Word: automen
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Never So Long. Detroit's automen have their own explanations as to why most models are not moving. President Ford did them little good when, in October in Kansas City, Mo., he urged consumers to save more and buy judiciously. Auto executives also blame tight credit for frightening potential buyers and Limiting dealers' ability to keep cars in inventory. Last week Chrysler President John Riccardo was in Washington urging Michigan's Congressmen to push for looser credit...
...Many automen hope, of course, that the current move toward small size and fuel economy is a passing fancy. "People like big cars," says GM Chairman Richard Gerstenberg. "The bulk of the people who buy a car want comfort and convenience, and they are willing to pay for it." The history of the U.S. consumer lends that view considerable merit ?but a continuing energy crisis could change the taste of many buyers who might otherwise prefer a larger car. The automakers are acting as if that might happen; they are converting to small-car production as fast as they...
Debate. The quadriphonic howls of protest indicated that Ruckelshaus had passed one test of an impartial compromise: he outraged both sides about equally. Ralph Nader, Detroit's perennial fifth wheel,* charged that the EPA decision amounted to "capitulation to the domestic auto industry, pure and simple." Automen insisted that the interim standards are still too stiff. General Motors Chairman Richard Gerstenberg pronounced himself "dismayed"; Henry Ford II pledged to "examine the avenues of administrative, legislative and legal recourse open to us" to get both the interim and final standards softened. The contrasting denunciations unintentionally symbolized what Ruckelshaus himself called...
...every new car in a single year. Any attempt to force them to do so with the catalyst, Detroit officials warn, could cause supply problems and even shut down plants. The cars that were produced would burn excessive amounts of fuel and require repair far too frequently. The automen pleaded with Ruckelshaus to leave antipollution requirements unchanged for an extra year−except in smog-plagued California, where the catalysts could be given a tryout...
Ruckelshaus hopes that automen will also use their extra year to explore alternate cleanup techniques. Among the most promising: a "stratified-charge" engine now being readied for mass production by Honda of Japan; it seems to require less change in the basic internal-combustion engine than any other antipollution idea and has extremely high fuel efficiency to boot. Environmentalists fear that Detroit will choose to concentrate its energies on a lobbying campaign to get the Clean Air Act weakened, and Ruckelshaus himself believes that there may be lawsuits aimed at overturning his decision...