Going back to the 1920s, automakers began to break with Henry Ford’s philosophy of sticking with the same model, in the same color, at the same price. Instead, manufacturers like General Motors changed models every year, to give the impression that there was something unique that the American consumer needed to buy. But changing models constantly required large capital investments for design and refurbishment.
Detroit was planting the seeds of its own destruction if it did not keep up with the trends of the buying public.
A high demand for cheap and attractive models would lead to one of the biggest muckraker stories of the mid-60s.
In 1965 Ralph Nader published “Unsafe at Any Speed: The Dangerous Design of the American Automobile.” He exposed how General Motors and the American auto industry were putting consumers’ lives at risk by failing to design safe cars. Nader especially singled out General Motors’ Corvair, which he labeled a death trap.
By the late 1950s, the big three automakers were losing out to a public that demanded smaller, less expensive cars, and was also increasingly attracted to imports, especially the Volkswagen Beetle. Imports, in fact, accounted for 10 percent of all sales in the United States, topping 600,000 a year in 1958. So in 1959 it was no surprise when the Big Three introduced three smaller models to compete with imports: the Ford Falcon, Chevrolet Corvair, and the Plymouth Valiant. These cars, which were cheap to build and attractive to the consumer, would be unsafe and poorly built.
Nader, as a consumer, was outraged that the auto industry could get away with it. So he published his book “Unsafe at Any Speed” to expose automakers. Millions of people read your book.
For its part, GM was shocked that this young and unknown lawyer attacked one of the pillars of American business. General Motors trying to hide from the problem was eventually caught, and GM president James Roche was forced to apologize to the Senate Subcommittee on Highway Safety. In addition, thanks to Nader, the Consumer Product Safety Act was passed along with the Freedom of Information Act. This forced the American auto industry to redesign and recondition its cars.
You owe more than you ever imagine to Nader and his research. If it weren’t for him, the auto industries might still be building unsafe cars. The time and effort put into “Unsafe at Any Speed” has paid off for American consumers and the auto industry as well.
Interested in another topic? Try this link for more information: http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/203714.Henry_Ford