U.S. Automobile Manufacturing Hubs

The American automobile industry has historically been viewed by policymakers and ordinary citizens alike as a load-bearing structure in the American way of life. Throughout its century-long history, the industry has been treated as the honored guest of any community lucky enough to have the jobs and tax revenue that came with having a factory nearby. Over the last thirty years, the industry has been noted largely for the speed with which it has been closing up shop and moving overseas. However, all of that might be changing as the automobile industry makes its first hesitant steps back into the communities it once left behind.

From the earliest days of the American automobile industry, some cities have been so closely associated with their local factory that they might fairly be called company towns. So close was the relationship between these towns and the companies that kept them afloat that their very names are synonymous with the American cars they once produced. Dearborn, Mich., was always Ford country, while rival GM was the king of Flint. Even the names of the cities call to mind the storied brands that were once made there: Pontiac, Mich.; DeSoto, Ga.; and Plymouth, Mich.

The investment the automobile industry made in these towns was so great that most of them apparently never looked to diversify—they would remain company towns to the end. The general retreat of the 1980s left these communities high and dry by eliminating almost the only source of revenue their experienced manufacturing workers had. Even today, as the automobile industry stages a comeback in American manufacturing, the new automotive hubs are not necessarily where they once were. While Ford has announced that it will be adding a solid 1,400 new jobs to one of its Detroit-area plants, other automakers are setting up new traditions in new places. Tesla, for example, has recently opened an auto plant in California's Silicon Valley, from which it intends to launch its challenge to the current dominance of Mercedes and BMW.

In a way, past is prologue for the American automobile industry. With rising overseas labor costs and greatly increased fuel and transport expenses, America is once again looking like a good place to invest. So good, in fact, that even foreign automakers have been building domestically, as with the billion-dollar factory complex Toyota has opened in Youngstown, Ohio.

If the current trends are any guide, the new American hubs of the automobile industry will be more dispersed than the old, with components made in nearly every part of the country. These parts will be fabricated in low-cost states such as Kentucky and Michigan and transported to more prosperous states such as California, Texas, and New York for final assembly. This plan puts the finished products close to their largest markets, lowering costs further still. With any luck, the entire US might soon be regarded as a manufacturing hub for not just American cars, but for the global automobile industry as well.

(Photo courtesy of stoon / freedigitalphotos.net)