Ask anyone who wins a lottery or comes into money and ask what kinda of car they want, response: Mercedes, BMW, Porche, Ferrarri..... No one ever says they're gonna buy a Buick. Goodbye US garbage.
I say Cadillac, Corvette, or a Viper. I had a BMW and they stink. My father currently has a BMW and he's constantly at the mechanics.
I've not had a viper, but had a caddy and a corvette, loved them both, but lack of mechanical problems was NOT one of thier virtues.
Nothing is perfect but in a unbiased test I posted a few pages above Cadillac was tops in long term durability. Trust me, no one would drive a car 370,000 miles if it were not ultra reliable. What people who drive 50,000 miles a year or more do is keep their cars until the repairs cost more than they are worth, then sell it to someone who doesn't drive that much. So it's safe to say that a car with that many miles is reliable, and Cadillac has more cars with high miles. I have taken many GM cars to 300,000 miles, my last was a Pontiac Firebird that was amazing, the most trouble free car I have had yet. I currently have a 2000 Bonneville with 134,000 miles. http://www.geocities.com/wallstreetmoney1/Automotive.html
Could the fact that the cost of german repairs/parts have anything to do with how long people keep them ... in the US? Of course it does. If you don't believe me, go to germany and see how many old gm vs old german cars are on the road. Something tells me you will find many more german cars. And so, your theory proves nothing.
These foriegn countries have strict limitations of imports as USA should. They used to have 15% cap on imported cars here in the US, now there is no cap and it's what 40% or so and getting worse. You won't find many Cadillacs in Germany to compare. If you go back and look at my test it was actually comparing the entire motor company of Toyota which resulted in over 4500 cars, year 2000 to present priced under $10,000, while Cadillac which is just one division of GM resulted in only 390 cars from 2000 to present priced under $10,000. The reason for the $10,000 is to avoid misprints, a car with these kind of miles would be discounted in price. Therefore you are wrong, the test was actually greatly skewed against Cadillac and yet Cadillac won. Anyone who knows anything about odds knows that out of over 4500 cars that Toyota should have had at least a few with more miles than the 390 Cadillacs in the test. Toyota had a 10 to 1 advantage and lost horribly in long term durability.
Wouldn't a car with less problems be less profitable and one with more big problems be more profitable for the manufacturer?
Good point, but my test does not take into consideration the initial quality that is covered by the manufacturer anyway. I'm looking at it from a consumer point of view. GM has longer durability and less money out of my pocket. Comparing size of vehicles GM has above average MPG, for example the full size 2006 Impala gets 31 MPG plus uses E85. This compares favorably to cars this size and actually even small cars do not get much more relatively.