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Comment by gnicholas | Hacker News Reader

Note: they're not talking about the death of sedans in America—they're just talking about the death of sedans made by American car companies. To the extent that the most popular sedans (Accord, Camry) are made by foreign car companies, this trend is somewhat less important.

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Sedans in general all look sooo similar. For the person not too deeply interested in cars, how will their lives be different if they chose a focus, civic, or corolla?

It seems like car safety standards, which aren't a bad thing, have just led to an uninspiring and very similar collection of sedans here. Would be refreshing to see a 4-door car that is interesting without being a muscle car or a sports car.

It seems like car safety standards have led

Don't forget about aerodynamics.

The cars all look the same (like lozenges) these days because of fuel efficiency requirements. The lozenge is the slipperiest.

A Corolla or Civic will generally be more reliable than a Focus, and have greater resale value. Compare a used Focus and Civic in the same model year, condition, mileage, trim level, and price. The Civic sells for $3k more than the Focus.

Exactly: these cars don't sell because they're unreliable; both the Ford Focus and Fiesta are on Consumer Reports worst car list of 2017. Unfortunately there are a few American SUVs on that list as well. So caveat emptor.

Ironically, they've probably ended up there for their persistently terrible automatic transmissions. Silly mistake for an American company to be making...

I was also surprised to see no mention of hatchbacks ("hot hatch" if you're so inclined). They're filling a really important sedan-like role that crossovers and SUVs are too bulky to achieve.

I think it's because hatchbacks just aren't that popular in the US. Or at least I don't see remotely as many hatchbacks in the US as I do in Europe.

Depends on where you look. The Bay Area is full of hatchbacks. And even when I was living in TX, I had two friends who had a Honda Fit when I bought mine, and Fiat 500 is pretty popular over there (even if F150 is still king).

What do you consider a hatchback? The Subaru Outback, for example, I believe is considered a crossover today, as is the Subaru Crosstrek, but both are arguably also hatchbacks.

I would agree. For subaru, the Impreza wagon would qualify. Audi A3 hatch, VW golf/GTI/R, hyundai veloster, ford fiesta, arguably the newer civics, etc.

The Outback has always been a ruggedised version of the Legacy Tourers, so it's not a pure crossover.

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