Quote:
Originally Posted by strat61caster
And what piece costs more on this car than it did three years ago? The factory workers certainly aren't getting paid more, the engineers sure as hell aren't, we haven't had a material shortage or external forces putting pressure on production or delivery.
Computer parts get cheaper, clothes get cheaper, hell even food is getting 'cheaper' as transportation costs decrease and we get better at growing it. (See Table 7) Hell the company I work for is lowering prices because we've gotten better at making our product even though complexity is increasing. |
Be that as it may, inflation is real in the US. The site you linked discusses CPI, which is a measure of inflation based on commonly consumed items. If everything was really getting cheaper as you said, we'd be in a period of deflation.
But you can see from the following link that the US had 0.8% inflation last year, 1.5% in 2013, 1.7% in 2012, 3.0% in 2011, etc.
http://www.usinflationcalculator.com...flation-rates/
I think companies are constantly correcting for that, either by increasing prices or decreasing sizes. Whether they're actually paying more for raw materials and labor YOY, only a Toyota insider or industry expert could answer that.