>> American automakers have gone all in on pickup trucks because they are massively more profitable per unit. << They are massively profitable because foreign

>> American automakers have gone all in on pickup trucks because they are massively more profitable per unit. << They are massively profitable because foreign‐ made pickup trucks are subject to a 25 percent import tariff -- ie, limited competition: Since a 1964 spat over European tariffs on poultry, the US has levied a 25% tax on imported trucks, now known as the “chicken tax.” That surcharge largely cleared the road for Detroit’s truck titans — at least until Japanese brands established US factories to get around it — and today means tricky economics for any foreign automaker looking to crack the lucrative American truck market.