The Rise and Fall of the American Motor Industry: Part 2 - 1975 to 2025

Ruairidh MacVeigh December 30, 2025
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Ruairidh MacVeigh

@rorymacve

About

Welcome to the Ruairidh MacVeigh YouTube channel, where I present detailed documentaries on various trains, planes and automobiles from both my native UK and across the world, with deep insights into the economic, social and political factors that decided whether these transportation projects were either successes or failures. If you'd like to support what I do, and get early access to advert-free videos, please consider joining this channel to get access to perks: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCC8R7kmt-W14zWUcr8mymEQ/join Also, feel free to donate to either my PayPal or Ko-Fi for just £3. Feel free to contact me at my personal email address if you wish to ask any questions or have any concerns. Please do not ask me to do any paid promotions, sponsorships or endorsements.

Video Description

Join this channel to get early access to new videos a week ahead of their public release: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCC8R7kmt-W14zWUcr8mymEQ/join This is a reworked and reuploaded version of the original video. Howdy! :D In a major reworking of my original video on the Malaise Era, which I felt a little unsatisfied about, I have now created this two-part series on the Rise and Fall of the American Motor Industry, with Part 2 starting at the height of the Malaise Era, immediately in the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis, and follows the development of the American carmakers on a year-by-year basis through the trials of CAFE, the 1979 Iranian Revolution, and the early 1980s recession. Throughout all these owes, the American car industry, alongside having to fight off the wider geopolitical and economic situation, had to contend with the arrival in significant quantities of foreign builders in the form of Honda, Volkswagen, Datsun, Mercedes-Benz and more, which set up permanent factories within the United States itself, allowing them to overcome transportation costs and import tariffs, meaning the US domestic builders would have to evolve in order to face a market where their rivals were now in their own heartland, thus demanding according changes to their models, practices and policies in order to remain relevant. Chapters: 0:00 - Preamble 0:33 - 1975 - The Rise of CAFE 9:30 - 1976 - Subcompact Scramble 17:14 - 1977 - Full Facelift 22:35 - 1978 - Fledgling Resurgence 29:33 - 1979 - The Iranian Revolution 41:35 - 1979 - Chrysler Faces Collapse 51:50 - 1980 - Hard Realignment 55:48 - 1981 - Reaganomic Reorganisation 1:01:49 - 1982 - The Japanese Make Landfall 1:08:57 - 1983 - The Road to Recovery 1:14:40 - The Long Hard Road to Today 1:21:55 - Conclusion All video content and images in this production have been provided with permission wherever possible. While I endeavour to ensure that all accreditations properly name the original creator, some of my sources do not list them as they are usually provided by other, unrelated YouTubers. Therefore, if I have mistakenly put the accreditation of 'Unknown', and you are aware of the original creator, please send me a personal message at my Gmail (this is more effective than comments as I am often unable to read all of them): [email protected] The views and opinions expressed in this video are my personal appraisal and are not the views and opinions of any of these individuals or bodies who have kindly supplied me with footage and images. If you enjoyed this video, why not leave a like, and consider subscribing for more great content coming soon. Press the Join button to get access to new videos a week ahead of schedule by becoming a channel member for just £2.99 a month! Paypal: https://paypal.me/rorymacve?country.x=GB&locale.x=en_GB Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/rorymacve Thanks again, everyone, and enjoy! :D References: - Car and Driver (and their respective sources) - Hemmings (and their respective sources) - Wikipedia (and its respective references)

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