> This let them put out products just as good as American ones at prices just as cheap Actually, some of the competing products, like cars, were significantly

> This let them put out products just as good as American ones at prices just as cheap Actually, some of the competing products, like cars, were significantly better than American ones. In the 1970s and 1980s, American cars were notoriously unreliable gas guzzlers, and Japanese cars grabbed a large chunk of the U.S. car market (which they have to this day). The resulting loss of jobs in the U.S. auto industry (and in all the industries that supply the auto industry) played a part in the collapse of the middle class in the 1970s, bringing down once thriving cities like Detroit.