(first posted 10/28/2015, updated 10/26/2021) At CC, we love to talk about the good old days, but as we all know, cars may generate less emotions today, but they sure are better in every objective parameter by a huge margin. And contrary to what might be sometimes assumed, it’s a lot cheaper to own and operate a car today; 25% less than in 1968, actually.
Two studies evaluating the cost of driving various classes of American cars in 1968 yielded an average of 11.4 cents, for an annual distance of 15,000 miles (the annual average then was 12,000). Since cost per mile decreases with increased annual mileage, the typical American in 1968 was paying more than that per mile. The studies also showed that the cheapest American cars to drive were pony cars, like the Mustang, undoubtedly because of their lower depreciation.
Gasoline averaged $0.34 per gallon, which is about $2.30 adjusted. The dropping price of gas in 2015 is a factor in the dip in ownership/operating costs as calculated by the AAA. Their April 2015 analysis showed that the annual cost to own and operate an “average sedan” (Camry class, presumably) is $8,698, or 58 cents per mile, also for 15,000 annual miles. That’s a 2% drop from the previous year, thanks to lower finance and fuel costs. The cost per mile for other classes of cars is: small sedan – $0.449; medium sedan – $0.581; large sedan – $0.710; minivan – $0.621; SUV 4WD: $0.708.
Of course, one can do better than that nowadays, mainly by keeping a car longer. We kept our 2000 Forester for 15 years, and our total cost of ownership was a mere 24 cents. That would have not been readily possible in 1968, as cars generally would not have lasted in full-time use for 15 years without major repairs.
Of course, lower costs are attainable by buying a reliable older used car. I know folks who’ve bought 20 year old Corollas and run them for years with very little cost. In 1968, very few would have considered buying a 1948 car as a regular transportation device. Although even then, I remember one or two folks who picked up old Plymouths and Dodges from that era and drove them regularly. Folks who can do their own mechanical work can always beat the average costs, if they’re so inclined.
Update 10/25/2021: Here’s AAA’s projected car ownership costs for 2021. It’s changed a bit, due to adding new vehicle categories, but the cost of driving a Medium Sedan (Camry, for example) is projected at $0.62.44/mile, which is actually a bit more than 25% cheaper than 1968. But then fuel costs have risen since this report was written in the spring of 2021. And car prices (average transaction price) have been rising. But on balance, costs to drive an average vehicle for 15k miles per year are still some 25% lower than they were in 1968.
Its all about the trucks: http://www.businessinsider.com/cars-most-likely-to-get-to-200000-miles-2014-10
That was interesting – especially once you get down to the tables without SUVs. My personal experience seems to match their study so far – Subaru Outback was #10, at .8% with over 200k miles. Mine sure looks likely to make it – 169k and everything works and looks good. Interestingly, the Subaru Legacy is on the list also, but up at #2, with 1.8% over 200k. Given that they are virtually the same car except for suspension ride height, I wonder what the difference is? Are Legacys only bought by older boring accountants? (Of course, demographics is absolutely why the Subaru WRX isn’t on the list! )
Part of the reason the big trucks and SUV’s get to high milage is that the user base tends to buy them for frequent long distance travel.
Where I live in the American midwest, a lot of people still buy a large vehicle with the expectation of making it their long distance over-the-road car. If you shop for late model used vehicles such as the F-150, Expedtion, Suburban or Tahoe, you’ll find that most of them have almost absurdly high milage for being 2 to 5 years old. If you do find a clean low milage vehicle, you’ll pay an almost new car price for it.
When I bought my F-150 a few years ago, I was briefly distracted by a very clean two year old Expedition EL on the used lot. When I made an inquiry, I was told it had about 170,000 miles on it. The vehicle I was replacing had only 70,000 on it – to say the least, I had no interest in going that direction. Apparently the first owner used it to tow a horse trailer to shows and was constantly on the road.
I drive my F-150 sparingly, but when vacation time comes, its on the road long distances, frequently pulling a boat.
This sounds familiar. Even though our ’06 FFV F-150 gets no better than 16 on the highway, we still prefer it for multi-person trips over everything except the new CR-V. No matter where you sit, it’s comfortable, quiet and smooth. If we bought a camper again, even if it was a little two-person thing for Mom and Dad, light enough to tow with the Honda, they’d still probably take the pickup.
We just rented a Caravan for a five-man trip down to Illinois and got “saddled” with a brand-new Tahoe–but even that was nice. 20 MPG on the highway and it rode like an old Cadillac minus any floatiness.
Now, given that we try to replace our vehicles every six to eight years (imagine doing that 40 years ago!), we’ve started looking for its replacement in the next body style (I’ve recommended to my father an ’11 or later with the 5.0). And it’s hard to find! Anything with less than 100K miles (which is an awful lot in my dad’s eyes; he grew up in a time when your pickup would get 5,000 miles on it a year, at most) is going for about 70-75% of its original price.
Most UK built cars lasted 5-7 years 40 years ago. Buying one with more than 60k miles was a no..no..My old 1980 Spitfire lasted 60k miles
before the front 1/4 panels rusted thru, end flowt on the crank shaft and baulking 2nd gear.. 1950s tech!.
Can confirm – my aunt’s Morris 1100 was shot by 70,000 miles, but it took her 14 years to achieve that.
> In 1968, very few would have considered buying a 1948 car as a regular transportation device.
My grandad would’ve been one of the few to do something like that. When he bought a new 1950 Plymouth as his “good” car, his daily driver (winter beater) was a 1936 Dodge. He overhauled the engine in the Dodge himself in his garage. I don’t know how long the Dodge lasted, but at some point he replaced it with a second 1950 Plymouth. When he factory-ordered a 1966 Chrysler as his new “good” car, his daily-driven 1950 Plymouth was beat, and the good one replaced it as his DD.
That’s how to do it BigOldChryslers.
A good case can be made that those stodgy but solid Briggs-bodied Chrysler products of the 1949-54 period were more practical, economical, and durable (and no less safe) than any succeeding Mopars up to about the mid-60s, with the possible exception of the Valiants, Lancers, and Darts with the Slant Six engines.
You would have to be a man (or woman) of fortitude though to put up with the laughter from friends and neighbors who had their shiny new toys to show off in those rapidly changing years of style.
But there were people like your grandfather — the best friend of my grandmother was still daily driving her ’51 or ’52 Plymouth Cambridge sedan at least as late as 1967, if not longer!
In the mid-1970s, one of my grandmother’s neighbors was a young man who was “handy” and made a living by fixing up houses and selling them, and doing repairs for others. He drove a very clean, all-original 1951 Plymouth Cambridge sedan, which stuck out like a sore thumb at that time. But the car, in retrospect, fit him perfectly.
My Great Aunt Irene (Perry, Missouri) drove her ’53 Mercury Monterey well into 1980. She bought it new. Had one rebuild that I know of and was a Merc-O-Matic.
Hardly saw any pre-1955 cars in Chicago by ’68-70, and by 1974, only Tri-5 Chevys seemed to be ‘kept’ running.
I think one of the reason is people in Chicago don’t have that many winter cars for tight land. It was outrageous in terms of parking, and it would be a big luxury to swap different cars for different seasons. As heavily salted as in Chicago, people in Detroit have easier time to store summer cars, and as a result it is still common to see cars many decades ago for frequent use in summer.
It’s pretty cost effective to drive a car these days, even though not pony cars for insurance reasons. More and more younger people drive Park Avenue Ultra and Eldorado to get the performance and lower insurance premium.
And vehicles are getting smaller with better MPG, which helps.
And yet it feels like our money doesn’t stretch as far. Stagnating incomes, rising home prices, and the regrettable modern tendency to see “wants” as “needs”. I am as guilty of this as anyone…
At least the cost of driving is going down!
Without having followed the link (no time at the moment) I wonder if the lower cost of ownership is completely a function of longevity and fuel costs, i.e. is the average car more or less expensive to purchase? I know this was discussed recently (a comparison between a current Mustang GT and a ’68 GT500KR was made) but it seems like the cost of an average vehicle in 2015 (say, a midrange Camry) as a percentage of 2015 median income must be higher than the cost of an average vehicle in 1968 (say, a midrange 4-door Chevelle) as a percentage of 1968 median income?
These are somewhat iffy comparisons. First of all, few buy cars for cash, so the monthly payment is the major consideration. And since loans are longer and interest rates much lower, that all contributes to the reduced average cost.
To make comparisons of purchasing power then and now would require a more thorough analysis.Generally speaking, health care and education have jumped dramatically since back then, while food, clothing and household appliances/electronics have dropped quite strongly. Housing has gone up some. And car ownership has come down some.
In 1968, single earner but married households with children were still very common. Not so much today!
The real issue is the growing income gap, as the lower and upper percentiles increase in numbers, and the classic middle shrinks. That explains why $55k trucks are flying out the door. Clearly, plenty of folks feel like they can afford a nice new car/truck, as sales and average prices are up strongly, to new records this year.
I completely agree. Health care and education shows how carefully a crooked system was built. Insurance companies don’t have enough restrain and they sneak through the responsibility too easily with too big profit. Both auto insurance companies and health insurance companies lack disciplines and they are too spoiled.
University education system shows how greedy they are. Traditionally more expensive private universities are pretty fair by compare, as they don’t overcharge tuition and they usually don’t stagnate students for particular reasons. Public universities these days are lured by the high profit from international students and they tweak slower enrollment for local students ( even with fairly good grades ) while they embrace international students without basic language abilities ( and how did federal government let them come ) and charge really outrageous tuition. First university like that coming to my mind is Michigan State University, I personally never hear any good words about them, and a whole parking lot of 100k imports cars tells the problem.
Insurance companies lack discipline? That’s rich. They are among the most highly regulated industries in the country. Not only that, a good portion of health insurers are not for profit. Meanwhile car insurers now have to cover ever-more-expensive personal injury lawsuits and modern cars that can be totaled after a fender-bender thanks to being full of airbags and proprietary electronics. The issue is the costs they have to cover, not the insurers themselves.
Of course, it’s easier to call it all a big conspiracy and post nonsense on Social Media I suppose than to actually think critically about it.
Phil L.
You sound knowledgeable but seriously?
You make insurance companies sound like benevolent charities. Thanks to “Health Care REFORM”, my father’s health insurance company stopped offering coverage last year. My sister had to scramble to get insurance for a 93 year old man….affordable? She was lucky to get him re-covered.
I have a home I recently found out is closer to 100 years old than it is to 50 years old…like I thought. Only 1 company in Florida will insure my house and insurance for this “bungelow” is over $2,000/year.
I’ve been driving older Hondas for nearly 20 years. No accidents, but because I am not carrying a “mountain” of debt my insurance company feels I am not a great driver, a marginal risk.
Insurance companies do not operate where they can’t generate huge profits. State Farm does not sell new homeowners insurance policies in Florida. And when Florida threatens to tighten the regs, State Farm and the other big companies threaten to pull out of the state….and I imagine they pull that stunt elsewhere, too.
Personal injury lawsuits are pretty expensive and demanding, and somehow no fault insurance was invented, and idea sounds pretty good, as it guarantees coverage for the victim from their own insurance company without lawsuits. But victims are pretty helpless in the hands of their strong insurance companies, and insurance companies have years of experience on how to legally sneak through without paying for the person they should protect. Without lawsuit against the people who is at fault, insurance companies only have more motivation to deny the payment.
And insurance companies do the same for all other things at the same time.
Health Care Reform on paper is beneficial to many people but loopholes were well exploited by insurance companies and they successfully threw away their due responsibilities, blaming on the government.
Phil L.
I have been working on the insurance/ business side of healthcare for 10+ years. There is major amounts of collusion and price gouging going on. The hospital system I work for is a “not for profit” that also happens to own a substantial portion of a major health insurance company everyone in the United States is familiar with. NOPE NOTHING TO SEE HERE MOVE ALONG>>>>>>
The system I work for must maintain a certain amount of charitable right offs to keep their “not for profit” status. One of the ways they do this is by the weird way hospital charges and bills are put together.
Here is an example
50k inpatient stay
patient has Medi-cal (California’s version of Medicaid)
Medi-cal pays 5-6k hospital then uses the remaining balance as a charitable right off. “45k write off see how generous and helpful we are?”
Same 50k stay but with a “contracted insurance” this time
pays say 15-20k
balance is considered “contractual write off”
Keep in mind that by law Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement levels are required to make it so providers do not lose any money on services at the minimum and still make a modest profit.
Amazing America puts up with this. Here in Canada, we get good health care for free. In my province, even the meds are covered.
What is more, in my opinion, is all the nonsense we hear about public health care is just that, nonsense. We can choose our doctors. We don’t live in a totalitarian dictatorship because we have public health care. All our leading indicators of health are superior to those of the USA and we spend 50% less per capita on health care.
Unless physicians, nurses and other medical services personnel are volunteering to work without pay, and the people who work for pharmaceutical companies are also graciously volunteering their services, someone is paying for medical care in Canada. It’s not free.
The Canadian system is not superior to that of the U.S. across the board. Americans, for example, enjoy lower mortality rates from breast, prostate and colon cancer than Canadians by 9 percent, 184 percent and 10 percent, respectively. The American system is also superior in other aspects, including patient access to preventative cancer screening and the amount of time patients spend waiting for care.
Geeber
I work in and profit from the current system. I am a patient advocate by trade. I work in this system from the inside and I am telling you Its broken. I would trade for the Canadian model in a hot second if I could.
Our model is great if you have really good insurance or are around the federal poverty level in income. Not so much if you are a working borderline ‘middle class’ person (which is what most people fall under btw)
personal example time:
two weeks ago I had an appointment with a specialist. This 20 minute visit cost 650.00 of which my insurance paid 56.00 with me being responsible for the rest (I accidentally chose this poop coverage because it had the same name as the year priors coverage that was better). This exact same visit a year n half before cost 550.00 of which my insurance paid 110.00 and I had no further out of pocket expense.
I pay 200.00 a month for my heath coverage from my employer plus all the nonsense charges from visits etc.
If I made less money I would have ZERO out of pocket expenses either monthly or for dr visits.
I have patients whose family health insurance monthly premium from employers is around 1500.00. That is insanity and I honestly have no clue how in the heck people pay that.
regarding the stats you put up I simply do not buy it. In the 12 years I have worked in healthcare I have never once heard of a Canadian citizen coming to any of the four hospitals I have worked at to received our ‘better’ care. Not a single time. The only time I have ever seen anything like that is in the news from very biased sources. I have had patients from a couple few south American and China (apparently its common for well of Chinese people to have their babies in the US to make them citizens…yes its a real thing) countries come up here for treatment but never one from Europe or Canada.
You are talking about costs. I’m talking about outcomes (i.e., whether the treatment was successful) and patient access to the latest technology.
The book The Narcissism of Minor Differences: How America and Europe Are Alike, by UCLA Professor Peter Baldwin, was written before the passage of the new federal health care law. It compared the U.S. system to those of European nations with nationalized health care.
He found that there is no clear-cut proof that their systems, based on actual outcomes, are superior to ours. (And this was with about 15 percent of the American population not covered by any form of health insurance.) When the Canadian system is compared to ours, the same holds true. There is no proof that it produces consistently superior outcomes to our system.
I recently had a patient that had no health coverage. 60yr old former master mechanic now service writer for small shop. He makes 15 bucks an hour working full time. His wife was recently laid off and he is their sole source of income. They live in a trailer park. He has stomach cancer but the hospital I work at does not have an oncology department so they had him in the ED for three days while trying to get one of the affiliated hospitals to take him but because he has no coverage and makes too much money for Medi-cal none of these hospitals would accept him as a transfer.
A couple years ago I had another patient that had put off seeing a dr for a year because she had no coverage and could not afford to pay out of pocket to see a Dr. Eventually she was able to get on a county health program and was seen. She was diagnosed with bladder cancer and by the time it was caught she had maybe a month left to live. Bladder cancer is one of those types that is defeat able if caught early but once it gets late stage you are done. This woman was broken because she tried to do things the ‘right’ way.
If I had a nickel for every patient that told me “I didn’t want to come in because I don’t have insurance but I couldn’t take it (pain, bleeding…etc) anymore” I could buy a PS4.
Most people in the US are 2-3 months missed salary away from being homeless. To most people cost is everything.
98% of something is always better than 100% of nothing.
Except that, even with the cases you outlined – and note that cases of that type would have been included in any statistics compiled by Professor Baldwin for his book – there is no proof that the Canadian system, and systems of various European nations, produce better outcomes than the U.S. system.
For some of the more serious diseases, the outcomes of those systems are WORSE than the outcomes produced by the U.S. system.
I have German relatives, and friends from Great Britain. The German relatives all tell me that anyone who can afford to do so in Germany supplements their government-provided care with a private health insurance policy. (For many Germans, this type of policy is an employer-provided benefit, just like in the U.S.)
The British friends tell me that, under no circumstances, do you want to rely solely on the British national system for care.
Geeber bro
I am not some bicycle commuting dandelion eating bleeding heart liberal.
The two cases I mentioned are not particularly rare. Their circumstances would not have even occurred in other first world countries because their illnesses would have been caught and treatment started long before needing to be hospitalized in the first place. Oh and that woman would still be alive.
The most common complaint about the countries you mentioned is regarding convenience issues like wait times. People aren’t going into bankruptcy because they got sick and they aren’t dying of easily preventable causes like they do here.
If we were to put up a poll asking Canadian visitors to this site (which lets face it doesn’t exactly cater to the super leftist crowd) which system they would prefer. Theirs or ours probably 75-80% of them would say something along the lines of ‘ours isn’t perfect but screw the US system’
I talk with Dr’s and High level nurses on a daily basis and most of them say pretty much this: The main advantage healthcare has in the US over other countries is our ability to keep really sick people ‘alive’ longer than other places. Things like being vented or intubated life support type situations we are great at. But at a certain point it becomes a quality of life question.
I work on the inside and see on a daily basis how it works. This is literally what I do for a living and the system as it stands is a racket.
“few buy cars for cash”
With cars lasting so much longer, wouldn’t it make more sense to “save monthly and buy” rather than “buy and pay monthly loan payments?”
Instead of an endless series of car loans, why not save for the next car after the current car is paid off, and break out of this cycle?
The ongoing “next car” savings account could also provide a nice cushion during unexpected hardship, such as unemployment, instead of having a car being repo’d due to missed loan payments.
Not necessarily. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with buying on credit, as long as the terms are relatively favorable and the item you’re buying brings material benefits. And today’s very low rates on car loans (2-3%, for good credit) are very low.
If your car is getting old and wearing out, keeping it running another 4-6 year while saving up the money for a new one makes little or no sense, especially if the new car is more efficient, safer, reliable, etc. The whole point of credit is to allow one to have the benefit of a better whatever now, and pay for it in the future.
Sure, if you have the money, or want to save it, pay cash. Which I typically do. But even I financed my latest car because the subsidized interest rate was so low (0.9%).
One should have a proper personal financial plan, including savings for various important needs (emergency, retirement). But buying a car on credit doesn’t have to be at the expense of that.
Of course some folks over-extend themselves. That’s a different matter.
Exactly. I leased my Rio at 0%. I could have easily charged the entire car on a credit card, but it makes more sense to finance.
In my situation, I couldn’t be bothered nursing a beater, since it would cost much more in the long run. I also want four wheel disks and all the latest safety gear.
The Rio costs C$.0.31/km to drive. Cheap.
“If you can afford the loan, you don’t need the loan”
It’s certainly possible that in the case of 0% offers, it may be better to borrow and save/invest the sum (interest rate for saving is very low as well, while investments have risks) However many automakers do offer equivalent cash rebates in lieu of 0% loans.
I am not sure most people who take out car loans can pay it off right away in an emergency, so let’s leave aside the kind of “strategic borrowing” above (which appears to be your case) and assume that the buyer can’t actually afford to pay with spare cash. Wouldn’t it be better to “save then buy?”
The monthly payment will be the same, just have that one-time phase adjustment of keeping the car 2x longer than the loan pay-off time (5 year loan, but keep the new car for 10 years) It means paying into a savings account, instead of an unforgiving lender. The new car fund could double as an emergency fund if needed. With today’s direct pay deposit and online banking, it will only take a few mouse clicks to set up. And with today’s long lasting cars, this makes more sense than ever.
I am not saying never take out a car loan. I am saying don’t do it more than once. Thanks.
And it depends on your starting point. For example, if you have a job where you spend a lof of time in your car but aren’t provided a company vehicle (like my wife’s situation) it doesn’t make sense to limit yourself to paying cash when a breakdown or an issue could leave you unable to do your work. The peace of mind of having a newer vehicle, with a warranty if anything should go wrong and with modern safety equipment in the event of an accident, is worth having to deal with a monthly payment. Plus the rates are, as mentioned, appealingly low right now.
Of course it also pays to exercise restraint, which is why my own car is essentially beater-grade, long paid off, and whenever it goes its replacement will probably be a well-used cash purchase. The thought of having two car payments makes me uncomfortable even though it’s financially viable.
One of reason is shrinking mid-class, especially among working class. And people such as Snyder came up with the idea of right to work at a weaker ground, with the help of congressmen backing up capitalist companies in those states with poor protection to the workers. I thought exploitation of labors was fixed in the ’50s, but sounds like it comes back with the help of Nissan, Toyota and Hyundai. GM, Ford, Chrysler are not exploiting the US workers yet, but they could be tempted under competition, and there should be strong restrain against them.
Consumerism is more excessive when payment is overused for purchasing or leasing. US automakers too heavily rely on leasing with lower payments, it’s a bad example.
But it’s worse when there is advertisement showing $29/month payment on steak for half a year? I never heard of payment for food before.
Huh?? What exploitation of labor in the ’50s? That’s when trade unions were at their strongest, & working Americans had it made since Rest of World was either unindustrialized, Communist, or rebuilding from WW2. And perhaps workers are happier when they’re not managed by Detroit suits.
Now that Rest of World is industrializing, the American party is over, and we can either keep whining about outsourced jobs & legislate price controls for labor, or take it like men & accept lower wages more in line with China et al. Since when do Americans deserve a perpetual high living standard?
Exploitation of labor happened in the ’30s, and Dearborn police had the most notorious reputation among public service when they really abused their power. Private security firms hired by Chrysler had pretty notorious reputation also. But it was almost fixed in the ’50s and there was no way to imagine it would come back.
China shouldn’t be compared as a good example at all. If not for the harsh capitalist dictatorship from the government on all levels, workers deserve a far better pay and better protection, while it will be better for them, and partially it would solve the issue of outsourced job in the US.
Low price for labor is merely a reflection about poor democracy and lack of voice from the people.
Private security police are not “exploitation of labor“ in the Marxian sense (which vocabulary you’re using). The fool Marx had it that workers are •always• exploited, with police or no police.
And I wasn’t citing China as a good example, merely one that exists & we better learn to live with it instead of whine about “fairness.“
Workers deserve nothing except the pay & conditions management agrees to. And pay is always fair if it’s agreed to by both parties.
Workers in the transplant operations of Honda, Hyundai, Nissan and Toyota are not being exploited. They are paid fairly, and enjoy good working conditions. The Toyota Lean Production System depends on everyone – including the people working on the line – to make suggestions to improve both the product and the process. Companies don’t get employees who will do that by abusing them or even paying them the minimum wage. That sort of working environment also drastically lessens the need for a union.
If anyone should be thankful, it’s the workers at GM, Ford and Chrysler, as the success of the Japanese in this country forced management to revamp their plants and change their attitudes regarding labor relations.
If you want to read about what it was like to work in a Big Three facility during the “good old days,” read A Savage Factory by Robert Dewar. He was a supervisor at the Ford Sharonville (Ohio) Transmission Plant from 1970 through 1979. He paints a picture of plant management and labor at war with each other, and both at war with upper management from Dearborn. Interestingly, he was sympathetic to the line workers, but neither the workers nor the UAW come off too well in his book.
He went back to the same plant in 2009, and was amazed at the transformation. The old labor-management animosity had been dramatically reduced, and the plant was much cleaner and safer. Workers enjoyed much better working conditions.
When he asked what drove this dramatic change, the answer was, “Fear.” As in fear of being driven out of business by the superior methods and products of the Japanese competition.
Japanese competition forced the domestics to improve the reliability and “user friendliness” of their products, and also forced management and the UAW to get on the same page regarding quality and working conditions.
Better vehicles are a big reason why it’s cheaper to operate one today compared to 1968, and the Japanese deserve a big thanks for helping to make that happen.
I’ve owned my 1968 Impala since 1975. It was my very first car. While I will agree that new cars need less maintenance, that in itself is yet another reason why they are so utterly forgettable and draw no emotion. The lack of appealing styling, bland color choices, nothing to choose from other than a four door sedan with black wall tires is the other. Cars are now nothing more than four wheeled toasters, washing machines and refrigerators….appliances only. For sheer style, I’ll continue to keep my 68 Impala, which has actually needed very few repairs in 40 years of ownership.
Simply BEAUTIFUL…and the pickup ain’t bad either!! 🙂
Beautiful car!!!!
I was thinking along those lines. Yeah, car ownership today may be cheaper, they may be safer, they may perform a lot better. But overall they are uninteresting appliances and that take much of the fun out of car ownership. I can go do just about any dealer and get a vehicle roughly comparable to anything other dealers sell. The difference between cars rated great or poor in reliability can add up to a whopping 1 or 2 repairs over 5 years yet people obsess over those reports. There are few new cars on the market that really interest me anymore.
Today, there is more passion in the iPhone vs Android fights than between car makes among “young people” today. Actual appliances! I remember defending your choice to go MOPAR/FOMOCO/GM was like picking your favorite sports team, It was a big deal. Though cars HAVE got better, They just haven’t the “soul” (no pun intended…)
To me, soul can only come with age and the associated cumulative memories. My ’02 car has more soul than any of our others (’06, ’08, and ’13, respectively), but our ’98 pickup had more soul than that.
Geez, that sounded a little pretentious.
Gorgeous, and solid evidence that American cars are not all rust-ridden, unreliable pieces of junk!
Beautiful car! If that photo is revealing the area where your car lives, then that helps too. (The saguaro cactus and palo verde in the background give it away as the Sonoran desert.) Salt on the road is never an issue, and if you can keep a car out of the sun, it will last a LONG time.
Thanks David. Yep you got it right, I’m in Tucson, but, I’ve only lived here six years. My Impala was originally a Long Island car, which is where I bought it and then I moved to Ohio. I have rarely driven it in rain and never in snow all these years. It does stay in a garage as you are correct, the sun here is a killer on older cars.
Beautiful. Is it your daily driver? How many miles per year do you drive it?
It was my daily driver well into the 1980’s, but now sees about 1000 miles per year. I do have a 69 that sees use weekly.
So how is it relevant to the discussion here? I though we were talking about the cost of driving some 15,000 mile per year? Are you trying to distract us? 🙂
Wow, that is one gorgeous car in a great period color! I learned to drive in a much plainer variant of this car, a ’67 Bel Air 2-door sedan with a six and 3-on-the-tree.
Ahhhh, Grecian Green! My Dad had a 68 Impala Custom in that same exact color that he traded in a 66 fastback Impala on that was the same color as the Impala in the ad at the top of the article. They were beautiful cars, as is yours, Jimmy. I’ve always wanted a 68 Impala Convertible… Make mine light blue metallic with a white top and white interior…. Someday… ;o)
Your car is beautiful, and it’s great that you held on to your first car.
Most people at that time, however, were not driving around in convertibles or even muscle cars. They drove around in hardtop coupes and sedans with an inline six or mild-mannered V-8, automatic transmission, power steering, whitewall tires and AM radio. That was it. They really weren’t that much more exciting than a 2015 Toyota Camry.
When I drive my 2003 Honda Accord EX sedan (with 241,000 miles), I don’t view it as an appliance. It view it as a very well-engineered machine that does a lot of things very well, and not always under ideal driving conditions.
In my opinion, the need to be repaired adds to the character and memorability to cars. For example, My grandfather owned a HZ Holden from new, and can tell me countless stories of the engine, interior and body and remembers exactly what colour it was (because he had to repaint it). Recently, I asked him about his ’05 Landcruiser which he had sold a decade ago, and he could barely remember anything about it, as it had nothing he had to fix. My problem with new cars is that unless it’s special, which most aren’t, you have no reason to remember it.
P.S. Nice Impala!
I wonder how the cost to own and operate a car in the late seventies/early eighties or i the Malaise era if you will would compare to today.
Interest rates were sky hi in 1980, 19% Prime!
Thy typical 68 Impala (or Bel Air) probably had power steering and brakes, AM Radio, Powerglide, and a small V8.
How much was the sticker on that? $3000? $3500? Plus a 2% Fed “Excise” tax.
How what was the median income? (average is usually higher than median)?
How much of that median income did Joe Sixpack keep? FICA taxes were 1% or 2% or 3% then, and Fed/State was lower.
So, how many months did Joe Sixpack have to work to acquire his new Impala in ’68?
Today, run the same numbers for Joe/Jane avg…how many months does he/she work to get that new Camry or Malibu or Civic or Cruze?
While the 1968 car didn’t last as long and had more upkeep, (and hence needed to be replaced more often), I think you’ll find that buy a new one may have been more affordable.
Here’s another look…in 1973, the last year of our post-WWII “happy economy”, before the first energy crisis, 205-210 million Americans bought over 15 million new vehicles.
This year, a “great”, “rebound” year, 310 million Americans will buy 17 million new vehicles.
The percentage of working Americans who can afford a new car today is a lot less than 1968, or 1973.
The issue is that back then, most Joe Sixpacks had a job that paid pretty well, and health care and other costs were lower. Today, Joe either has one of the shrinking number of jobs that still pay well, and probably drives a newish F150, or….not, and drives a beater.
The economic circumstances of workers has changed very substantially. But the formula for calculating average cost of ownership and operation are pretty consistent.
Agreed Paul. Back then people in my high school class could get a well-paying job in the steel mills of my native Pittsburgh after graduation if they didn’t want to go to college.
My father graduated high school in 1970. His first job after graduating was as a body man at a shop in Los Angeles. At 19 he was able to buy a house and partially furnish it. There is no way a person can do such a thing these days.
The median home price here in California is over 400k and body shop workers make around 36k if they are lucky.
Yes, many things have changed since then, not just the cost of car ownership.
That’s one way of looking at it. Another way: with almost free financing and 96 month ( WTF!) plans, who CAN’T afford a new car?
What a great topic Mr N.
My ideology on buying and running a car with it’s attendant costs was molded by Michael Lamm with his “Used Cars” columns [and special Used Car editions] many years ago when I was reading them as a kid. Your work reminds me of his, Mr N. and I look forward to your observations as avidly as I have Mr Lamm’s.
I usually throw out the depreciation “costs” as a monetary factor, as when I have purchased a car the intent is to drive it “forever”. I have never lost the excitement and pleasure of driving or even riding in a car, any car, even if it’s a trip to the grocery store, so the idea and “cost” of depreciation is irrelevant for me. I always get back more than I’ve paid in pleasure.
In addition over a decade or 15-20 years the cost per year/mile becomes ever lower.
One of my favorite books from the 80s was “Why Trade It In” which pointed out the waste and financial cost of buying new or trading and a targeted plan for keeping your car running forever through preventive maintenance and component replacement at time and mileage intervals rather than when they wear out.
Another article in MT that influenced my ideas on this was the refurbishment of a 64 Dart wagon as an alternative to buying a new car in 1974. Prices were on the rise monthly during those days. It’s such a practical concept, it has stayed with me for 40 years now.
To do that today would be to find the simplest car with the highest production, long lived engine and transmission, parts commonality and ease of service. Not that hard to do, still.
On the ONION, I have had the spark plugs, boots, belts and all hoses replaced in the engine compartment. The car could have gone longer, but it’s been 10 years and heat and time also take a toll. Better to do this at 10 years/60,000 miles on my schedule than being stranded by the side of the road.
Trading and cost of a replacement would be far greater than factoring in “depreciation” on the one I have. It’s only relevant if I ever sell the car.
Saving money gives me as much of a goose as automobiles and driving. And coming onto CC.
As to being condemned to driving an ION for 20 years, that’s okay. Driving anything is pure entertainment. Saving money by not playing the credit/depreciation/keeping up with the Joneses game is, well, priceless.
While I agree with much of what you have written and have owned cars a long time myself — the longest being 21 years for a Volvo 240 (sold in 2003) and 17+ years for a 1998 Nissan Frontier still in my personal fleet — the rapidly increasing pace of safety improvements makes a strong case for replacing daily drivers on a more frequent basis today.
I still do as much maintenance on my vehicles as possible: oil changes, tire rotations, filter replacements, and the like. Fortunately, fuel injection, electronic controls, and much better rust resistance make cars much more dependable, so I can mostly avoid taking the cars to a professional for service.
I have also saved quite a bit over the years by selling my cars privately — my last trade-in to a dealer was in 1978.
Too bad California doesn’t get to enjoy any of these reduced costs. CARB smog tests mean it is still expensive to keep a car on the road past the first few years. Cap and Trade makes our gas cost a dollar a gallon more than in other states(currently $2.88 a gallon for unleaded 87 octane). Property tax on cars and registration are several times what I paid in Virginia. Insurance costs are up there with lease payments. Don’t let this report lull you into a false sense of security. The same interests that have made California such a middle class wealth-suck have their sites set on the rest of the country.
You beat me to it. “Average” costs are just that, while good for the 1968 vs present comparison overall, local factors are huge in actual operating costs. Now that I am retired, actual cash outlay is less due to far fewer miles driven, but per mile cost has skyrocketed. Annual tag fees and insurance premiums dont go down. State Farm does charge slightly less for under 7,500 miles annually, but with a car and pickup, it was under a combined 15K miles before. Now it is less than half that and still the same premiums. Tires can rot before the tread wears out and batteries tend to last years longer with longer, more frequent trips.
From 1991 to 2009 I drove the same car (’86 Jetta) that I bought for 2k. Put 175k miles on top of the 100k miles it had when I bought it. Most of the places I worked at were dealerships, many of them VW. I always have had a second vehicle as a back up. Rarely needed but a pickup truck is always good to have available. If work was needed often a co worker mechanic would repair the car for next to nothing. And pre-internet it was really helpful to get details on how to perform a certain repair at home along with a loan of special tools if needed. This has saved me a lot of money and the car never had a problem that kept me from getting home or to work. Came close once, when a weld broke in the shifter rod getting it stuck in second gear. Luckily I was a mile or 2 away and made it to work with just that gear. Rewelded the same day at work (Nissan dealership) for $100.00. Did once have an accident which smashed the radiator and had to be towed home. But can’t blame the car for driver error. I still have it as an around town car, but don’t drive a lot anymore. Speaking of rotten tires, it’s time for new ones for the truck (’04 Titan, bought new) which has less than 15k and good tread but they are starting to crack. Still original battery, even with sitting a lot. This plan worked well for me, and saved ton’s of money over the years.
FWIW, in my driving lifetime, I think the golden era was the 1985-1995.
Fuel-injected VWs, Preludes, Accords, Taurus, and yes Camry, for middle America, and BMWs and Benzes still stood out. The “new” Lexus were great too.
And the Mustang 302s were great!
GM’s derided A-car (6000, Ciera) were boring, but solid.
And you could still get your Mitsubishi Mirage, OmniRizon, Corolla, Civic in base form.
These studies can be skewed all sorts of ways. I’m not saying the information is wrong, but there are all sorts of ways to make the raw data say what you want it to say.
My Volvo wagon will hit 200,000 miles this week, and I have been attacking small repairs and upgrades at a slow but steady pace…I figure as long as I spend less than $200/mo it’s cheaper to operate the wagon than it is to lease a new Civic, and I have no mileage limitations. There is a whole generation of young people with NO mechanical aptitude or feel for how machines work, including my son and his friends, none of whom have a clue about how to do any repair or diagnosis. In their case, leasing a new car is a good bet, as long as they don’t go nuts with mileage.
Did automotive leasing even exist in 1968?
AAA has no agenda, to make the numbers say something other than what they do.
Leasing is not part of “ownership and operating costs”. These calculations assume purchasing a car with a loan.
i would say they do have an agenda: encouraging automobile ownership. it would be better if they also posted the numbers based on purchase price and resale value. interest rates are not a function of the automobile industry and we are in an artificially low interest rate environment at the moment.
Conspiracy theories about the AAA’s hidden agendas are not really useful.
Interest rates, gas prices, taxes, registration, etc.and other costs are all variables that inevitably affect the cost of ownership. Of course thye have to be included.
This is not about the automobile industry, and the AAA is not in the industry’s pockets. This is about the total cost of ownership, period. And yes, the variables will change (hence the name).
And yes, their numbers ARE based on purchase price and resale value (depreciation). Was that not clear?
the aaa numbers are based on monthly payments minus resale value. it’s not the same as purchase price minus resale value. is that clear enough?
they did however separate out finance charges but since you didn’t cite the full 1968 data, there is no way of comparing it to the current costs.
No it’s not. What’s your point?
my point is this:
if you don’t break out the components of the two studies, the 25% assertion is meaningless. you don’t show enough data to back it up.
I give up. Take it up with the AAA, whose cost of ownership reports are the benchmark. Don’t believe it, if you don’t want to.
But it does rather make sense when you think about it. Cars cost about the same. Financing is much cheaper (8.5% or so back then; 2.9% now). Depreciation is lower now, since cars hold their value much better. Gas is cheaper. And cars are much more efficient; a typical sedan now gets about twice the mileage of one back then. Maintenance is significantly cheaper. Most cars need almost zero maintenance in the first few years. Tires last longer. Oil change intervals are longer. Etc…
So what would be more expensive?
Sometimes the truth is all too obvious, even lacking the nit-picky details.
Well, leasing did exist back in the day, just not common, used to see ads for “Cad-i-lease” in paper at Cadillac dealers, at least in 70’s.
Leasing has been around since at least this time. My dad was the manager of a radio station that leased it’s vehicles thru Ford Leasing, coincidentally a ’67 LTD like that in the ad. Even more coincidentally, one of his friends leased a Meteor Montego, like that in the ad, thru his clothing store business. My dad managed to total that rare Merc for him on a return business trip from Regina one night in 1969. The man simply turned the wreck back into Ford and let them deal with it, replacing it with a ’69 LTD.
Depreciation cost seems like the joker in the deck to me, the motivations behind buying a new car isn’t always done because someone’s last car was rendered undrivable, rather that it didn’t fit their growing needs, they want something better, something more economical, faster, more utility ect. That’s not even to mention the keeping up with the Joneses mentality, which definitely should be factored into 1968 vs today, where now it’s far more socially acceptable to be driving around a 5-10-20+ year old car.
Admittedly I do fall into the small group of people in the final sentences who do their own work, so cost per mile is never something I bothered worrying about. Those people shouldn’t be dismissed though, to say I’m blind to factors determining a car’s longevity would be very false. One thing 1968 had going for it that is simply not the case today is mainstream cars were all essentially identical underneath their more distinct skin – your average person could get their hands dirty to save on tune ups and repairs and transfer that knowledge into just about everything else they’d end up buying, since it really was all the same, just different sizes. That’s not the case today. Maintaining a 68 Mustang was really no different than maintaining a 68 Falcon, Fairlane or Galaxie, and none of those four from a 68 Camaro, Nova, Chevelle or Impala for that matter. Abysmal rust is really the true mortal wound the classics suffer.
Of course, that’s the price we pay for the handling and efficiency cars have today, and I won’t dispute or condemn those advancements, but as someone who does work on both new and old cars, not to mention my own, I’ve learned to really appreciate simplicity cars used to have, even if it means a regular ol appliance doesn’t hang with 30 year old Lambo. The irony of which is what made all those exotics of the past so impractical to own and require specialty shops with VERY expensive labor, was that everything underneath was simply alien to even the best general mechanic of the day. Well now a 2016 Mustang couldn’t possibly be more different under the skin from the Focus in the same showroom, requiring their own respective shop software and specialty tools to do any work on.
There are of course plenty of cars that are more reliable and rugged than others and longterm maintenance shouldn’t be a factor in keeping them drivable, but notice how few and far between they are, old Camrys, and Cierras are cockroaches of the roads today, but what of their other insect bretherine? The 80s and 90s was really the time when automakers seemed to switch from making the same car different size/skin to making a individual cars with totally bespoke platforms and drivelines suited specifically to their market tasks, and many of the less hot sellers, more obscure models since then are completely extinct – important parts can’t be found and nobody knows how to fix them. Many 2015/6s won’t fare any better 20+ years from now
The other thing to consider is that back in the old days, most people drove 10-12,000 miles per year. By the time a car had 70,000 miles on it, most were seeing rusted sheet metal and carb work was needed. Time took as much of s toll on a car as mileage did. People also had a tendency to not follow maintenance schedules all that closely, further resulting in mechanical issues. Case in point, Chevrolet 307’s have a reputation for cam shaft failure. I’ve opened up many of them back in the 70’s and always found the same thing: sludge, because nobody bothered changing oil regularly. My father bought a brand new 68 Impala with a 307. He was fanatical about maintenance as he was a mechanic, and it was his first brand new car. He changed oil every 1500 miles or 3 months. When it was totaled in 1991 by a tractor trailer truck backing into it, we took the engine out and it was as clean as new, with 189,000 miles on it. It still had the original cam shaft and had never been opened up before. Today, people put 100,000 miles on a car in three years and change the oil at the suggested intervals for the most part. Putting lots of miles on in a short time means time doesn’t take its toll and they get rid of it and start over.
I asked my parents once whether they regularly maintained their Oldsmobile 88s in the 1970s. They replied that they didn’t; they just took the cars to the independent mechanic that they knew and trusted when they started running poorly or making a strange noise.
And here it is. Growing up in the 70’s and 80’s few people other than my dad and mechanic uncles regularly serviced or took care of there vehicles properly. We used to pull valve covers and intakes off older V8 cars and see loads of sludge, worn out cams and other worn or bad items. For what ever reason maintenance seemed to fall by the wayside during this time era from what we saw. It was no small wonder that engines didn’t last more than 100K without rebuilds or extensive work.
Of course it didn’t help that components were being made lighter weight and cheaper, timing gears were made of nylon instead of steel, aluminum replacing steel etc. This made service even more critical.
Dad and I prided ourselves with the fact we never lost an engine up to this very year. And we had some engines that were considered poor such as the Buick 231 V6, the Pontiac 301, the Ford 351 etc.
Years ago I could do a simple tune-up, when all you had to do was properly gap the plugs and set the timing with a timing light. I could adjust valves on my old Accord, too, and there were other things I could tackle without risking my hands too much. But now with all the computer controls, there isn’t much I can do, and there are so many things under the hood now that bear no resemblance whatsoever to parts as I knew them years ago. The upside is that the computer controls and electronic fuel injection do their job very, very well these days.
In fact, that’s just what the dealers want you to think. If you have an old notebook, an OBD II adapter and some (easy to get) pieces of software – you can do just the same thing on almost any production car with all the computer controls. And for the most part it is *more simple* than it used to be in the good old days of carburetor engines and manual valve adjustment. My father does that for life, so I do know what I’m saying.
Try as I might, I simply can’t get excited about today’s cars. The *”Bold New”* Toyota Camry just isn’t attractive enough for me to get excited about it. In fact, I call it the most hideous looking car I’ve seen Toyota offer.
The new Camry is a sign of the times. Competent in most ways but not all. Inoffensive to most. Generic and vanilla. Decent ride and safe handling. Average performance from the volume selling 178 Hp 2.5 4 cylinder. Average gas mileage, trunk space and resale value. It is the average nature of this car that keeps it so popular along with it’s perceived reliability. But most everything else made today is just as if not more reliable, a bit more exciting and involving to drive(Accord/Fusion/Mazda 6 etc) and offer far more value for the coin with better performance (Sonata/Optima) with longer warranties etc. None of these cars can be accused of being exciting and many car enthusiasts like myself find them boring or ugly to the point of never considering them for purchase. Which brings me back to the Camry analogy. It’s like the McDonalds hamburger. Billions sold but far from the best choice.
Many of the exact same things could be said about a 1960s Chevrolet.
There sure are a lot more words on the Nova ad, and most of them are about the car, not the lifestyle.So, Americans then knew more about cars, and had longer attention sp….. wait, what was I saying?
Impala. What was that about attention sp… mmmm cookies… numnumnumnum
They had to convey a certain amount of information in the ad itself, to get a prospective buyer to go into a dealer showroom for more info. Current print ads just have to grab your eye enough to get you to the website.
In my opinion, both of the ads in the opening photo are pretty lame. I don’t remember that Chevy ad at all, and with good reason compared to so many other great ones Chevy ran during the glorious 60s.
At least the pictured ad shows an Impala Sport Coupe (fastback) and not a Caprice with its more formal top.
My hat is off to people who can keep a car for many years, thru umpteen 100,000 miles.
I tire of them quickly. My record was a Chevy Optra (Daewoo Lacetti) that I kept for 6 years, just slightly longer than the Lanos before that. I have a KDM Cruze now. Mind you, i drive very little. I only put 11,000 kms (less than 7000 miles) on the Cruze in 18 months.
I agree about the tiring part–the longest I’ve daily driven any car was 5 years. Day in, day out, it kind of gets old. My and my wife’s current cars have been with us for 3 and 4 years respectively and I’m rather bored of both. Long ownership is best from a cost standpoint, clearly (as long as you get out before the repair bills turn from occasional annoyances to regular wallet-openers) but it’s not exciting.
Though I suppose there’s a point where the vehicle has been around long enough to seem like ‘part of the family’ – I own an old Malibu that has been in my extended family its entire life and my immediate family since ’86. Even though it hasn’t been driveable since 2001, waiting since then for a restoration that never seems to have space or funds available, I can’t imagine *not* having that one. (Though even with that long tenure, it was only my daily driver for a little over 4 years, ’96 to ’01.)
One point often neglected in such discussions (apologies if someone raised it already – I had not yet had the chance to read all the comments) is that modern cars are very good but can only be maintained by a workshop having all the testing equipment, equipment which costs terrifying amounts of money. Once the guarantee has ran its course, heaven help you if anything goes wrong, because it will not be cheap. Up to the early 90s it was (assuming parts were available) possible for owners having basic equipment to maintain their cars almost indefinitely. In fact, something like a 55-57 Chevy is a car which one could keep in service perpetually (or until some politician makes cars illegal). Given that most pollution is given off when the car is produced, it is far more “green” than a Prius, which cannot really be recycled in this way. Oh, and if you do not like 50s handling, braking and safety, there is much you can do to improve it – and the price will not be prohibitive over the very long time you will be keeping it.
Yes ! Just what I intended to write, but you did it first.
To replace the headlights on a 2010 Mercedes-Benz, you have to have be an Authorized Dealer (C) (R) with some Proprietary Authorized Dealer’s Equipment and Software – otherwise the car’s computer just would not recognize them. Compared to this, the 1990s cars had an almost completely open architecture, in programmers’ terms. An that is a troubling tendency. In fact, mostly because of this I have big doubts that most 2010+ cars would last for 15 years in the first place – they seem to be programmed to become economically inefficient to run after 10 years or so.
Modern cars are great and very inexpensive to run – until they actually break down, that is. And, considering how complicated they’ve got, they *do* break down, oh they do, men. Often after the warranty expires.
How about re-setting the pressure senders inside your tires? If you are in a EU country, all new vehicles MUST have these – what happened to self-responsibility? In Austria, if they do not work it’s a roadworthiness fail. So now for changing from summer to winter tires you have to take the car to an authorized dealer, who of course charges for this extra task. No such nonsense on the proverbial 55-57 Chev…
Required in the US as well, possibly due to the Ford Exploder/Firestone Tire fiasco quite a few years ago. Resetting can be done by yourself. Just read the owners manual. Servicing of them can be done inexpensively at most any tire shop, at least over here.
Hmm I came here for the old cars, conspiracy theory arguements are room 3b.
I agree that my perception is that overall costs have come down, though as a Canadian I wonder what our numbers would be since I suspect we pay more for insurance, gas and toll roads and cars and, well everything…
I am also reminded of my Grandfather’s obsession with keeping track of his cents per mile, he saved every reciept and calculated it out at the end of every car’s life. And all this effort was really not too useful at the end of the day. I drive, I try to minimize my cost, I don’t keep records..
Please read my comment above. Who do you think lobbies for such rules? Nowadays, together with the safety Nazis, manufacturers and dealers. It is not a conspiracy but – from their PoV – sound business policy.
Right you are sir, the door is this way….
Political issues can have a very real bearing on the price and complexity of cars. I do not consider any of this as “conspiracy”. In the example I provided there is no question the whole process was set in motion by manufacturers with politicians jumping on the bandwagon.
I’m going back prior to 1968 to the years from 1960 into the early seventies during which I tried to influence my father’s choice of cars. It rarely worked. He wasn’t brand loyal, didn’t care about the color or which options a car had. He usually bought three year old cars and replaced them at six. I remember him saying that the greatest depreciation was during the first few years and any issues a car might have had when new would have been worked out by the time he bought them. He preferred six cylinder cars and to him, fewer options meant fewer repairs. His worst purchase was a 1966 Country Sedan with a 352 which was only months old when he bought it. It was a beautiful car, but got horrible mileage. He hated it, and when my sister totally wrecked it, he thanked her. As time went on, he continued to buy used cars, but he kept them longer because they became more reliable and more fuel efficient. The one exception to the norm was in 1981, when he ordered a new Mercury Zephyr. It was my parent’s only new car. He ordered it with a 2.3 Liter 4 and a four speed manual transmission. It was very reliable and got near 30 mpg. He loved it. From that time on, with the exception of his ’82 Celebrity and Mom’s ’93 Lumina, the rest were small cars with fours. I can’t tell you what it cost him per mile, just the things he did to keep the cost of ownership down. I remember him telling me that he didn’t understand why some folks are nostalgic about old cars. He said that modern cars are more comfortable, have good heaters, start every day and are better in every way. And to him, that meant money saved.
You have just described my father’s philosophy on buying cars.
My father bought the exact same Zephyr but in 1978; he loved it.
I don’t know if your father had a tendency to speed while driving his Zephyr, but mine sure did. He told me that his drove so well that he’d find himself driving way above the speed limit. Mom said that she’d look over and see that he’d be going 70 miles an hour. She said, ” He’s going to get picked up one of these days.” Guess who got her one and only speeding ticket in that car?
The driving experience on those must have depended greatly on the transmission. We had a ’79 Fairmont when I was a child, with the 2.3 I4 and an automatic. And my mother, who is not afflicted with a lead foot or a tendency to speed, hated the car because she thought it was bog slow, or in her words “it had no pickup”. It’s not like her comparison points were all that fast either–the other cars whose ownership the Fairmont coincided with were a ’68 Impala Custom Coupe that in all likelihood had the base 307 and was pushing 15 years old at the time, and a ’79 Malibu with the small 267 V8. So for her to complain it must have been pretty bad.
Dad didn’t have a problem with it, and it was mostly his car, but his expectations may have been different. He drove deliveries for a pharmacy all through college in VW Bugs and Microbuses, so after a lot of seat time in those in his history, even with the autobox the 2.3 Fairmont probably seemed quite acceptable.
I’m a 37 year old single man with no children making around 45k a year. I should fit the demographic for a newish vehicle purchase but reality just doesn’t match up.
I do NOT want another car payment the rest of my life. I daily drive my 1968 Electra and keep my 1995 Pathfinder as a second vehicle / mobile garage. I am planning on buying a motorcycle (cash no financing) next month to take over as my primary mode of transportation.
So far the most expensive part of my Electra is the fuel cost. 10 mpg gets pricey quick.
This past weekend I replaced the rear brake shoes and it cost a whopping 22 bucks.
If you have the tools and inclination working on your own vehicle can save you a ton of money. Local shop wanted 2500 bucks to rebuild the front suspension. I did it myself for less than 500.00 and so far that is largest single expense the car has had. Everything else that has failed has been in the 60.00 or less range.
Especially if one is able to do most of the labor themselves, the savings in repairs on a vintage (I.E. computerless..) car can offset the difference in gas cost and you get to enjoy a ’68 Electra (worth the gas to me anyway…) If one wanted the repair atvantage and a bit better mileage , a Dart or Valiant with a Slant 6 is a nice garagable option!
Let’s get to the real issue here, that ’68 Impala is a serious looker!
Red was a decidely rare factory color on these, Grecian Green seemed to be on 80% of ’68 Chevys.
Interestingly, the Camry ad seems the more likely of the two to have been written by somebody using 60’s psychedelic creative aids. That ad is just goofy. Toyota is trying way too hard to turn the image of the Camry into something it isn’t. The theme of the Chevy ad would be far more fitting.
One of the comments above takes the Chevy ad to task for being lame. Actually, it’s kind of cool, and a sign of the times back in 1968.
Magazine print ads were far more common back then. GM’s ad buys in magazines were huge. With so many ads purchased, the ads sometime covered all kinds of detailed topics – in this case new efforts to make the ’68 Chevy a quieter car.
It was not uncommon to see GM ads touting GM Harrison air conditioning, some aspect of testing the cars for durability, or promoting certain options or features.
Ads even had a seasonal trend. Ads in the fall focused on the whole car, specific models and what was new. As you got into April or May, the ad was more likely to cover why you should take your car to your dealer for service or discussion of things like durability testing, financing, or in this case, sound insulation. Notice that the Chevy ad does not even mention the Impala by name. This ad is focusing on the intrinsic goodness of Chevy products and by extension GM products in general.
You are correct Dave, Grecian Green seemed to be a very popular color in 68. It did seem to be somewhat rarer for a convertible. When I was looking for my first car, I wanted a Grecian Green 68 convertible, to match my Dad’s Grecian Green Custom Coupe. We never did find one after months of looking. Most of the convertibles were white, Ash Gold, Grotto Blue or Butternut Yellow. We found mine which was Sequoia Green, itself an unusual color on a convertible. My Dad repainted it Grecian Green for me and it’s been that way ever since.
My dad’s ’68 Impala sedan was Grecian Green, as was the neighbor’s black vinyl topped ’68 Impala Custom coupe. It was farirly common to walk out of the supermarket and find my dad’s car parked next to one, or even two Grecian Green ’68 Chevy’s. It wouldn’t suprise me if something on the order of a quarter million or so big ’68 Chevys wore that color. It seemed like a lot of Novas also were done in that color.
At some point my dad had a can of Grecian Green Dupla-Color spray paint. A couple of my Matchbbox cars were in need of a respray – I still have those cars!
I love your ragtop and the color is an excellent period choice.
Why do I have the sudden sensation that I’m off topic again – much like my experience in college economics!
Almost any manufactured item you can think of is less expensive now than in it was back then except for housing (which includes a land component) and, maybe, cars. Watching The New Price is Right from 1972, the Mazda @ 17:00 is $2504 which equates to $16,432 in today’s money. Is there a car that cheap today? I don’t know but probably. The $250 dishwasher? $1641 in today’s money. Lots of other examples:
Love the Vega wagon at 4:00.
$1000 for a Spiegel Color TV?! Wow, kinda pricey back then. That unit looked to be about a 26″ gem, probably weighed a hundred pounds.
Seeing bob Barker now, all I can think of is Happy Gilmore, the movie.
Wait a minute, that thousand bucks was for the whole display, including a washer and dryer. Much more like it.
That Vega is a nice looking car. I especially like the color.