Tell me you've got no experience with 70s and 80s compact cars without telling me you've got no experience with 70s and 80s compact cars. There's a reason impo

Tell me you've got no experience with 70s and 80s compact cars without telling me you've got no experience with 70s and 80s compact cars. There's a reason imports had a tin can reputation to overcome. The fuel crisis gave the Japanese brands a foot in the door. Detroit had to take languishing compact car platforms that were only available with poverty spec trims feature sets (because the target buyer was someone who's #1 priority was low cost) and bring them up to snuff with the features and comfort the average buyer wanted. Japan had those products ready to go. They weren't "beating" anything until the mid to late 80s. The boomers didn't grow up seeing Japanese cars out-compete. That didn't happen until they themselves were well into adulthood and bought a bunch of Japanese commuter cars in the late 80s and 90s. The 80s decline of Detroit was just the collective bargaining and corporate management hens coming home to roost right at the same time that environmental law was really hitting US industry hard.