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1-Page Summary of The Great Race

Overview

Electric cars are the future and will help us achieve a cleaner environment. However, there have been many obstacles to overcome on that road. Many countries and companies have tried to do so with varying degrees of success. In California and Japan, however, we see two leaders in this field who are really innovating new ideas to solve these problems.

In the late 1800s, German engineer Carl Benz created a combustion engine vehicle. A few decades later in the United States, Henry Ford revolutionized personal transport again by making it affordable for everyone.

The automobile industry is changing. It has been since the 1960s and 1970s, when major cities were getting smoggy and people wanted less polluting engines in their everyday transportation. Now, electric vehicles are becoming more popular than ever before, so this is a pivotal moment in history for automobiles. In this piece, you will learn about the history of electric cars; its pioneers and visionaries; competition to develop an electric vehicle; winners and losers in the race to an electric future.

In addition, you will learn why nuclear energy is a bad idea in Japan; the definition of Fordism and how it relates to Henry Ford’s automobile assembly line production system; and that Chinese people don’t need Tesla cars.

Big Idea #1: After Henry Ford revolutionized the automobile industry, US car manufacturers were at the forefront of that industry.

Cars have changed the world like no other technological advancement. Henry Ford of the Ford Motor Company was one of its innovators, and he revolutionized car manufacturing by introducing assembly lines to make cars more affordable.

In 1903, he founded the Ford Motor Company. In 1910, 20,000 Model Ts were built every year. By 1927, one car was being produced for every five Americans.

Henry Ford was a pioneer of the assembly line, which he used to create affordable cars. By only making one model in one color, he could keep his prices low and appeal to more people. This method also allowed him to use an assembly line system that made it easier for workers on the production lines. His company sold millions of cars all over the world and became very successful as a result.

By the 1930s, Ford, GM and Chrysler were dominating the auto industry. In 1938, Germany was producing about 437,000 cars per year while America produced 3.5 million! The US companies were all focused on different models but GM had diversified into many small manufacturers while Chrysler combined several marques such as Plymouth or Dodge.

Early on, American companies dominated the auto market. However, as people became more concerned about pollution in their cars and wanted to make a change, Japanese car companies took over with their new models.

Big Idea #2: Japanese car companies were the first to address vehicle emissions.

It’s no secret that Japanese car manufacturers outcompete American ones. The reason is they’ve paid close attention to the problem of emissions and have come up with a solution.

In the second half of the twentieth century, smog was a big problem and car companies were getting slapped with more stringent environmental regulations. The math was simple: since cars emit pollution that causes smog, the more cars on the road, the worse it is for air quality. So naturally, there should be stricter environmental regulation to slow down auto sales. When states introduced them in 1970s, automakers claimed they were so strict as to be “impossible” to follow.

At the same time, Japan was also experiencing an auto boom. Smog had become a problem in big cities like Tokyo and environmental regulations were being enforced.