Every Canadian consumer knows that when it comes to new car prices, we get screwed. Yes, Canada is a small market with higher taxes. It costs more to do business here in part because the high distribution costs can’t be amortized over 300-odd million people. In addition, things like metric instruments further complicate things.

But then there’s the question of why a Toyota RAV4, built two hours outside of Toronto, costs $2,890 less in Hawaii than it does in Canada. Why does an Oshawa-built Camaro demand a $4,685 premium in Canada? Where does BMW get off charging a $19,300 premium in the Great White North for a 535i xDrive, a 38.9 percent increase over the U.S. sticker?

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Better Place is shutting the doors of its Australian and American operations, and will concentrate on its Danish and Israeli divisions. The New York Times reported the news just days after Evan Thornley, head of Better Place Australia, left his post as CEO after just three months on the job.

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Another Detroit début languishing at the back of a booth is the 2014 Nissan Versa Note. Nissan’s discount hatch, which replaces the Nissan Versa sans-note is still singing the discount tune undercutting both the Honda Fit and the Fiesta.For hatch back duty Nissan fitted the Versa with a new nose that looks a bit less premium than the sedan. Click through the jump for more.

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TTAC writers will stoop to any trick to get access to cars. This may be my last post at TTAC because I bribed my way into the ELR and may be removed for ethics violations (a Diet Pepsi was involved.) Fresh off its début in Detroit the ELR may be old news, but since none of the TTAC staff had seen one in the metal, I knew my duty.

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What happens when foreigners have been in America for a few years? They start getting fat like Americans. And so it is with the 2014 Fat 500L which has gained mass, two doors and a plumper overall visage. We found a red model strutting its chunky stuff at the back of the Chicago Auto Show For some reason we weren’t allowed inside, but we were able to caress it through the open windows.

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Car guys with a commercial leaning seem to usually wax poetic about the old Dodge Ram vans. Chrysler’s four speed automatic transmission may not have been the most reliable cog-swapper ever built, but the 318 engine will run forever. Chrysler gave up on the van market in the middle of the last decade to focus on getting raped by Mercedes other projects. Enter the 2014 ProMaster.

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So you want a Cadillac XTS but think the price tag is too dear? Chevrolet has an answer with the 2014 Impala, the Caddy’s kissing cousin. By all appearances, the main-stream model is the more attractive and sensible model as well. In between stuffing my maw with leftover breakfast muffins and a Kia sponsored mimosa I tripped across Chevy’s full-size sedan. No, this isn’t the RWD Chevy we’ve longed for, this is Malibu to the max.

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Ford’s commercial booth is very quiet at the Chicago Auto Show despite having on display the biggest news in commercial vehicles at the show. OK, so a new cargo van isn’t that exciting, I’ll give you that. While Ford had their cargo hauler locked, I was able to get a few impressions.

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 Nissan’s motorsports division doesn’t think it has enough brand awareness in America. To counter this perception, Nissan tossed out a few NISMO (NISsan MOtorsports) models at the Chicago Auto Show. First up we have the Juke NISMO which is Nissan’s oddly shaped small crossover vehicle. The NISMO treatment makes the Juke look even more conspicuous on American roads with shapes and styles never before seen on a production vehicle. Whatever you do, don’t look up Juke in the Urban Dictionary while at work.

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I believe that it was over text message, three years ago, that my then-girlfriend proposed we take a month-long trip to India together.  To a Westerner, life on the Indian subcontinent is a feast for the senses, rife with sights, smells, sounds, and tastes that bear no comparison prior to visiting.  For her, the trip would be something of an opportunity to clear our heads and devote attention to a relationship that was based on spontaneity and excitement, as well as to take in the redolence and beauty of Indian culture.

For me, however, it was much simpler.  Fresh into my career as an automotive journalist, it would, naturally, be all about the cars.

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Kia has officially entered the traditional hot hatch market today at the Chicago Auto Show with the 2014 Kia Forte 5-door. Based on, you guessed it, the redesigned Kia Forte sedan, the four-door-plus-hatch seems to have Volkswagen’s Golf in its sights with an optional 1.6L direct-injection turbocharged engine good for 201 horsepower. Kia has yet to release full details but with 201 ponies and a curb weight likely to be under 3,000lbs, it should give VW a run for their Euros.
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Kia slipped their new Cadenza sedan into their booth in Chicago. Our launch invitation apparently got lost in the mail because this is the first time a TTAC writer has seen one in the flesh. Based on the Hyindai Azera the Cadenza isn’t the RWD Kia flagship so any have been drooling over. Instead it is one step up from the Optima and the only way to get a V6 under the hood of your Kia sedan. Fit and finish looked excellent and the sedan certainly strikes an unexpectedly elegant pose at Kia’s booth. I hit up the Kia PR folks for a tester and they have promised to deliver, check back for a review when that happens. In the meantime, click past the jump for the gallery.

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Legs of RenCen executives must be covered with black and blue marks from kicking themselves daily for not unloading Opel when the German government offered to take the sick patient off GM’s hands. A deal, financed with $6 billion courtesy of German tax payers and a little petty cash from Russian bankers would have given GM a little money and an immediate end of the huge losses at Opel. Frankly, nobody in Germany had much hope for an Opel under Magna and the Russians either, it was seen as a hospice where to wheel the sick patient until it dies in silence, a la Saab.

At the last minute, GM changed its mind. Who made the ill-fated decision? Was Akerson for keeping Opel, or for getting rid of it? Read More >

Last year, carmakers sold more than 1.8 million midsize sedans in the United States.  That’s 155,000 per month; 5,095 per day; 212 per hour.  It’s 3.53 per minute, even when the dealers are closed, the lights are off, and the salespeople are fast asleep, dreaming of silk ties and customers who show up in rental cars.

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Toyota chose Chicago to introduce the new 2014 Tundra. Following the lead of the big three, the Tunda is bigger and has a more premium interior. Unlike the big boys, Toyota still won’t have a 3/4 or 1 ton models, but they are touting the Tundra as having the highest North American parts content of any other 1/2 ton truck. Them’s fighting words.

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