrative control.

[@PorkChopJones]

I was around in the 1970's and it was well known that foreign made cars were much more reliable than American made cars. Does anyone remember the Ford Pinto? My mother bought one of those cars. So did a lot of other people mainly due to the massive Ads on TV and radio. The big selling point was to save on gasoline. Little did people know Ford Pinto's were a piece of crap car. But Ford was right you did save on gas, because most of the time your car was in the shop for one reason or another.

[@discerningmind]

That's ridiculous. You stated reliability, the Pinto was an excellent reliable car that lasted over 100K. Your mother probably bought some used up POS or didn't maintain her cars.

[@wolfmanradio]

The only issue that I’m aware of with the Pinto is its drop-in fuel tank that can spray fuel inside the cabin when crushed from a rear end crash. Its 2.3L engine is a simple and reliable masterpiece.

[@walterkersting6238]

This video makes me feel a lot better about the quality level of a 1975 Chevy C 10 pickup. Why? Because they were built by us. Us is we, and we are slobs but we built a pick up truck with two feet of total tolerance and what are we if not tolerant?

[@searstutor]

They failed to mention the lack of workers' authority to stop production lines for defects (Toyota), and the breakneck speeds American car companies expected from factory workers.

[@m.woodsrobinson9244]

Agronsky!!!!

[@JeffHokie]

what was he writing those numbers on at 8:30?

[@truthsayers8725]

he was writing in dust

[@kc4cvh]

It got started just after World War II. There was tremendous pent-up demand for new vehicles, and the American manufacturers responded. They pumped out vehicles as fast as they could, leaving no corner uncut. They had legions of cunning salesmen ready to screw every returning serviceman. Cars kept getting bigger and more profitable. Traffic fatalities skyrocketed. Things couldn't be better for the auto industry, and they thought it would be a seller's market forever. The Arab Oil Embargo of 1973 disabused them of that notion and they never really recovered.

[@jerrywood4508]

The thing American automakers wouldn't admit was that they were the problem, not American consumers. How did we come to believe Japanese and German cars were superior? Experience.

[@lukestrawwalker]

Ok I was taking this video seriously til he started talking about the Chevy Chevette and Vega being a quality car... My old man had a Chevy Chevette for awhile back in like '79-80 timeframe... biggest POS he ever owned. It was in the shop more than it was on the road. He finally walked into the dealership, threw the keys on the desk, and turned around and walked out... left it in the parking lot, and went and bought something else. Just at TOTAL POS. I started laughing when he started talking about the Chevette... LOL:) OL J R :)

[@warmstrong5612]

When the workers and management cooperate very well, you get Toyota. When the workers and management don't cooperate at all, you get British Leyland. American auto industry is between these two extremes.

[@sblack48]

It’s all moot now. There are no exported American products except weapons and airplanes.

[@greglivo]

don't forget cigarettes.

[@alphaomega8373]

American have never taken toys for granted.

[@historybuff9276]

Size size size, if the U.S car manufaturers started with compact cars earlier (before the oil crisis) alot of those jobs may have been saved. Those 1st cars mentioned in this clip Grimlin,Vega,Pinto,Colt, etc sucked so bad but are so fun when you turn some 🔧 & cram a big V8 in them. The early cars that were small & compact were ran out of business by the big 3 like the Henry J, Nash,Crosley etc. No telling how good american compacts wouldve been by the 70s if they had been able to stay in business. Dont get me wrong im a fan of those big cars but after about 1970 71 the started getting very ugly & under powered. I love my 72 C10 & late 60s Chevys, also loved Hot Roding those early u.s compacts when I was younger like a 71 vega I had with a 400 sbc. I wish i half of the cars back i sold for next to nothing to get $ for the next "project".

[@RinkyRoo2021]

I gave up on US stuff once I got Kubotas ,and Yamaha outboards ,and Honda engines.

[@symbionese2348]

The Japanese designers had the sense to put the air conditioners in the conditioned space instead of a roasting oven (i.e. the engine compartment.) The retro-fit auto air conditioning makers had demonstrated this for years, but the staggering old fools running the U.S. automobile companies just continued assuming their customers all lived where it never gets hot.

[@georgegeorgakopoulos5956]

Buyers bought them with BBM,nobody expects that they will last 50 years.

[@jasonconnor3905]

I sell frozen horse meat packed in dry ice, I’m a touch, Matt Lewis baby!

[@geoben1810]

Yeah, I couldn't believe the total garbage that was coming out of Detroit in the 70s. There was no pride whatsoever in American car manufacturing. Then it was good again for a while, and now it's ok I guess. I have an old '05 Caravan with 150K + on it so I haven't bought a car newer than that as of yet. I'm hoping to get another 150K out of it. We'll see...🤔 And btw, did we really look like that back then? Lol!!!🤣

[@georgegale6084]

Like iphones today. Hahhaah!🎉

[@JohnJohn-zn8ib]

The Japanese are way ahead of many western countries today, Japan probably builds the best cars and are leaders in electronics.

[@dbozexpat894]

The Japanese was only buying time in 1970s. I was stationed in Japan in the 90s. By that time, the Japanese had already copied American technology and made better Japanese products. In the 90s, American appliances in Japan were overpriced to discourage Japanese people from buying them. The only acception was in the automobile industry. I saw a "Ford" automobile in Japan with the steering wheel on the right hand side of the car.

[@J_Calvin_Hobbes]

👍

[@videosuperhighway7655]

Look at Tesla QC

[@TechnoCoManCHE]

'Maybe we are not as good as we can be, but we definitely are better than we believe that we are ' ... ;)

[@shaftwood]

That list of cars under three grand includes some of the worst US cars in history. That was the real problem.

[@stephenmulholland4868]

Now lets discuss china's quality..it would be a 1 minute video

[@panosvrionis8548]

Very funny by todays standards!! American cars sucked back then. Japanese cars was the answer 👻 Still is today 😋😋

[@AudiophileTubes]

American cars still suck, for the most part! Japanese cars are far more reliable and better built than cars here in America, unfortunately. Nothing but problems with our Cadillac and Buick!

[@suspicionofdeceit]

Hilarious they are selling Black and Decker in Japan, that era was pure junk and went downhill from there.

[@Ynalaw]

The best products come from Nigeria. African quality.

[@paulvalentine4157]

planned obselence

[@AudiophileTubes]

Indeed.

[@larspederson1451]

This is an interesting propaganda film. If America had never had to compete with way superior engineering and quality we would probably still be driving throw away crap cars today.

[@larspederson1451]

@@TugIronChief maybe so. I grew up in the 70s and my father was a pneumatic tool salesman then. He would return home from the big three telling stories about how the employees would steal tools and figure out ways to shut down assembly lines for a 3day weekend. And the UAW would flex their power and muscle to get top $$$$ for shitty underskilled workers. No matter how you look at this film, it doesn't represent a real look into 70s manufacturing. There's more to the story than they're willing to say.

[@larspederson1451]

@@TugIronChief of course not. It took America going through the engineering chaos of the 70s-80s to get us back to the quality and competitive products of today's market

[@kevinlearner40]

So its not really a Suprise that there was a decline in the quality of American automobiles, then, when every effort was taken to cut costs to pay for higher wages and expanded benefits.

[@discerningmind]

Don't forget about the EPA, CAFE, OSHA, and the others all making things difficult. Now they're totally out of control and we barely have any American auto manufacturing remaining.

[@johnstuartsmith]

The Board of Directors answers to the stockholders who elected them, the banks who own them, and the value of the stock options that they own, not the unions. If factory workers were making that much money, factory towns would be a lot more upscale.

[@cetocoquinto4704]

If america would make simple,quality electric cars the world would buy it. Make it fast the chinese are catching up.

[@cipherthedemonlord8057]

The opposite is now happening. Garbage Chevette and Pinto when new however.

[@kevinlearner40]

Unions destroyed the domestic car manufacturing. They demanded higher wages and better benefits, which meant that we couldn't compete with foreign manufacturers that could hire workers for pennies on the dollar. This drove up the price of cars, resulting in less sales, meant hiring less workers, which meant less cars were manufactured, and put a hiring freeze on union workers, so that it cost more to train and hire new people. Maybe their demands were reasonable, and we should have used protectionism to tax and regulate imports. Maybe they weren't, but were too greedy and lazy to compete in a global market. Either way, domestic manufacturing in the United States is in shambles, and not just for automobiles.

[@jesusislukeskywalker4294]

similarly in Australia.. the unions seem to have been infiltrated/ corrupted .. combined with the United Nations Lima Agreement 1975 .. we have little to nothing remaining. Australia used to export cars in the 1960s . now almost everything is imported.. cars, shoes, blankets, clothes, televisions, , it’s sad.

[@jacksons1010]

Are you sure this is what happened? Somehow the companies that employed those union workers continued to make profits and pay dividends to stockholders. You know what they didn’t do? They didn’t invest in technology - they continued to operate aging plants with labor-intensive manual assembly. Meanwhile Japan and Europe were building new plants heavy with automation. German workers were unionized and well paid, yet those companies increased imports into the USA and made money doing so. If unions ruin everything, how do we explain Volkswagen’s success? Capital investment, that’s how. American manufacturers eventually figured that out.

[@jtsena]

Bull Shit. Period. [Calling BS on Kevin and his follower Jesus of Adalaide, here.]

[@GlutenEruption]

@@jacksons1010 Nailed it. The greed of the executives and board members who ran those companies was (and still is) utterly shameless and far FAR in excess of anything the most corrupt union boss of the 70’s could even dream of, however when a few people at the top run the company into the ground rather than cut their pay to only 500 times what their workers make “it’s just the cost of doing business”, And if they think they can get away with shifting the blame onto the workers for daring to ask for a living wage or safe working conditions, they do. Just like they did in the past, continue to do now, and will do until the day there’s nothing left to take.

[@silverload3622]

When a CEO or some other greedy paper pusher takes a 10 million dollar bonus the company can’t support pay like that so automatically let’s put it on the union’s,,, you sound exactly like the rich pricks that like to keep people enslaved with shit pay and have to work two jobs trying to survive,,,when wonder bread filed bankruptcy the greedy paper pushers took 1.5 million in pay to stay on during the process and this was oked thru the court systems,,,how many jobs could that 1.5 million have supported,,do some common math and get educated b4 you trash unions

[@jasonconnor3905]

Sony, bony

[@albear972]

Anti-Japanese US propaganda. I have read about not buying GM or Ford cars that were built on a Friday as the doors came with an empty, ratting beer bottle or two. UAW guys man!

[@rapman5363]

Hardly, nowhere is there an anti-Japanese bias in this video. This is pro-American for sure but not anti-Japanese. And as for not buying a car made on Friday,how would you know what day the car was made when you go to the dealership? There is no way to know and if you think the salesman would tell you, you are being naive because he will use any day but Friday as the made on date just to make you feel better.

[@jR060t]

bUt cHInA

[@DVD927]

Looking back, I think it was the difference in technology as much as workmanship. The auto unions in the USA as well as overpaid auto executives & line workers set US automakers back. I grew up in the 70s in Michigan & it seemed like every month, my friends would tell me their dads were on strike. In high school I had a classmate who made $25/hr working on assembly line overnight. Hadn’t even graduated yet. $25 an hour in 1979 or so. For perspective, the Minimum Wage in 1985 was $3.15 an hour or something like that.

[@d.m.3645]

$25 in 1980 is the equivalent of $90 in 2022. However, a 1980 Chevrolet Impala cost $6,700 retail, which comes out to 24,000 in 2022. Somehow we were able to pay those union workers at the automotive plants and extremely good wage, and make the cars affordable at the same time. All that has happened since is the pay has gone down and the cars have gotten more expensive and the rich have gotten richer off the deal.

[@kleverich]

Union propaganda.

[@ramongonzalez7458]

This has been a long process, globalization...

[@Artguitars]

Nope I was there. It was shit cars vs reliable cars. We still don’t equal the reliability of many entry level cars. We easily could be untouched in the car industry. We decided to drain middle class Americans with cars that needed to be replaced every 50-70k miles. It was pure greed. Globalization had nothing to do with it.

[@Artguitars]

If we had made cars as reliable as the Japanese in the 60’s and 70’s this conversation would never have happened.

[@fayekephart848]

1945? Really?no shit! Lol

[@someone6170]

Before that America was dropping their manufactured goods for free from aeroplanes.

[@fayekephart848]

@@someone6170 yeah thats for sure

[@frankcalifano7970]

Two crappy cars the Vega and the exploding Pinto.