Surprise choice tops list of most 'American' vehicles

Chris Woodyard | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Surprising choice for most 'American' car An unlikely choice tops a widely watched listing of cars with most American-made content. It's the Toyota Camry.

An unlikely choice tops a widely watched listing of cars with most American-made content. It's the Toyota Camry.

Cars.com says it chose the Camry to top its American-Made Index because it is assembled at a Toyota plant in Georgetown, Ky., and the plant jointly shared with Subaru in Lafayette, Ind. The Camry supports about 5,900 assembly-plant workers, according to Cars.com's analysis of employment figures provided by each plant.

Camry replaces the Ford's F-150 pickup, the nation's best-selling vehicle, at the top of the list. The F-150 now falls short of having at least 75% domestic content after its 2015 redesign, Cars.com says.

Overall, the story when in it comes to Made-in-the-USA content is pretty grim.

For the first time in the index's nine-year history, fewer than 10 cars were found to have at least 75% domestic content. That's compared to 29 just five years ago.

The list now includes seven -- Toyota Sienna, Honda Odyssey, Chevrolet Corvette and three of General Motor's crossovers: Chevrolet Traverse, GMC Acadia and Buick Enclave.

Still, Detroit makes more cars with the highest domestic content than others. GM, Ford and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles build 37 of the 57 U.S.-assembled cars with 60 percent or higher domestic content, Cars.com says.

Many foreign brands bring in car with a nary a single American part. Two vehicles from Detroit's Big 3 have less than 5% domestic content, the Buick Encore and Chevrolet Trax. They are made in South Korea.

Cars.com's list looks at the percentage of domestic parts in every car -- it's listed on the window sticker of every new car -- along with where it was made and how well it sold. It doesn't include where the profits went from the sale. Toyota, of course, is a Japanese company.