And yet 10,000 deaths per year means so little
Weak roofs are just one SUV design defect
Perhaps you’ve had enough recall news for the week? Well, forgive me then, but I’d just like to use the Toyota recall to demonstrate the silliness of American culture.
Today, foreign oil dependence is a hugely important talking point, and that’s it, it’s only a talking point. Nobody wants to take any real action, at least not today. It’s always about tomorrow.
Certainly, we can’t do the obvious, simple stuff than can be done today, like making our vehicles smaller and lighter to easily increase fuel economy and reduce foreign oil consumption. Our personal safety is just too important.
And safety drives the US auto industry, right? That’s why the Toyota recall scandal is SOOO important. It must be terribly important because it’s possible that a few people died due to a design defect.
Ironically, however, every year around 10,000 people die in SUV rollovers, many of which are significantly due to design defects, such as overly high centers of gravity, inadequate roof structures, defective tires, defective door latches and overly narrow tire tracks – all of which are design defects that the auto industry has known about for decades.
Consequently, for decades, the US auto industry has been largely driven by an entirely defective automotive design that directly kills thousands of SUV drivers every year – mostly in single vehicle accidents – while guzzling massive amounts of foreign oil and killing everything else that gets in its way.
And yet 10,000 deaths per year continues to mean so little.
