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Top 12 Fun and Safe Family Cars Made in America

Old Chevrolet pickup with American flag
It used to be easy to tell which vehicles were American. That's no longer true.

According to the 2017 Cars.com American Made Index, 25 percent of people surveyed want to buy an American car. That’s almost double the number of people who said so in 2016, and it doesn’t take an astrophysicist to figure out why. President Trump has clearly made Americans aware again.

Whether you agree or disagree with the man and his policies, it certainly doesn’t hurt this country’s economic fortunes to deliberately choose a vehicle that is designed, engineered, and built in America using American ingenuity, parts and labor. The question, of course, is this: What the hell is an American car in the first place?

Some people follow the profits. Ford Motor Company, General Motors, and Tesla are the only car companies currently headquartered in the United States (Fiat Chrysler Automobiles is incorporated in the Netherlands with an HQ in London). But does that make a Buick Envision built in China an American car?

Some people consider the brand. Fiat Chrysler is a now single company serving as an umbrella for multiple legacy brands. Is an Italian-made Alfa Romeo Stelvio as American as a Detroit-built Jeep Grand Cherokee? Is an Italian-built Jeep Renegade as American as a Michigan-made Ram 1500?

Some people consider where a car is actually assembled. The Toyota Camry is built in Kentucky. The Ford Fusion is hecho en Mexico. Which one is American? Both? Neither?

With the help of American University’s Made in America Index, Speedy Daddy aims to define an “American” car.

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Opinion

Autonomy is Right Around the Corner, Yet Car Companies are Doubling Down on Driving Fun

2018 Toyota Camry SE in Red
2018 Toyota Camry SE

Can a Toyota Camry legitimately be described as fun to drive? Toyota thinks so, and expects this to come to pass when the redesigned 2018 Camry arrives later this year.

The next-generation Camry is built on Toyota’s new global vehicle architecture, designed from the ground up to improve driving dynamism. Chairman Akio Toyoda, himself a fan of taking the long way home, has decreed that Toyotas and Lexuses must be more than just high-quality, dependable, and efficient vehicles. They must spark emotion, they must be enjoyable to drive, and they must be aspirational rather than an appliance.

Toyota is not alone. Multiple automakers are flexing their engineering muscles in order to appeal to people for whom the journey is just as much fun as the destination. Clearly, if you are a driving enthusiast, now is a great, if disconcerting, time to be alive.

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Safety Technology

What is Teen Driver Technology from General Motors?

Buick Regal Grand National Smoky Burnout
A Buick Regal Grand National and an owner with lots of money to spend on tires.

As a car-crazy kid raised during the 1970s on a steady diet of “The Rockford Files” and “Starsky and Hutch,” I could not wait to turn 16 and get my driver’s license.

Shortly thereafter, while trying to impress a girl with my fishtailing expertise on a snowy residential street, I planted my mother’s 1980 Buick Regal into a telephone pole. The girl sat in the middle of the velour bench seat between my buddy and me, and none of us were wearing seat belts.

Miraculously, none of us got hurt. My pride? That’s another story.

Today, as a father to four kids ranging in age from 6 to 19, I’ve shared this story (and many others) with my older daughters in the hopes that they won’t repeat my mistakes. And I’m thrilled that new vehicles are now equipped with technologies like Teen Driver from General Motors, even though I would have hated them when I was a new and reckless driver.

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