Every year the gods over at Agoura Hills speak and the auto manufacturers quake in their boots. I'm talking about the research and survey firm J.D. Power and Associates. They publish The Power Report, a monthly newsletter targeted towards the auto industry. Besides the usual business oriented articles, the company also conducts a number of surveys and their best known one is the J.D. Power and Associates survey of initial vehicle quality.

Carmakers often use the results of this survey in their advertising to point out how "good" their cars are and indeed, there are some car buyers who place great value on such information. Personally, I believe that at best, this survey and others like it highlight overall trends more than anything else. If you look closely, there are inconsistencies. For example, I know that many cars are built on the same assembly line (Plymouth Neon/Dodge Neon, Geo Prizm/Toyota Corolla, all the Chrysler/Dodge/Plymouth minivans, Chevrolet/Oldsmobile/Pontiac minivans and others) yet they get different results. Why does the Toyota Corolla rank ninth while the identical Chevrolet Prism comes in at number 26? Are the Corollas built any different than the Prizms? No, they aren't-the difference has to do with the people who buy them and no survey takes that into account.

Anyway, listed below are the results of the 2000 survey. Take them with a grain of salt.

The 2000 problem scores show the average number of customer-reported problems within the first three months of ownership per 100 vehicles, covering 135 specific problem areas. The industry average was 154 problems.