Wait - weren't ALL Mercury Grand Marquis EFI by 1987? EFI was available on it as early as 1983, IIRC. So you're comparing Japanese cars of today against your experience with a Mercury 20+ years ago?
Why is it that people will believe that Hyundai can go from building vehicles with piss-poor, industry worst reliability to high reliability just 5 years later, but they don't believe that Ford or GM could fix reliability problems in 15-20 years?
I don't base my opinion of American cars on that one car, I have owned several other American cars since that one. I only mentioned it because I put more miles on it that any car I have owned and well remember it's problems. As nearly as I can remember, I have owned 10 Ford and Mercury cars and trucks, 3 Chrysler cars, 1 AMC, and 9 GM cars and trucks since 1956. Some were good, some were not good. Most of those which were not so good were built after 1971.
Why is it that people will believe that Hyundai can go from building vehicles with piss-poor, industry worst reliability to high reliability just 5 years later, but they don't believe that Ford or GM could fix reliability problems in 15-20 years?
I have trouble believing it because of the experiences of my family and friends who owned or now own late model American cars that haven't been a great deal better in the reliability department than American cars were 20 years ago. Maybe my experience is not typical, but all I can say is what I have seen with my own two eyes.
I am not opposed to buying American cars, in fact I would much rather buy American all things being equal. But for now at least, all things are not equal. If Detroit gets it's stuff together at some point I will probably buy American again.