2014 Yaris - Made in France

[Septembersrain]

I think regardless of brand, If the car is made in that country, it's essentially on the standard of that country.
I know that quite a few people in France do number checks to make sure they are getting a car that is made OUTSIDE their country. That's a bad sign in my opinion.

It always makes me sad when companies like Toyota risk their reputation rather than just continue to pay their people.
Look at what outsourcing has done for the U.S.A. More low wage jobs, Less benefits, and tons more government oversight. =/

[nookandcrannycar]

Originally Posted by Septembersrain

It always makes me sad when companies like Toyota risk their reputation rather than just continue to pay their people.
Look at what outsourcing has done for the U.S.A. More low wage jobs, Less benefits, and tons more government oversight. =/

The thing is, they have to stay relatively competitive or the features and quality relative to cost won't be there and consumers will make another choice. This has been a challenge for, among others, Toyota and Mazda because of the high value of the Japanese yen. This is one of the reasons that Mazda is building the plant in Mexico and that Toyota will be producing the USDM Yaris in france. Mazda is also going to Mexico for lower labor costs and Toyota is ( in addition to the Japanese Yen French Franc valuation difference) moving the Yaris to France because electricity (for production) is cheaper there.

The Bank of Japan is now going to increase bond buying with the goal to be doubling the countries effective money supply in the next two years. They hope that this will create a desired amount of inflation (2% I believe) and will hopefully help devalue the Yen (even more than recent declines) in order to help the manufacturing sector in Japan. The U.S. and other countries are already doing this quite a bit as they don't want to be like Japan has been for the last 20 years. Automakers like Mazda and Toyota aren't idly waiting around to see if this works, they are being proactive by moving production out of Japan. I imagine the Japanese government is just trying to reverse this trend. Only time will tell what works and what doesn't.

[nookandcrannycar]

According to a post on the kilometermagazine.com site, the first shipment for the U.S. was shipped from the plant in France on May 21st