Often speaking of historic cars we talk about what happened before and after 1973. Before, the cars with higher performance and higher consumption seemed to have no limits whatsoever, with the technique that was privileged over any primordial ecological discourse. After that, motorists began to do more accounts in their pockets, and consequently the manufacturers had to completely change their way of managing the price list.
Like any self-respecting historical event, there are dates and past dates before them. The 1973 energy crisis began decades earlier, with the inclusion of the State of Israel in a patch of land disputed and claimed for centuries and centuries. After wars, attacks and quarrels, peace never took off between neighboring countries, which saw Israel as an invader. On October 6, 1973, the day of the anniversary of Yom Kippur, another escalation took place: Syria and Egypt attacked Israel with the support of the Arab countries associated with OPEC, or the organization of countries that export oil.
That support came thanks to strong increases (a doubling, basically) of the price of oil, and through a embargo, put into practice by October 17, 1973, to importing nations. The consequences were enormous on the immediate and also on the future of all the countries that bought OPEC oil. The economic boom he broke off abruptly; several nations were forced to ration energy, build ‘alternative’ power plants, cut costs. In Italy the famous Sundays on foot were established and the lighting in the cities was reduced. The topic of energy saving was brutally discovered, never even taken into consideration before. The embargo lasted more or less depending on the importing country; the United States and the Netherlands were denied oil until January 1975.
Also for this reason Ford, Chrysler and General Motors, the three Detroit sisters, were hit at the heart of their business. The era of muscle cars found an end, and thanks to the perfect timing of some Japanese and European manufacturers, the US market changed forever. The Americans did not have the chance to continue to burn gasoline with local cars, not very attentive to consumption: so they increasingly relied on less ‘generous’ and lower cost models. The three sisters managed to recover only after a decade, after having lost many brands and many projects along the way.