Cars are a necessity in America not because of car advertisements, but because of the low density of American towns and cities. Things are built that way becau

Cars are a necessity in America not because of car advertisements, but because of the low density of American towns and cities. Things are built that way because Americans want them like that, and it's nothing new: Americans started moving to the suburbs in the 1950s, partially because of the availability of inexpensive automobiles and fuel (mostly thanks to the post-war economic boom), and also because they didn't want to live near the black people in the inner cities. Outright racism drove a huge amount of why America looks the way it does now, as far as infrastructure and urban planning go. And it hasn't changed: just look at what Americans on online forums say when you try to suggest they live in dense, walkable cities and use subways. It'll either be comments about how they like having such a huge house and yard, or comments about the people living in inner cities.