Due to the shortage of chips, the US auto industry has suffered a continuous decline in production this year, which not only has an impact on the production and sales dimensions of the Detroit auto giant, but also brings an additional heavy load to the entire US economy.

　　Reuters recently wrote an article that in the past third quarter, the growth rate of US gross domestic product (GDP) slowed down significantly, falling to the slowest growth rate in more than a year, at an annual rate of only 2%. Such data is less than one-third of the growth rate in the second quarter of this year.

　　Although the mutation of the new crown pneumonia and its resurgence have suppressed the national consumption growth in July, August and September, according to the data of the most recent quarter, the biggest weakness that caused the economic downturn is actually the continued weakness of the auto industry.

　　It is reported that the downturn in the auto industry directly deducted 2.4 percentage points from the US economic growth over the same period. This is the biggest drag on US economic output from Detroit in 40 years and a rare drag outside of the Great Recession a decade ago.

　　Of course, the new crown pneumonia also hit the U.S. economy once and its negative impact on the U.S. economy began in the spring of 2020, but such a sharp decline lasted only about two months, and the U.S. economy has been recovering ever since.

　　According to the calculations of Wall Street analysts, behind the difficulties of the auto industry is a global shortage of chips, and the downturn of the auto industry has become the chief culprit of the US economy's sluggishness in recent months. It is worth mentioning that the impact of chips on the entire economy has long been not limited to the automotive industry, as well as digital electronic products and other fields, which have directly inhibited the consumption of the entire country.

　　From the data point of view, US auto production has been in decline in 6 of the past 9 months. At a time when US inflation is more serious, chip shortages have pushed inflation to the highest level in decades.

　　It is worth mentioning that the chip shortage has directly subverted the price dynamics in the US market in the automotive sector, which is unprecedented. Due to the limited inventory of new cars, consumers who have a rigid demand for cars indirectly raise the price of used cars.

　　Since this spring, the price of used cars in the United States has soared by more than 10% for three consecutive months.