I saw this coming 2008 when it was announced they would start using footprint, AKA vehicle size. I saw that it would incentivize larger vehicles, and of course hoped for a return to C bodies, LOL but as you can see that's not what's happened.
It's worth noting by the way that we are the only country in the world that does fuel economy like this, (on the supply vs demand side). Go read some old Motor Trend magazines from the era where Cafe was being debated, and you'll see that all the manufacturers were pleading for a gas tax, as is done in Europe.
What Cafe standards have done is make sure that American companies would become uncompetitive in the highest profit segments, where they were traditionally strongest. That is unless they used the loophole that trucks provided until the change to footprint Style versus truck / car.
The video also fails to point out that manufacturers who sell less than 400,000 total units per year are exempted from Cafe penalties. That basically leaves Mercedes, BMW, Rolls-Royce, Etc to build whatever type of gas hog vehicle will sell to the American Elite who can afford them. None of these manufacturers sell anywhere close to 400,000 total units annually. However a company like General Motors, which sells millions of vehicles every year in the United States must include Cadillac sales which might top 100,000 in a good year. Thus while the European manufacturers were free to ship in as many as class and 7 Series Gas Hogs as they wanted during the 1970s - 2000s, Cadillac was forced to completely retool it's lineup into toy like luxury cars that would meet the cafe standard. Or in another case that strikes closer to home, the Dodge Viper which sold 2500 units in its best year ever, incurred profit eating penalties for the parent company, which sold millions of vehicles per year. By the way during the entire time of Daimler Chrysler ownership, Mercedes sales were still viewed under the 400,000 rule. This exemption was even called the coastal exemption, because it was lobbied for by wealthy auto dealers on both coasts who did not want to see their sales evaporate, has had happened for Cadillac, Lincoln and even Chrysler.
I don't think I'm really being political, because this obviously wasn't an issue with any one particular party. Our bureaucratic state regularly kneecaps our Industries. It's almost as if our politicians are on the payrolls of foreign governments. If you're not on that payroll, and choose to level the playing field.. or at least attempts to.. they will get you six ways till Sunday as I believe one of our Great American legislators was quoted saying.
Now here's a photo of a car, just so people will read the post.
