Americans Are Happier with This Car Brand Than Any Other
Americans may love their cars, but these days they love them a little less.
Consumer satisfaction with their cars has fallen for the third consecutive year, reflecting unhappiness with increasing recalls and rising prices, according to new data from the American Customer Satisfaction Index.
Car reliability has improved overall in the past decade but the number of recalls is at an all-time high. “This should not happen with modern manufacturing technology and has negative consequences for driver safety, costs, and customer satisfaction,” ACSI Chairman and founder Claes Fornell said in a statement.
Car owners in the second quarter of 2015 reported a 40 percent increase in recalls year over year. The most high profile recalls involve Takata airbags, affecting more than 17 million older-model vehicles built by 11 different auto makers.
Related: Senators Urge Recall of All Vehicles with Takata Airbags
Looking at individual brands, the index shows that Americans prefer Japanese and luxury brand cars, with Lexus displacing Mercedes Benz as the brand with the highest overall satisfaction (84 out of 100). Mercedes tied for second place with Acura and Lincoln.
The average for all autos fell 3.7 points to 79. The only American automaker to rank above average was Ford with a score of 81. General Motors and Chrysler saw their scores fall modestly to 79 and 75 respectively.
Despite a growing decline in satisfaction, Americans are holding onto their vehicles longer than ever. The average age of cars and light trucks is now 11.5 years old, according to a report issued last month by IHS Automotive.
Top Reads from the Fiscal Times:
- Big Surprise: Hispanic Voters Can’t Stand Donald Trump
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GOP Tax Cuts Getting Less Popular, Poll Finds
Friday marked the six-month anniversary of President Trump’s signing the Republican tax overhaul into law, and public opinion of the law is moving in the wrong direction for the GOP. A Monmouth University survey conducted earlier this month found that 34 percent of the public approves of the tax reform passed by Republicans late last year, while 41 percent disapprove. Approval has fallen by 6 points since late April and disapproval has slipped 3 points. The percentage of people who aren’t sure how they feel about the plan has risen from 16 percent in April to 24 percent this month.
Other findings from the poll of 806 U.S. adults:
- 19 percent approve of the job Congress is doing; 67 percent disapprove
- 40 percent say the country is heading in the right direction, up from 33 percent in April
- Democrats hold a 7-point edge in a generic House ballot
Special Tax Break Zones Defined for All 50 States
The U.S. Treasury has approved the final group of opportunity zones, which offer tax incentives for investments made in low-income areas. The zones were created by the tax law signed in December.
Bill Lucia of Route Fifty has some details: “Treasury says that nearly 35 million people live in the designated zones and that census tracts in the zones have an average poverty rate of about 32 percent based on figures from 2011 to 2015, compared to a rate of 17 percent for the average U.S. census tract.”
Click here to explore the dynamic map of the zones on the U.S. Treasury website.
Map of the Day: Affordable Care Act Premiums Since 2014
Axios breaks down how monthly premiums on benchmark Affordable Care Act policies have risen state by state since 2014. The average increase: $481.
Obamacare Repeal Would Lead to 17.1 Million More Uninsured in 2019: Study
A new analysis by the Urban Institute finds that if the Affordable Care Act were eliminated entirely, the number of uninsured would rise by 17.1 million — or 50 percent — in 2019. The study also found that federal spending would be reduced by almost $147 billion next year if the ACA were fully repealed.
Your Tax Dollars at Work
Mick Mulvaney has been running the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau since last November, and by all accounts the South Carolina conservative is none too happy with the agency charged with protecting citizens from fraud in the financial industry. The Hill recently wrote up “five ways Mulvaney is cracking down on his own agency,” and they include dropping cases against payday lenders, dismissing three advisory boards and an effort to rebrand the operation as the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection — a move critics say is intended to deemphasize the consumer part of the agency’s mission.
Mulvaney recently scored a small victory on the last point, changing the sign in the agency’s building to the new initials. “The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau does not exist,” Mulvaney told Congress in April, and now he’s proven the point, at least when it comes to the sign in his lobby (h/t to Vox and thanks to Alan Zibel of Public Citizen for the photo, via Twitter).
