This is inevitable, with China's economy growing at a double digit strong over the past decade and USA's debts (growth as well) imploding on itself since early 2008, triggering an economic Tsunami wave of recession, tumbling down almost every industry, laying off millions of Americans into the cold wilderness of unemployment.For the first time in history, USA's automotive sales had fallen behind another country, and almost not surprisingly - China. The wrapped up of January's automotive sales shows just how far China had gone ahead (or US on reverse), where USA registered a number of approximately 657,000 vehicles, whereas China registered 735,000 vehicles in the same month. With both on a downward trend, -37% from USA and -14% from China respectively, over prior year.
So does this make China having more shots to call over influencing other countries using its consumer mights? Unlikely.
As both countries are fundamentally very different, USA's automotive market is largely a free market (until the Big 3 went to become Bail 3) where consumption on foreign imported vehicles are huge, and collectively, America is a market dominated by makes and models that are easily 'flagships' of many automakers, big barges with engines considered 'small' if its under 7.0 liters.
China on the other hand, were dominated by local and foreign joint ventures that still produces cheaplified versions of their European/American siblings, and then a sea of local produced, cheap, steel on wheels. Which might not be a market that consumes as much quality, high profit margin makes from other countries compared to the US as the disparity in income levels in China is huge compared to the US.
To put it simple, China might consume more Rolls Royce Phantom in the coming years, but its unlikely to consume more BMW 3 Series than USA for long time to come.
