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How much of your car is made in America

Consumer Reports News: June 15, 2011 08:38 AM

With the July 4th holiday right around the corner, consumers are reminded about supporting our economy and buying American-made products. While many products we use are clearly labeled with the country of origin, for vehicles, that’s not always clear cut. So what constitutes an American vehicle? Sure, we think about American-branded automakers--Chrysler, Ford, and General Motors--but many foreign automakers have factories and R&D facilities in the United States and design, develop and build vehicles for sale in this country, employing part of America’s workforce. In several cases, a vehicle wearing a foreign brand, is conceived, designed and built by Americans, in America, for Americans. So you are still supporting U.S. workers throughout the process all the way through dealership personnel.

ABC News has a fun interactive feature based on data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) American Automobile Labeling Act (AALA) Report that shows what percent of your vehicle is made in America. To look at the larger picture, we pulled together a list of the top-selling vehicles based on May sales data and for the last 5 months of 2011 to compare sales data with the percentage of parts made here.

Sedans
Model	May sales	2011 sales (5 months)	% of parts made in America
Chevrolet Malibu	25,600	99,046	75%
Nissan Altima	25,525	112,308	60%
Ford Fusion	24,666	110,878	20%
Hyundai Sonata	22,754	96,370	41%
Toyota Camry	18,830	125.218	80%
Honda Accord	18,185	120,035	80%
SUVs
Model	May sales	2011 sales (5 months)	% of parts made in America
Ford Escape	23,140	100,333	65%
Chevrolet Equinox	17,587	77,884	66%
Honda CR-V	14,397	77,074	60%
Kia Sorento	11,936	51,765	60%
Jeep Wrangler	10,008	41,946	79%
Jeep Grand Cherokee	9,484	45,401	71%
Toyota RAV4	7,437	51,590	60%

As you can see, for the sedans, the top-selling Honda Accord and Toyota Camry are mostly made in America. For SUVs, the Escape is the strongest seller and more than half of its parts are made here. The two Jeeps have around ¾ parts made in this country. None of these vehicles have 100 percent U.S content, though.

The vehicles with the highest percentage of American parts:

Model	% of parts made in America
Ford Explorer	85%
Dodge Dakota	84%
Dodge Avenger	83%
Dodge Grand Caravan	82%
Chrysler 200	81%
Toyota Tundra	80%
Toyota Sequoia	80%
Toyota Camry	80%
Toyota Avalon	80%
GMC Savana	80%
Dodge Nitro	80%
Chrysler Town & Country	80%
Honda Accord	80%

If buying American products is important to you and you’re in the market for a new car, it may be worth checking out the ABC News interactive to see which vehicle will benefit American workers the most. Keep in mind, though, that even cars not made in the U.S. are still sold by your friends and neighbors who work at or own these retail stores. But above all else, it’s most important to buy a good, safe, and reliable car--regardless of who builds it. To see which are tops in our tests, check out our model overviews for Ratings and recommendations on individual vehicles.

For more on how the automakers rank in our tests, see our automaker report cards.

—Liza Barth