Perhaps the $20 million dollars that Pres/CEO Robert Nardelli collects from HD every year keeps HD's costs down too? And the next 4 execs in HD's chain also extract a cool $15 million from the profits.
But Harley Davidson only exists still because Ronald Reagan imposed a big fat tarrif on over 700cc Jap bikes, when HD was headed for extinction.
Bob Nardelli and gazillions of clownish Harley riders must be thanking their lucky stars for that thing, that dirty word, that nationalist practice that the randian purists deride, what do they call it....? "Protectionism", yeah that's it!