Earth Equity News

Small Car Sales Surge in U.S. By Bill Vlasic, NYTimes, May 2, 2008. "Soaring gas prices have turned the steady migration by Americans to smaller cars into a stampede. In what industry analysts are calling a first, about one in five vehicles sold in the U.S. was a compact or subcompact car during April... The switch to smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles... has accelerated recently with the advent of $3.50-a-gallon gas. At the same time, sales of pickup trucks and large [SUVs] have dropped sharply. In another first, fuel-sipping four-cylinder engines surpassed six-cylinder models in popularity in April. 'It's easily the most dramatic segment shift I have witnessed in the market in my 31 years here,' said George Pipas, chief sales analyst for [Ford]."