…which, of course, is why the average age of a car on American roads in 1979 was 5.7 years, and that was up from 5.1 years in 1969. The 2013 figure was 11.4 years, that is just about double the 1979 figure. It hit 11.7 years in 2017, and the 2021 figure is 12.1 years. That’s the average age. Today's cars do a better job of staying out of the shop, too, which is why the service station with bays and lifts and stuff is mostly a thing of the past—not enough broken-down cars to support 'em, so gas stations have junkfood stores attached instead. Across the board, car quality and durability are far better and more consistent than ever before. We'll have to see how things play out with EVs; that might change the picture (Tesla's thrown-together junk, insurance companies totalling out electric cars because of cosmetic scratches on the battery case guard, Chinese-made cars, etc), but today's combustion-engine vehicles have longer working lives than the old ones we like. They just do.
