These days, it’s difficult to say really. Ford Transit Connect? Built in Turkey and shipped to the US. Lincoln MKZ? Built in Mexico and shipped to the US. Dodge Charger and Chevrolet Camaro? Built in Canada.
On the flipside, a lot of ‘foreign’ cars have more US content than you might imagine. Mazda 6? Built in Michigan. Toyota Camry? built in Kentucky, or how about the Mitsubishi Eclipse, Toyota Tacoma or Toyota Tundra? In the case of these three, all of them are vehicles not only built here, but specifically designed and engineered for our market.
Start adding in specific components, i.e. German sourced engines from some GM cars and transmissions from Japan or Germany and it starts to get very, very confusing.
Well the American International Automobile Dealers’ Association hopes to clarify what exactly constitutes an American car by highlighting which ‘foreign’ automakers have a significant manufacturing and assembly process in the United States. This comes at a time where the issue of ‘buy American’ and protecting American jobs has become a politically hot topic.
The AIADA has created a website that enables the user to click through foreign automakers that have US manufacturing facilities, highlighting how many employees they have on the payroll and how long they’ve been established on American soil.
According to the AIADA’s own research, there are 21 ‘foreign’ automakers that build cars and trucks in the US that employ a total of 86, 507 workers. Click on the link below for more information – some of the findings might surprise you.
[Source: What is An American Car]
